DROWNING AND FALLING * * * FRONT MATTER Drowning and Falling: The Fantasy Role-Playing Game of Adventure and Death from Drowning and Falling By Jason Morningstar With major contributions by Joshua BishopRoby, Piers Brown, Alex Fradera, Christian Griffen, Bryan Hansel, Maura Hogan, Eric Provost and Lisa Provost. Additional ideas and pithy suggestions from the good people of story-games.com, including Eric J. Boyd, Stuart Broz, Paul Czege, Chris Goodwin, John Harper, Jonas Karlsson, Andy Kitkowski, Levi Kornelsen, Judson Lester, Ben Lehman, Tony Lower-Basch, Matt Machell, Dave Michael, Bradley Robins, Brennan Taylor, Graham Walmsley, and Fred Wolke. BENEFICIARY All proceeds from sales of this game, after taxes and production costs, will be donated to ORBIS International. The mission of ORBIS is to eliminate avoidable blindness and restore sight in the developing world, where 90% of the world’s blind live.  They do this in part by operating a completely awesome flying eye hospital in a converted DC-10. Visit ORBIS on the Web at http://www.orbis.org/ to learn more. COPYRIGHT NOTICE The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game is copyright 2006 Jason Morningstar. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License. Feel free to share this game, but consider giving ORBIS some loot if you do. * * * FICTION Fyren Cloudfloater stood at the edge of the precipice and stared down into the rushing water below. Behind her, slowly climbing down the cliff that separated her and her men from the safety of the plateau, a mass of an amorphous blob slowly climbed down. Fyren pulled her mace from its sheath with a quick jerk and loud swoosh, and the sound of the mace rung into her ears and into her mind. She remembered back to her childhood when the mace now in her hand belonged to her father, Besyrwan the Waterwalker. On the last day of her father’s life, Fyren watched him walk across the water and before she could warn her father, she saw a cliff shark fall out of its nest and land in the water. The wave quickly splashed, rolled, and turned as a frothy white bubbling gurgle until it rolled over her father. Besyrwan was no more. Days later, the waterlogged corpse floated to the shore and Fyren retrieved the mace, her father’s mace. It was that fateful day, when her father drown from the wave created by the falling cliff shark, that Fyren vowed to carry her father’s mace and fight the forces that would cause the drowning and falling. Awaking from her remembrance, Fyren took a final look into the Canyon of Falling Rocks and turned towards the blob -- now closer. She knew in his heart that if this blob approached any closer, she would be forced off the cliff, and she would fall to her death in the frothy whitewater below. Would she drown or die from the fall, she didn’t know, but Fyren didn’t want to find out. At the top of her lungs, Fyren called out, “Men, fight! Fight for your lives, or I’ll throw you over the edge myself.” The other adventures pulled their swords and axes and readied their spell books. They all joined the battle cry, “I will not drown or fall!” They rushed the slowly climbing amorphous blob with Fyren in the lead. --Bryan Hansel INTRODUCTION There is a world far from here - a world like our own, but completely different. A gritty medieval world of magic and mystery with enchanted creatures, drowning, and falling! Are you brave enough to face the danger? Do you enjoy killing monsters? Do you like acquiring treasure? Do you have good balance and a decent Australian crawl? If so, prepare to test your mettle against the sorts of devilish challenges only your friends could create, because only the best heroes will emerge victorious in the savage world of Drowning and Falling! WHAT YOU NEED TO PLAY The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game is best played with a bunch of people - you and all your friends. Playing with three is the bare minimum, and it really starts to get fun with five or six participants. As a group, you'll need: A place to play. Some post-it notes. A standard deck of cards. Snacks. Each player ought to have: A pair of standard six-sided dice. A pencil. A Drowning and Falling Characters Sheet, or some scratch paper. PREPARING FOR THE GAME Group preparation consists of giving each player some playing cards, with which you will all create challenges by writing them on post-it notes. The rules for creating challenges are in Part Six: Underworld And Wilderness Adventures. Individual preparation consists of making up a character, and then making up a few more as backups. It's pretty easy, so always try to keep a spare around - that's why it's called a *characters* sheet. * * * PART ONE: MEN AND MAGIC The life of an adventurer in the Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game is fraught with peril - deadly peril that can kill you! The characters sheet includes space for five guys, and you might want to roll up a couple in advance, just to be sure. TRAITS Each character in the Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game has fifteen traits - ten helpful and five harmful. THE HELPFUL TRAITS The helpful traits are: Brave, Cool, Mysterious, Blessed, Fast, Agile, Alert, Observant, Strong, and Tough. Brave reflects the character's raw courage. Use it when bravery is called for! Cool is that certain quality that the really cool kids possess. Mysterious refers to a character's air of mystery, or aura of mysteriousness. Blessed is the degree to which the Gods favor a character. Fast indicates the character's raw speed, and also whether he is fast or not. Agile comes into play when feats of agility, dexterity, nimbleness and adroitness are called for. Alert provides guidance on a character's general state of readiness for sudden trouble. Observant is pretty self-explanatory. Strong is also pretty self-explanatory. Do I really need to get into what being strong is all about? Tough is a measure of a character's ability to absorb punishment - a measure of toughness, if you will. THE HARMFUL TRAITS The harmful traits are Pathetic, Unlucky, Clumsy, Oblivious, and Weak. Pathetic includes all things dorky and embarrassing. For example, if your character plays role-playing games, his Pathetic is probably high. Unlucky refers to general ill fortune. The character with a high Unlucky will be a cosmic whipping boy. Clumsy refers to a character's lack of agility, dexterity, nimbleness and adroitness. Oblivious is a measure of all-around cluelessness, absent-mindedness, and lack of observational skill. Weak, like strong, is pretty self-explanatory. GENERATING YOUR TRAITS Trait generation is random. Roll a six sided die for each trait and write the result next to it. For your ten helpful traits, higher is better. For your five harmful traits, lower is better. If you are lucky you will have a better character than your friend who is unlucky. It is all in the implacable hands of fate! If you have fifteen dice handy, you can roll all your traits in one gigantic mega-throw! Just toss them all, then line them up based on the distance they fell away from you, and write the result starting at the first trait (Brave) and continuing until you get to the end. If you want to have some kind of equitable and balanced point-allocation system, go ahead and make one up - but know that you'll be missing out on rolling a *bucketful* of dice for every character. WHAT'S UP WITH THE WEIRD COMBOS? Clumsy-5 and Agile-6? It happens. It is your duty as a role-player to find an exciting reason why your alter-ego, your virtual champion, would be simultaneously fabulous and lame. Embrace contradiction! In play, all of your helpful scores are going to spiral down like airplanes on fire anyway. If it really bothers you, choose a character class that allows you to change one of the scores you don't like. DETERMINING YOUR HIT POINTS Your hit points are equal to all your helpful trait scores added together, resulting in a number between ten and sixty. Your maximum total hit points do not go up if your traits increase. hit points will be reduced by injury from drowning or falling. They can be restored by the earnest prayers of a good cleric, or to a lesser extent by some good magic. CHOOSING AN ALIGNMENT Just like real life, there are two alignments in The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game. Each character you make must be good or evil. This choice will guide your decision-making in play. As a guideline for appropriate play, good characters normally do good things and evil characters are more likely to do evil things. Wizards and clerics have access to rad alignment-based spells and prayers. Playing an evil character is obviously wrong and bad, but in the interest of presenting a complete role-playing system, rules have been included for it. CHOOSING A CHARACTER CLASS You must choose a character class. Your class will determine many things, such as whether you carry a sword or wear a purple robe with stars on it. You will probably want to pick the class that is most beneficial to you, but there are no restrictions. Each class has advantages. As a group, the very best strategy is to diversify! Warrior: Warriors fight things and know countless menacing poses to strike fear into the hearts of their many enemies. Change Brave and Strong to 6, regardless of what you rolled. This means that if you roll up a weak, cowardly character, make him a warrior. Warriors also ignore penalties from monsters of their level of lower. Thus, a level two warrior suffers no penalty from a difficult or easy monster (more on monsters in Part Five: Monsters and Treasure). Wizard: Wizards possess the arcane lore of ages past, and channel the eldritch energies of the cosmos to do their bidding. They also wear crazy robes and/or capes. Gain a number of spells equal to your Mysterious trait. Choose good or evil spells based on your alignment. Play a wizard if your Mysterious is high. Cleric: Clerics are the stalwart faithful who travel the paths and byways in service to their Gods, caring for the dead and praying for things. Gain a number of prayers equal to your Blessed trait. Choose a number of good or evil prayers based on your alignment. Play a cleric if you like tagging along and healing people, or if your Blessed is high. Elf: Elves, the wispy denizens of the deep forests and secret places beyond the realm of mankind, are beautiful to look upon and somewhat fun to play. Change any single helpful trait to 6, regardless of what you rolled, and add one magic spell, based on your alignment. Elves are resistant to drowning. As an elf, you get to re-roll any one die per drowning encounter. It can be a test you failed, or it can be a damage die. Play an elf if you are afraid of drowning or if you are a girl. Dwarfling: The stout and jolly dwarflings enjoy a good pipe and a flagon of ale at the end of the day! They are lucky and adorable. Change any single harmful trait to 1, regardless of what you rolled, and add one prayer, based on your alignment. Being little, dwarflings are resistant to falling. When playing a dwarfling, you get to re-roll any one die per falling challenge. It can be a test you failed, or it can be a damage die. Play a dwarfling if you are a huge Led Zeppelin fan. Modify your character's traits and add spells and prayers according to the class you choose. MAGIC Magic - is there anything more awesome or powerful or mystical? When a character uses magic, weird rainbows appear around them and the air tinkles with tiny, frightening bells. Role-play it! Wizards can cast spells at any time, and they automatically succeed. Once cast, a spell is gone forever - they are like bullets of pure imagination! If you are a wizard or elf, you have the option of gaining a new spell when you go up a level. An evil wizard is, generally, an unreliable companion. GENERAL SPELLS Magical Tornado of Magic: This spell, available to Good and evil wizards, lowers the monster penalty by one each time it is cast and is intensely irritating. Bulldrag's Arcane Guardians: This spell, available to Good and evil wizards, provides a single re-roll during the current challenge for *two* randomly-determined members of the party. Draw straws or roll a die to figure out who the arcane guardians guard. It can be cast multiple times simultaneously, and arcane guardians can double up on the same adventurer. GOOD SPELLS Sailor's Charm: This Good incantation protects the person it is cast on from drowning. It can be cast by wizards on themselves. The recipient automatically succeeds in their next drowning test, whenever that occurs. It is not retroactive. Wings of Love: This Good eldritch spell protects the person it is cast on from falling. It can be cast by wizards on themselves. The recipient automatically succeeds in their next falling test, whenever that occurs. It is not retroactive. Summon Apprentice: The apprentice is a much-maligned helper that can be summoned by any good magician. The poor apprentice has ten hit points and will insert himself into any dangerous situation ahead of the wizard, taking damage intended for his master until he dies. Wizard's Balm: A good wizard can cure one die worth of hit points caused by drowning or falling to two different characters, but only on others - not himself. And not on an elf. Wilkin's Helping Hand of Help: With this good spell, a wizard can choose his own harmful trait in a challenge, taking over that duty from the challenge creator. He also chooses one of his helpful traits, as normal. EVIL SPELLS Create Zombie: An evil wizard can raise a fallen comrade from the dead as a mindless zombie. Like a student, the zombie has ten hit points and will insert itself into any dangerous situation ahead of one member of the party, who is chosen by the former player of the dead character. A zombie must be raised immediately after a character dies. Since most sensible people will have the zombie guard their own new character, the totally boss thing to do is to make up an evil wizard when you die and take this spell right off the bat. Magic Rocket: This spell, available to evil wizards, is used to hurt people. If cast on a player character, the victim takes 2 dice of damage. It can also be used to destroy a treasure. Neither of these actions is helpful in any way. Gregor's Hand of Malignant Dunking: This evil spell causes the victim to automatically fail their next drowning test. Pure evil. Alan's Hot Wind: This evil spell causes the victim to automatically fail their next falling test. Why would you take this spell? It's just mean. Azagor's Icy Puppet-Strings: This evil spell allows the wizard to choose which players will decide another player's traits in a challenge. Two players must be selected to choose helpful traits, and one to choose a harmful trait. Both the wizard himself and the victim can be assigned choices if desired. PRAYERS Praying to the gods is even more magical and mystical than magic. There are gods of good and gods of evil, and they will hear and obey your words until you run out of prayers and then abandon you. If you are a cleric or dwarfling, you have the option of gaining a new prayer when you go up a level. Evil clerics are real good-for-nothings - most of their prayers are just mean. GOOD PRAYERS Please Help the Drowned Person Amen: This good prayer causes the recipient to recover two dice worth of hit points caused by drowning. It cannot be directed at the cleric himself. Please Help this Person who has Fallen Amen: This good prayer causes the recipient to recover two dice worth of hit points caused by falling. It cannot be directed at the cleric himself. Please Imbue this Person with Your Awesome Power Amen: This good prayer raises all of the recipients' helpful traits by one point, even above six, until after the next challenge. It can be directed at anybody, including the cleric himself. Holy Do-Over: This prayer, available to good clerics, allows the recipient to re-roll any single die. It can be cast on anybody, including the cleric himself. Righteous Appropriation: This prayer allows a good cleric to steal a single item of treasure from a monster prior to defeating it, or from another player character. Righteous Destiny: This prayer allows the cleric to assign both his own helpful traits in a challenge, rather than having the player on his left provide a trait. Obviously he's in a better position to choose an ideal combination. EVIL PRAYERS Shower Wet Hatred Upon this Swimmer So Mote It Be: This evil prayer causes an extra die of damage to the victim for each failed drowning roll in a single encounter. Let Them Fall As You Fell My Dark Lord: This evil prayer causes an extra die of damage to the victim for each failed falling roll in a single encounter. Let the Abyss Gaze Back into Thine Enemies: This evil prayer raises all of the victim's negative traits by one point until after the next encounter. Unholy Do-Over: This prayer, available to evil clerics, allows the recipient to re-roll any single die. It can be directed at anybody, including the cleric himself. Blasphemous Song of Stealing Treasure: This prayer allows an evil cleric to steal a single item of treasure from a monster prior to defeating it, or from another player character. Foul Destiny: This bastardly prayer allows the cleric to assign both helpful traits in a challenge to another character, rather than having the player and the person on his left provide traits. If the cleric has a good idea in which areas the victim is weak, he can do a lot of harm. ADVANCEMENT AND NOT-ADVANCEMENT Characters begin with no levels. They gain a level each time they succeed in a difficult or deadly challenge, and lose a level each time they fail any challenge - even easy challenges. Killing monsters can also net you treasure, which helps you out a lot. Easy challenges are not noteworthy in terms of loot. Rising and falling levels make The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game different - and better - than many other role-playing games. If you have experience with those other games, it may take a little getting used to. Levels are much less monolithic and more flexible. Gaining a level allows you to improve your character in one of three ways: Buff up: You can increase a helpful trait by one point, with no maximum. Compensate: You can decrease a harmful trait by one point, down to a minimum of one Reload: If you are a wizard or elf, you can add a spell. If you are a cleric or dwarfling, you can add a prayer. Losing a level requires that you lower a helpful trait of your choice to one. Failing any challenge begins a slow, relentless spiral of death! One strategy to lower your worst traits first, starting with those rated at two. Another is to chip away at your best traits, keeping your average up. You can't lower a trait already at one, although you will want to. * * * PART TWO: DICE AND CHALLENGES CHALLENGES The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game is filled with challenges. Every challenge poses the risk of drowning or falling - you will fall, you will drown, or you will triumph. This means that all challenges take place near things to fall off of or things to drown in, or perhaps both. Later chapters offer plenty of insight into how to arrange challenges. Challenges always requires a series of three linked rolls to survive. Each challenge is rated as either easy, difficult, or deadly. An easy challenge requires one out of three rolls to be a success for the character to avoid a penalty. Once you succeed, you can stop rolling. You can miss two without a problem. A difficult challenge requires two out of three rolls to be a success for the character to avoid a penalty. If you succeed in two tests, you need not roll the third. You can miss one without a problem. A deadly challenge requires all three rolls to be a success for the character to avoid a penalty. If you miss a single roll, you fail. Luckily, these are pretty rare. If you fail more than the allowed number of times in any challenge, your character goes down a level and must reduce the helpful trait of your choice to one. Depending on what you fell from or drown in, there may also be additional penalties. RESOLVING CHALLENGES For each of the three linked rolls, the player will be trying to get a total under a target number on two six-sided dice. To determine the target number, two players and the challenge creator need to be involved. First, the creator of the challenge describes the scene - what's happening. Based on this, the player whose character is in danger chooses a helpful trait to use, and describes using it to avoid falling or drowning. Then, based on that description, the person to that player's left (no matter who it is!) chooses a second helpful trait that they are using to avoid death or injury. Add these two together to get a number, generally between two and twelve. Finally, the challenge creator chooses a harmful trait that is interfering, and the value of this is subtracted, giving a final total target, usually between two and eleven. To succeed, the player must roll equal to or under this number on two dice. No trait can be used twice during a challenge. Once a trait is used (helpful or harmful), it is effectively gone until the next challenge. This means a lot of traits will be invoked, which is fun. A successful roll means that third of the challenge has been overcome. If this is enough to complete the challenge, stop rolling. If not, pick some new traits and roll again. A failed roll means that the character takes damage. GETTING HURT Damage is usually the difference between the target number and the number rolled, modified by circumstances based on what the character is drowning in or falling into. Ironically, you have a greater potential to take damage from easy challenges, since you can fail twice (taking damage each time) and then succeed. Different types of drowning and falling impact characters differently - some even cause damage on successes! Damage is removed from hit points. If your hit points reach zero, you are dead, and all your treasure is suddenly up for grabs. Roll up a new character and catch up with the adventurers as soon as you can. They will have divided your loot among themselves by then. EXAMPLE Johnette's character, Scorm Ironsinger, is drowning. Clemont created the challenge and Sandy is the person on Johnette's left. Clemont: OK Johnette, Scorm has fallen in a pool of water and is drowning! It's an easy hazard. Johnette: He's a mighty warrior! He's Strong! He can swim for ages. That's 5. Sandy: And he's Agile and can probably find a hand-hold on the mossy lip of the pool. Johnette: Right, and his Agile is 3, so that's a total of 8. Clemont: Yes, but he's scared - real scared. Pathetic, actually. Johnette: His Pathetic is 3 - crap! I need to roll a five or less on two dice. (She rolls an 8) Whoa! That's three damage, and I failed the first test. Two more to go, and I hope I make one of them! WHAT IF A CHARACTER GETS STRANGLED OR BURNED? Then, quite frankly, you are playing wrong. The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game is about the horror and sorrow of drowning and falling. It simply does not support "burning" or "strangulation" any more than it supports wizards flying airplanes. In a game that strives for focused realism, these extraneous elements have no place. If this sounds strange to you, maybe you are not ready for The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game. PART THREE: DROWNING When creating a challenge, use the guidelines below to determine damage and challenge difficulty, but feel free to interpret them in a way that is both satisfying and fun. If you want a raging lava river filled with angry robots but only have an easy challenge to use, make it a very small and irritating lava rivulet filled with verbally abusive robots and don't worry about adding a bunch of penalty damage. These lists are not canonical, so be creative and go nuts. BASIC DROWNING Drowning in water: In regular water, damage is equal to the difference in the roll and the target number. Thus, if the target number is 6 and you roll an 11, you take 5 hit points of damage. This is the standard for drowning challenges. Drowning in thick liquids: In thick liquids like blood, oatmeal, or mud, a challenge cannot be easy - it is automatically difficult or deadly. Drowning in your own fluids would also fall under this classification. Drowning in raging or turbulent water: A challenge cannot be easy - it must be difficult or deadly. Drowning in hot liquids: Like thick liquids, a hot liquids challenge cannot be easy - it must be difficult or deadly. Add a die of damage each roll, even on successes. Drowning in thick, hot liquids: Drowning in lava or hot tar must be a deadly challenge. Add a die of damage even on successes, and add three dice of damage on failures. Drowning in sand or wheat: Drowning in fine grains and other solids is exceptionally damaging. Add a die of damage when you fail. ADVANCED DROWNING Drowning when drunk: Being drunk makes survival harder. Increase the hazard from easy to difficult, or from difficult to deadly. If a deadly challenge is encountered, a drunk character automatically dies! Drowning your sorrows: Getting drunk is itself a potentially serious challenge in Drowning and Falling. It is always an easy challenge, and no damage is accrued through failure. Success means the character is drunk for the next challenge, with appropriate penalties and benefits. Drowning in self pity: The victim of a bad breakup or other hardship increases Pathetic or Weak by one point for each failed roll but takes no hit point damage and does not die. Drowning in debt: A character drowning in debt increases Unlucky or Oblivious by one point for each failed roll but takes no hit point damage and does not die. Drowning in greed: Characters bickering over treasure may be drowning in greed, but you can drown in greed without treasure as well. Characters drowning in greed increase any harmful trait and take one die of damage for each failed roll - their lust for wealth is physically painful. PART FOUR: FALLING Suggestions and guidelines for various falling hazards follow. BASIC FALLING Tripping, slipping, and falling down: Falling off things and out of things like logs and barrels as well. In minor falls, damage is equal to the difference in the roll and the target number. Thus, if the target number is 9 and you roll an 10, you take 1 hit point of damage. This is the standard for falling challenges. Falling onto dangerous surfaces: Jagged stone, fire ants, or flaming oil can all complicate a fall. Add a die of damage when you fail. Falling in complicated ways: If the fall involves bouncing around, or passing through trap doors, or being vaulted into the air first, a challenge cannot be Easy - it must be difficult or deadly. Falling from a height: Like a complicated fall, a challenge ending in a prolonged fall cannot be easy - it must be difficult or deadly. Falling onto sharp things: Like falling from a height, this challenge cannot be easy - it must be difficult or deadly. In addition, add a die of damage each test, even on successes. Falling onto poisoned spikes, into flaming tar pits, etc. Any severe, complicated fall must be a deadly challenge. Add a die of damage even on successes, and add three dice of damage on failures. ADVANCED FALLING Falling when drunk: Being drunk makes survival easier. Decrease the challenge from difficult to easy, or from deadly to difficult. If an easy test is encountered, a rubber-boned drunk automatically succeeds. Falling in love: A character falling in love increases Brave, Cool, Mysterious, or Blessed by one point for each successful roll but increases Pathetic, Unlucky, Oblivious, or Weak for every failure. No hit points are lost. Falling out of love: This has the same mechanical effects as Drowning in Self Pity, which is a popular follow-up. Falling off the wagon: An abstemious character returning to drink increases Pathetic or Weak by one point for each failed roll but takes no hit point damage and does not die. The character is automatically drunk for the next challenge. Falling for a Trick: Like falling in love, a character increases Brave, Cool, Mysterious, or Blessed by one point for each successful roll but increases Pathetic, Unlucky, Oblivious, or Weak for every failure. No hit points are lost. Having a Falling Out: Characters bickering over treasure may have a falling out, but you can have a falling out without treasure as well. Characters having a falling out increase any harmful trait and take one die of damage for each failed roll - probably from the fists of their rivals. PART FIVE: MONSTERS AND TREASURE The world of Drowning and Falling is a mist-choked fantasyland of dark moors and verdant forests, craggy crags and crumbling castles. There is magic, and there are monsters - monsters that can make you fall! Or drown! But for the hearty souls who seek adventure, there is also treasure! FIGHTING Monsters, like drowning and falling challenges, are rated as easy, difficult, or deadly. They always accompany drowning or falling challenges and cannot be encountered alone. Easy monsters inflict a -1 penalty to character's chances of success during the challenge. Difficult monsters inflict a -2 penalty to character's chances of success during the challenge. Deadly monsters inflict a -3 penalty to character's chances of success during the challenge. That's serious business! EXAMPLE Johnette is crossing a raging stream guarded by a pirate skeleton! This is a drowning challenge (in this case, difficult), and for her first test, she, her left-hand neighbor, and the challenge creator work out her target number - an 8. The skeleton, being an easy monster, inflicts a -1 penalty, so Johnette must roll a 7 or less to succeed. TREASURE Everybody loves treasure! If a challenge with a monster attached is overcome, the group gets treasure. The amount of treasure is equal to the die penalty of the monster, so an easy monster (-1) gives up one treasure and a deadly monster (-3) gives up three, total. These must be divided among the player characters in any way that seems equitable. Work it out among yourselves. Clerics may wish to steal treasure at some point. When you get treasure, immediately state what it is - a pair of magical pants, an ancient sword, a vest of bones, a pile of gold, or whatever you like. If another character dies, the survivors may divide up the dead guy's now-abandoned treasure in any way they see fit. Treasure is awesome. A treasure can be used to re-roll a single die in every challenge. If you have three treasure, you get three re-rolls. Describe how your treasure is helping you overcome the challenge! To be clear, a treasure can be used once in every challenge, and if you have more than one treasure, you can take advantage of multiple re-rolls during each challenge! BICKERING OVER TREASURE If the players cannot agree about how to divide treasure, use the following procedure: Any player who wants a piece of the action faces a challenge - they are either drowning in greed or having a falling out with the rest of the party (the individual may choose the nature of the challenge). The difficulty of the challenge is based on the number of points of treasure at stake - easy for one, difficult for two, and deadly for three. Anyone failing the challenge is out of the running, and loses a level per the rules (although they take no hit point damage). If more than one character remains in contention, they may work it out among themselves or up the difficulty of the challenge and start over, until players bow out or only one character succeeds. This character has earned all the contested treasure to allocate as his player sees fit, which probably means he'll be wearing it himself. THE BEAST CYCLOPEDIA You are free to make up monsters to throw at the adventurers. There are countless manuals stuffed with monsters that were designed for other games. Clever players of The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game can easily repurpose these. EASY BEASTS (-1 to player tests) Jenny Green-Teeth: A hideous river-bank witch! The Maiden: She seeks love! Skeletons: Dead men made of living bones! Blood Squirrels: When the nuts and berries run out, they turn to flesh! Friendly Cat: She's always purring underfoot, threading figure eights around your ankles...until you fall! Big Brother/Big Sister: Your age-old nemesis will trip you and then point and laugh. What a wuss. Blob: A pudding-like amorphous beast of terror. DIFFICULT BEASTS (-2 to playter tests) Cave monsters: These hodags, imps, and goblins like to hang around deep pits! Giant clams: These mollusks have malice on their minds! They travel in packs. Gorgons: The dreaded Gorgons travel on cliff ledges! Tripping knights: Tripping knights are sworn to make passer-by fall! Elves and scorpions: They travel together to sow chaos! The Princess: She demands love! Venus Fly Kelp: Beware what lurks below the surface. Sirens: All those flashing lights and blaring noises, distract you. Where was that pit again? Cliff Shark: These relentless, carnivorous fish lurk above narrow cliff ledges, waiting for doughty adventurers to send to their doom! DEADLY BEASTS (-3 to player tests) Metagorgons: Gorgons composed of living Gorgons! Dragons: Giant fire-breathing lizards of yore! The Kraken: This many-armed monster of the briny deep seeks to drown anyone who hunts for it's treasure! Lava monsters: Creatures that live in lava! Medusa: That's a whole lot of ugly! You'll run anywhere just to get away from her hideous visage - even into a pit of boiling oil! The Queen: Like the kraken, this many-armed monster of the briny deep seeks to drown anyone who hunts for it's treasure - or make them her king! * * * PART SIX: UNDERWORLD AND WILDERNESS ADVENTURES MAKING AN ADVENTURE Give each player some playing cards randomly. For a 90 minute to two hour game (about right), give about 24 cards total - so six each if you have four players. Vary from this suggestion based on the number of players and the amount of time you want to spend. Give the same number of cards to each player. A speed round of two cards each might be fun! Each number card is an easy challenge. Each face card (jack, queen, king) is a difficult challenge. Each ace is a deadly challenge. Each player looks at their cards and assembles them into challenges. Each card can be a drowning challenge, a falling challenge, or an added monster. They can be used individually, or two cards can be paired together. In circumstances in which they adjudicate their own player characters, the challenge creators enjoy a slight advantage, which is recompense for their additional responsibilities. It all works out, rest assured. EXAMPLE Clemont is dealt the following: 3,5,7, Jack, Queen, Ace. He organizes them into the following: One easy drowning challenge (the 3) One easy falling challenge (the 5) One difficult drowning challenge with an easy monster (Jack and 7) One deadly falling challenge with a difficult monster (Ace and Queen) For each of the challenges you create, write out the particulars on a post-it note. You can lay these out as the game progresses and see the dungeon take shape! DROWNING AND FALLING COMBINATIONS If you choose to pair two drowning and/or falling challenges together, one of them becomes, in effect, a monster - it's difficulty becomes a penalty for the other challenge. The specific rules for the type of drowning or falling apply only to the "main" challenge - the second just makes it harder. And, like a monster, when bested it offers up treasure. The add-on challenge is just an environmental monster, but it could be stacked with a real monster to make a very, very challenging challenge. EXAMPLE Johnette has a deadly falling challenge paired with an easy drowning challenge, and decides that the fall is more interesting. "You've entered a huge cavern with a narrow, slippery ledge," she says, "and there's a dark stream at the bottom. It's a deadly challenge, and the potential for drowning if you fail adds a minus one penalty. Whoever gets across first has first crack at an interesting looking chest worth one treasure, too." EXPLORING The player with the most gaming materials within arm's reach goes first. This player states a direction that the party will explore - straight ahead, left, or right. If they choose left or right, the player to their left or right announces which of the challenges they have crafted the party has encountered. If straight ahead, the person most directly opposite them does likewise. Lay down the post-it note adjacent to the last one played, creating a map of the adventure as you progress. This process may fray at the edges if people insist on going in circles. PICKING A CHALLENGE You must play easy challenges, or challenges with easy elements, if you have them. If you have no easy challenges, you Must play difficult challenges. This creates a de-facto escalation during the game, and ensures that all the characters will be killed by a dragon, kraken, or other enormous monster at the end of the game, rather than the beginning. RUNNING OUT OF OPTIONS As players use up their challenges, certain options become impossible - you can't go left if the player to your left has no more challenges. You can't go that way - pick another direction, until you face your final doom - the most rough and tough monster in the Gorgon pits. If, for some reason, a character survives the final challenge, an exit to the surface inevitably beckons. WINNERS AND LOSERS Role-playing games are all about imagination, and camaraderie, and telling stories together. It isn't about competing, it is about collaborating. When the dungeon and its monstrous denizens and savage dangers have finally been bested, take stock - who ground up the least number of characters? Who emerged with the most treasure? These players win. Who lost the most characters? Who emerged with the least treasure, or didn't emerge at all? These players lose. Whoever the group feels did the worst is responsible for providing snacks - good snacks - the next time The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game is played. A SAMPLE CAMPAIGN SETTING: GORGON HUNTERS OF GORGON ISLAND The Gorgon hunters on Gorgon Island are cold-hearted killers - they have to be. They are the brave men and women who go down the gorgon pits to slay gorgons. Why hunt gorgons? Because they are a blight, an evil canker upon the green and nice land above. It is a ren-faire-like land of peace and good will, with jolly kings and smiling peasants, marred only by the stinking Gorgon pits that dot the landscape within easy reach of every village. Within them are gorgons and their hated minions - cliff sharks, skeletons, and the mighty kraken itself! This campaign setting should be heavy on the gorgons. It should also include a lot of falling and drowning. Are you brave - and foolish - enough to enter the gorgon's lair and give them the whipping they deserve? --Jason Morningstar ANOTHER SAMPLE CAMPAIGN SETTING: THE EDGE "We're living on the edge!" - Aerosmith, Living On the Edge The world is flat and the Maroons live upon its ragged Edge. Oceans of water are constantly pouring off over the side, creating waterfalls and torrents and collecting in swift rivers and even some ponds and lakes where the crags jut out far enough to trap the water. Of course the edge is tectonically active, and gouts of lava pour out of lava tubes and suchlike. There are deep, water-filled craters, caused by the magic rockets of angry wizard and undead meteors. Also there are scary castles with moats and ramparts. The Edge was originally populated by crews of sailing ships that went over the edge of the world and managed to crash on the steep slopes below. Since that time, however, the sailors - the Maroons - managed to find themselves some women and have prospered and multiplied. They farm terraced gardens and loot the remains of underground dungeons that get brought to the edge of the world through tectonic action. Of course, their lives are in constant danger -- constant danger of drowning, and of falling. --Joshua BishopRoby BACK COVER COPY Will you drown or will you fall? The choice is yours! In development since February, the Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game includes everything you need to slip and plunge into a world of mystery and adventure!* With five character classes, two alignments, over twenty three spells and prayers and fifteen statistics unlike any seen in the history of role-playing, you and your friends will be tossed head-first into thrilling tales limited only by your imagination and attention span! The Drowning and Falling Role-Playing Game - play it once and you'll never look at drowning and falling in the same way ever again! *Everything you need not included.