Wales Valleys
HomeBrew Rules for D&D
1980s 1990s
The “What do you want to do?” checklist.
Kill it
Fuck it
Fight it
Steal it
Drink it
Burn it
Ignore it
Forget it
This came from the Welsh Valleys Player Groups and caught on across (at least) three counties (that I knew of). Not through any fault of my own; I have always promoted character development and story content over hack&slash.
As a kid and young teen I had a wide social group because of extra-curricular activities and changing schools. We didn’t have internet and mobile phones back then so I lost contact with so many people from the old days.
In our rpg sessions we quickly dumped the time consuming laborious necessity to use Character sheets at all. Introducing new people to the game, often girls and younger nerds, the same way older nerds had introduced us to it, to optimise the actual playing time, the story content time, plus lack of bits of paper and dice available meant our cultural playstyle was improvisational and quick.
“What is your character?”
Barbarian, Wizard, Evil-Wizard, (the colour-specific) Knight, Elf-Maiden, Fairy-Princess, “I dunno” generic Adventurer, Strangler, and Ninja-Assassin were the most popular character types.
“You have one weapon according to your Character type.”
It was always the most obvious thing.
Next, no matter what adventure the GamesMaster improvisational thrust the group into…
“You are all gathered in the courtyard of the Castle.”
…the following sequence of events would happen.
Strangler: “I strangle the Elf-Maiden.”
The stranglers Aim and conditions for winning the game are to strangle as many people as possible preferably everyone before someone permanently prevents it.
Ninja-Assassin and Knight: “I kill the Strangler before he strangles the Elf-Maiden.”
Gamesmaster: “Strangler is dead.”
Elf-Maiden “I thank the knight by taking him into a room in the castle.”
Ninja-Assassin: “What about me?”
Elf-Maiden: “oh wait, I thought you were the Knight and he is the Ninja-Assassin.”
They sort it out.
Elf-Maiden: “I don’t really mind, really.”
GamesMaster: “What is everyone else doing while this is going on?”
Knight, Elf-Maiden and Ninja-Assassin characters get bored and wander off somewhere together. As far as they are concerned they have won the game by achieving their character goals of using the story to justify wandering off somewhere together in real life.
At this point it’s contemporary to elucidate how in the social groups I was involved with even during the late 80s early 90s there was a 50/50 chance the Knight and Ninja-Assassin players were male or female while the Elf-Maiden and Fairy-Princess players were always female.
GamesMaster: “Who is left?”
Fairy-Princess: “I wake the Strangler up.”
Strangler: “I’m dead.”
Everyone else: “I thought he was dead.”
Fairy-Princess: “I am a Fairy and a Princess so I am using my Fairy-Princess magic to wake the Strangler up.”
GamesMaster: “Fair enough. Strangler, you’re alive again now.”
Strangler: “I thank the Fairy-Princess. No wait a minute do I know she has brought me back to life?”
GamesMaster: “I don’t know. Fairy-Princess does he know you have brought him back to life using your magic?”
Fairy-Princess: “No it’s a secret. Nobody knows.”
There is a fifty-fifty chance the Strangler character is male or female. The same rule applies for the Barbarian, Wizard, Evil-Wizard. “I dunno” generic Adventurers are always usually male. Nobody knows why or if they do they’re keeping quiet about it.
Barbarian: “I get bored and punch the Wizard.”
Wizard: “What? Why?”
Barbarian: “I’m bored.”
GamesMaster: “Okay. You punch the Wizard. Wizard what do you want to do?”
Wizard: “I cast a spell of Niceness on the Barbarian so he doesn’t hit anyone again.”
GamesMaster: “Say your magic words.”
Wizard: “Ahamabalamba”
As far as the Wizard player is concerned he has won the game because everyone laughs and half the people repeats the Wizards magic word. It is a moment they have all been waiting for. This word will be repeated occasionally for several weeks by various members of the party even when the rest of the party are nowhere around. Such is the power of magic words intuited during spontaneous roleplaying sessions.
Strangler: “While everyone is distracted with laughter I strangle the Wizard.”
It is the perfect set-up. The Strangler has struck at the most opportune moment.
Everyone: “Shit.”
GamesMaster: “The Wizard…”
Everyone: “Yes?”
GamesMaster: “…is…”
Everyone: “Yes?”
GamesMaster: “…dead.”
Everyone: “Nooooo!!!”
Elf-Maiden: “Hey you didn’t all cry out like that when I was strangled!”
Everyone: “We did! We did!”
GamesMaster: “You don’t count, you’ve wandered off somewhere into the castle.”
Strangler: “I strangle the Adventurer!”
Generic Adventurer: “It’s not your go.”
Strangler: “Everyone was distracted again by the Elf-Maiden interrupting.”
GamesMaster: “This is true but it’s still not your go. Some of them haven’t had a go at all yet.”
Generic Adventurer: “I stop the Strangler!”
GamesMaster: “How do you do that?”
Generic Adventurer: “Do I have a weapon?”
GamesMaster: “Yes you have a sword.”
Generic Adventurer: “I stab him.”
Everyone: “Gasp!”
GamesMaster: “Where do you stab him?”
Various people make various suggestions.
Generic Adventurer: “In the funniest of places!”
Everyone laughs.
GamesMaster: “The Strangler is dead. Again.”
Everyone (including the Strangler), speaking almost but not exactly at the same time so every voice is individually heard in its own space as part of the collective: “Again.”
Strangler: “Rats.”
Everyone laughs.
Evil Wizard: “I cast the Death Spell.”
GamesMaster: “Who do you cast the death spell on?”
Someone: “The Dreaded Death Spell!”
Someone else: “Dreaded Death Spell of Doom!”
Some other people, chanting: “Doom! Doom!” and “Death and Doom!”
Evil Wizard: “EVERYONE!”
Everyone (including the dead people): “Noooo!!!”
GamesMaster: “Including yourself?”
Evil Wizard: “Er.” A dramatic pause of baited breaths ensues. “Hang on a moment, I’m not sure yet.”
GamesMaster: “Everyone is dead.”
Most people feel they have won the game because they have successfully accomplished their characters goal. Some feel they have won simply by taking part in the adventure. Nobody really cares much that they’re all dead.
Next week will be another variation of the same story with some minor changes, most probably with different people playing the different parts. The session was a collective ritual.
I swear to the Gods we did versions of almost exactly this same session multiple times with different people playing different roles in different ways and in different places.
The strangest thing of all is some of the groups didn’t know anyone else from the other groups or even have any awareness that they existed, aside from myself to observe the progression and compare sessions. I swear was not generating it myself. I usually always played the Wizard or Generic Adventurer, not a lead role.
I spent years trying to explain to people about ‘speakers of the cosmic script’ ‘tapping into something’ and ‘underlaying structures affecting us collectively and subliminally’ before the movie The Matrix came out and now everyone says ‘oh the matrix’ whenever anything like that happens, which it does a lot more often than most of us are willing to be openly aware of.
Sometimes the boys would play without any girls around in which case the story developed very differently. See: Player Checklist. To this day I still have no idea at all what female-only roleplaying sessions are about. I might possibly be grateful for that.