Only Monsters Here

 

 

Only Monsters Here is a 227-page, full colour setting supplement for The Nightmares Underneath (second edition) that focuses on overland exploration in a hostile wasteland full of monsters. It is a product of the Monthly Monsters patreon.

Go to DriveThruRPG for the pdf and premium colour print options.

Go to Lulu for the standard colour softcover option.

Only Monsters Here contains:

• An overland hexcrawl exploration setting, with factions, landmarks, a hex map, and new rules for travel and vehicles. There is both a dangerous wasteland AND a ruined city to explore.
• Numerous random tables for generating dungeons, encounters, events, settlements, and other locations.
• Playable monster types, including chaos riders, dark elves, goblins, mutants, pirates, orcs, spider people, and trolls.
• A complete bestiary with over a hundred different monster stat blocks.
• A conversion guide for other old school fantasy role-playing games, in case you want to use this setting with a different set of rules.

A note of caution: This is an open world, sandbox style setting and it leans heavily on random tables and wandering monster encounters. There are a lot of monsters in it, but if you are looking for already-detailed dungeon maps or adventure scenarios, this may not be the book for you.

RPG Focal Points: Characters vs Maps

Let's say I'm running a game and  you are playing a character who has a Sword of Giantslaying and a Ring of Fire Resistance. Cool.

When are you going to run into fire giants?

1

In a game focused primarily on your character and their adventure, you encounter fire giants when I decide to introduce them. When I want to see your character kick ass and do their thing, I bring the fire giants. But when I want to give you a challenge, I bring the frost gnomes. When the frost gnomes show up, you can't just fall back on your fancy sword and your magic ring, you have to rely on your other qualities.

Or I can give you a choice. I can put the threat of the fire giants over here, and the threat of the frost gnomes over there, and let you decide what order you confront them in. But the point of including them is still based on their relation to your character: the fire giants are a threat your particular character is uniquely well-equipped to deal with, and the frost gnomes are a threat that forces you to come up with a different solution.

This ends up being a deliberately narrative process, driven by our understanding of what an interesting story is. Instead of relying on randomness or chance, it relies on the sensibilities of the people playing the game. Thus, it tends to feel more like a coherent narrative arc.

Or, perhaps it feels too staged. Like every situation has been crafted for you. You might feel too much like a character in a story, instead of a character in a world.

2

In a game focused primarily on exploring a map that one player keeps secret from the others, you encounter the fire giants when the map tells you to. Either the random encounter tables say they show up, or you enter the area of the map that says it contains fire giants.

Ideally, the map is created either through random procedures, or before the players make their characters. This tends to make it feel more “real” because it relies on players exploring an already-fixed structure instead of relying on the narrative sensibilities of the participants. When you know the encounter with fire giants is random, instead of planned, it can feel like you lucked out and hit the jackpot.

Or, perhaps it feels too random. Like your decisions don't matter and none of the things you do have any connection to each other. You might feel lost in a world that has a life of its own but no connection to your character.

3

To make this difference even more abstract let me put it this way:

A good story is a series of events that are somehow connected, arranged in an order displaying cause and effect. Anything not related to the specific events the storyteller wants to highlight is abstracted out. Thus: a series of situations arranged in time.

A good map is a collection of locations that are physically connected to each other, where interesting things happen (otherwise you wouldn't want to go there). The map has borders, leaving off places that are not important to the specific locations the cartographer wishes to focus attention on. Also, places on the map might be abstracted as well, leaving out small details that are of no consequence. Thus: a series of situations arranged in space.

Also it sucks to have a Sword of Giantslaying and a Ring of Fire Protection in a setting that has no giants, no fire-themed monsters, and no fire-themed locations. But that's a matter of building a game with a self-contained setting.

4

Obviously this distinction is to some degree artificial for the purposes of comparison. Few actual rpg campaigns are exclusively focused on one or the other, and you will notice that this is not an important distinction being discussed by other people. I like both types of games, but I also like to know which one I'm playing, so it's important to me, at least.

Call of Cthulhu uses a relationship map of clues instead of a spatial map usually. Yeah fuck it, send tweet.

Productivity Tips

 This is a post about productivity tips that was a thread on twitter a long time ago. Might as well collect it all in one place.

The main route to productivity is this: learn how to work even when you don't want to. That does NOT mean working yourself to death. It means doing a reasonable amount of work on a regular basis, even when you feel sick or uninspired, even when you're busy.

Routine

Make producing rpg stuff routine. Daily, on the weekend, two nights a week, whatever works. You have to be able to ditch the routine though, when you have other priorities. It's no good feeling guilty because you miss a day, that's not what the routine is for.

The point is to make creative work a regular part of your life so it becomes easier and so your subconscious mind continues to work on it when you have to do other things. Practising a thing means reducing the amount of effort it takes to do it.

If you are running a regular game, use it as your focus and try to produce more material than you use. If you skip a game session, do the same amount of prep that week as normal. You can always use the extra stuff later.

Deadlines

Set reasonable deadlines and stick to them. If you have to actively manage your time and move commitments around in order to get stuff done on time, that's good practice and it means you'll get better at doing it well.

When you have to ditch your weekly routine, your monthly deadline is what tells you how much you need to make up for it the next week. Routines are for forming good habits, deadlines are for ensuring that work gets finished.

You might need to be accountable to other people in order to meet deadlines. If that's the case, find people who will encourage you. Don't make yourself beholden to people who bitch and moan and complain and put you down when you eventually do miss one.

Lists

Make a list of the stuff you need to do next. Now you have a random table, roll on it for what you're going to do right now. If you don't want to do the task you rolled and you roll again instead, that's not actually cheating, that's figuring out your priorities.

That's what lists are best at, in my experience: priorities. They're good for organizing stuff too, but for producing rpg stuff longer than a couple pages, I think turning your lists into an outline probably works better.

Outlines

If you know what you want to produce, make an outline for it. If it's a book, outline all the chapters and the sections you need in them. Break down the work into small chunks that are easy to conceptualize and complete without making you feel intimidated.

If you need an outline to say what each paragraph will contain, do it, but the point is to know what work you need to do without having to think about it or re-evaluate every time you start working. You just check the outline, see what needs doing, and do it.

Then fit the sections together once they're done and see what you've got. I find sometimes that just fixing up a large section that's already done feels just as satisfying as actually writing a whole new section the same size.

If you break things down to small enough pieces, you can even do work when you only have a few spare minutes. Imagine you need premade characters or monsters for a game: you have a character sheet and a rough concept, right?

It only takes a few minutes to decide on stat numbers. Or to write a special move or rule. Or pick some gear. If you have a stack of small tasks like this, you can even knock a couple off while you're waiting for your soup to cool down.

The reason you have an outline is so you can use all the small tasks you complete. Otherwise, you'd have to just jam a bunch of random stuff together and come up with some excuse for coherency. An overall outline puts them together effectively.

Take Productive Breaks

If you hit a wall and need to think about what you are doing, or you just need a break, have things to do that will help you be productive at the same time. Eat, exercise, change your POV, switch surroundings, feed your mind.

Mindless tasks allow your subconscious to work while you rest your conscious thoughts. Consuming media that can inspire your work while you take a break is great too. It's also good for your subconscious mind, and it can give you conscious ideas too.

A decade ago (more now for anyone reading this), Vincent wrote: "Cultivate an imagination full of harsh landscapes, garish bloody images, and grotesque juxtapositions." Most of you aren't writing that kind of post-apocalyptica though, so swap out those things for the ones that match your project. Cultivate an imagination specific to the thing you are making. Feed it when you have time (on breaks for example) and let your mind wander while you do other things. It will pay you back.

Steal Effectively

On that same note: nothing is truly "original." It's only the way you combine things that is new or distinct. But if you only steal what your audience knows already (AKA "borrowing"), your stuff looks boring and derivative.

If you cultivate a wide enough range of inspiration sources (both in terms of media and real-life issues you are interested in), they will cross-pollinate in a way that is unique to you and will continue to interest and inspire you.

When you then present your combinations to people who don't share all your inspirations, it looks "new and original" to them. They get to see things from a distinct and different perspective. It's that mix of novel and familiar elements that tends to spark people's interest.

Handle Your High

Inspiration is great when you have it. But it's fickle (or that's what people say about it, yeah?). You can't rely solely on outside factors to provide that inspiration, though. Instead, learn to inspire yourself.

Just like you can learn what outside influences (people, media, life experiences, etc) inspire you and then seek them out, you can learn what states of mind allow you to be inspired and train your brain to reach them quicker and more often.

Many years ago, Eddie van Halen said in a magazine interview I read that after he got sober, his guitar playing sucked (please no van Halen opinions in the comments, thank you). He was told to imagine himself in the same place as he would be after 4-5 beers and so he basically role-played his mental/emotional state when drunk and that's how he was able to loosen up and relax and once again feel comfortable playing while sober.

Obviously, you can't imagineer yourself out of medications you need to function properly, but in this case, being drunk was a circumstance, like what room you work in, how much noise there is, and what emotions you feel.

If you pay attention to yourself when you are inspired, you can remember the circumstances—your emotional state and your physical surroundings for example. Then later you can imagine yourself in those circumstances, remember what it was like, and pretend to be there again.

[This is also how you cast a spell, incidentally.]

Maybe you can use methods similar to meditation, or astral projection, or cultivating God consciousness, or practising mindfulness, or pre-visualizing a performance. If you know how to do any of that stuff. Up to you to find out.

In any case, this one sounds the most New Age-y but it's not miraculous. It's just a small tool you can use to push yourself fractionally toward being psychologically proficient at productivity.

Make Sacrifices

This one you probably don't want to hear, but: if you want to create things, you need to spend time doing it. That means less time doing the non-creative things. Maybe make a list of things you do and prioritize them.

Ditching out on sleep, health issues, or your kids is almost universally bad, for obvious reasons. But do you really need to have a job or see your friends? Ok fine, but you can definitely skip church and video games once in a while.

Collaborate

Working with other people can be a shortcut to inspiration, give you a sounding board, and lead to a division of labour where you only have to do the stuff you like or are good at. But it also means dealing with other people.

If working with someone provides you with inspiration and energy, you still have other obstacles to deal with. You need to learn how best to communicate with each other. You need to learn how to schedule your time working together.

Putting the work in to do that can reap productivity rewards later on, but it's still work. And, to a certain degree, it puts you in the position of relying on someone else (though hopefully the rest of these tips will help you be more independent).

Plus, there's no guarantee it lasts or continues to be productive. When a creative partnership becomes more obligation than inspiration, it's probably time to stop. Don't be afraid to re-evaluate at regular intervals.

Of course, rpg products are complex and multi-faceted beasts. If you find that you can't do everything yourself, collaboration is necessary to finish anything. I recommend people who are easy to get along with.

Reflect & Analyze

It can be hard to look at your own work objectively and you may have to wait until it's finished to do so, but it's a good habit. You can also study works you aspire to match or emulate.

What worked? What did you enjoy? Remember that stuff so you can do it again. What parts were a pain in the ass? Look for ways you can get around those parts so they will sap less energy from you next time.

What shortcomings do you see? Be honest, but don't beat yourself up. If you could do it better now, that doesn't mean it's bad, it means you've improved and the next thing you make can be better too, if you pay attention.

Did you meet your initial goals? Does it matter? If you made something you like that is not what you originally intended, look back at how you got there so you can re-use the methods that got you results you're happy with.

If you're disappointed you didn't meet your goals, study works that did achieve your goals and see what you need to do to get there. Make a plan, use lists and outlines, practice. But don't be hard on yourself for not being exactly like someone else. You will never be them.

Reflect & analyze is perhaps less a tip for increased production and more for increased quality. But if you feel like you are improving and/or meeting your goals, that may be a source of energy and drive for you.

The End

Well those are the 10 tips I could think of and also articulate in a satisfactory manner: routine, deadlines, lists, outlines, take productive breaks, steal effectively, handle your high, make sacrifices, collaborate, reflect & analyze.

If any of them don't work for you, don't sweat it. People are different.

The Good Parts of Old School RPGs.

What do I enjoy most about old school rpgs? It's the mapcrawling procedures.

There's this idea in some rpg design circles that stuff isn't real until it happens at the table—in other words, it doesn't really exist until you introduce it to the group's shared imagined space. But with old school mapcrawling games, that isn't really true. The map IS real, even when only the DM knows what's on it. That map that you the players discover gradually, that the DM reveals to you in play, is the same as it was before you knew what was on it. The true main responsibility of the old school DM is to make sure that map stays real.

This produces a different experience from a game where the setting you are exploring is created by improv. You can have a sense of exploration with improv, but you're not really discovering something, you're creating it. When the DM keeps the map secret from you, and maintains the integrity of its contents, the feeling that you get is one of interacting with a place that is real, that exists beyond both the decisions of your characters and the narrative arcs of their deeds, beyond even the sense of narrative that players try to impose on the game. This can be anti-climactic. It can even be boring for some people. If what you want out of rpg is to experience the dramatic arc of an action movie, a mapcrawl is going to fall short. But it's great if you want the feeling of discovering something with substance, exploring it, and finding out how it works. That, to me, is the heart of old school games.

This happens at the organization level, in procedures. Players need to be committed to exploring the map, the DM needs to be committed to managing it and revealing it. You need to know how much you can explore at a time, what the dangers are, how the map reacts, how much can be discovered, what sorts of tactical options are allowed. And there needs to be opportunities for interactions beyond just the dangers and the rewards. But these things can all be expressed in terms of step-by-step procedures and attitudes the participants should adopt. They're independent of what dice you roll and what stats you make your characters out of.

When it comes to the resolution mechanics of old school and osr games, I can pretty much take 'em or leave 'em. The trend in osr games toward being primarily rules lite systems over refining and exploring the mapcrawling process isn't something I'm excited about at all, really. Some ideas are clever, sure, but I don't think any of them are vital to having a good map-focused experience. I've run games in the old school style using only the rules from Apocalypse World and the only thing that I felt was really lacking was that read a sitch didn't work very well as a mechanism for finding secret doors.

But it doesn't seem like the massive variety in rpg rules these days has ever been fully applied to mapcrawling procedures. Of course, old rules from the 80s aren't the only option anymore, but even so. It feels like a underdeveloped area of game design to me, and I would like more of it. I don't think anybody's likely to listen to me, so maybe if I want something I'll have to write it myself. Which I should probably do instead of writing this.

Fuck the OSR

 In my experience, the OSR is kind of two parts. One part is about nostalgia and how it was in the old days, and that part tends to attract a lot of reactionary bigots and creeps. It isn't all bad, and for the most part I've found it easy to ignore the jerks, but then again, I'm also not that interested in recapturing the 70s.

The other part of the OSR is the progressive, weird, and generally more inclusive scene that wants to take the old rules and make something radically new with them. The problem with this part of the OSR is that it also decided to support one dude's massive campaign of harassment. It might be a little reductive to say that everyone in that part of the OSR either a) supported harassment guy, b) stayed friends with people who supported him, or c) left, but it sure felt like that sometimes.

Granted, there were plenty of people who got fed up with his harassment and stopped supporting him before 2019. Those people showed me they don't support harassment. And that's great. I'm still on good terms with some of those people, as individuals.

But there were also plenty of prominent people in the OSR (as well as prominent rpg companies outside the OSR) who continued to support him in spite of everything he did, all the way up until the rape allegations happened. And then they apologized for getting caught supporting a rapist and walked away like that was the end of it. Those people told me, loud and clear, that they will support a guy harassing me out of this hobby, as long as he's not a rapist.

And what I haven't seen in the two years since then is a whole lot of accountability for that. If someone supported harassment before, I have to assume they would do so again, unless I see proof that they have changed and they know better now (and are committed to doing better now). For the most part, that hasn't happened, or at least not where I've seen it. Instead, every contact I have with the OSR includes someone who refused to stop supporting a harasser. Every OSR forums space. Every list of OSR recommendations. Every OSR person's friends list. Every photo I see of my own book if it's not alone.

And that is why I'm not all that interested in the OSR as a scene, or a community, anymore.

And it's not like these and other problems don't exist elsewhere in rpg communities, but trying to be part of the online OSR scene was the most miserable for me. At least in the indie/storygames scene, public bad behaviour seems to lead to serious consequences a lot quicker, even if some fairly serious issues stay private.

Anyway, I'm not looking to start any fights over this. I prefer to deal with this stuff by just leaving, or putting as much distance as I can between myself and people who are a problem for me. That includes pulling away from people who stay close to problem people, whether they know about the problems or not.

This is just an explanation of why you might not see me getting involved in things with other people.