Go over to my other blog and read the full entry if you are interested, but basically the idea is to randomy choose keywords within your various gaming (or non-gaming) books to fill in the blank spaces of a common pattern describing a possible frp adventure.
Depending on the diversity of the books used, the resulting sentence can be a sensible adventure hook, or a super-gonzo, multi-genre crazy scenario seed.
I have decided to use the Random Adventure Generator to generate such a scenario seed for The Celestial Empire. However, I have also decided to restrict the book base to my East Asian-themed books, so as to respect the setting of TCE.
The resulting adventure is as follows:
Charles-Édouard Hocquard asks the Player Characters to go to Hǎilóng (in Liáoníng) to retrieve a dictionary. The PCs will end up fighting against Toyotomi Hideyoshi in Shāndōng. During the course of the adventure, gold and jade will feature prominently.
The only "gonzo" element here is that French military doctor Charles-Édouard Hocquard was stationed in Indochina at the end of the 19th century, whereas Toyotomi Hideyoshi was active at the end of the 16th century...
Let's make this hook a real scenario inspiration:
ReplyDeleteA Chinese merchant is dying in Dr Hocquard's hospital in Hanoï. The merchant speaks about a ancient dictionary of traditional medicine & herbs that could save him and many others.
The dictionary is in the merchant's safe in Hailong. The Doctor knows the characters are in Liaoning, so he writes to send them on the treasure hunt.
Unfortunately, one of the merchant's servant opened the safe, and ran away with its content (including gold and jade pieces) to his family in Shandong. There, he repaid his family's debt to a triad (or a local tyrant).
The characters must follow the servant's trail, helped by the fact that he paid expenses along his trip with jade and gold trinkets. Then, the characters must enter the triad/tyran's treasure trove, which is guarded by the ghost of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, wielding his antique samurai sword. The sword had been brought 3 centuries ago by pirates, and is also being the recipient of the Hideyoshi's soul. Since the ghost is now enchanted to protect the treasure, its sword does not hit jade nor gold, which could protect the characters.
Ha ha, not bad. The debt could have been to a loan shark allied with local bandits who have a stronghold in the marshes... like latter-day outlaws of the marsh :)
ReplyDeleteMay be the dictionary contains a code to a cache for a great treasure of jade and gold which Hideyoshi gathered to pay spys and traitors for his projects of domination above China and Korea, but neither the PCs nor Hocquard know this. Triads and Yakusas and looking for the book as well.
ReplyDeleteZit