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Volcanic Crater

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The Avernian hex key is going to be one of the “hands on” sections of the Remix: We’re going to set up the scaffold here, but there’ll be some finishing work you’ll probably want to do before running it.

To stock the Avernian hexcrawl, I will be:

  • drawing locations from Descent Into Avernus,
  • pulling material from a variety of Avernus-related supplements on the DMs Guild, and
  • creating original content.

Most of the locations in Descent Into Avernus were originally and primarily designed to be part of the Choose Your Railroad structure that the campaign is built around. The key below assumes that you’ll have access to the Descent Into Avernus book, but will be providing notes focused on how these locations should be adapted in the absence of this railroad.

In cases where I’m using material from the DMs Guild, you will similarly need to either obtain the original supplement or swap those hexes out for your own creations. The notes below, once again, focus primarily on how you can adapt the published material to good effect. (Harvesting published scenarios like this is something I almost always do when stocking hexcrawls.)

Original content is also unlikely to be a in a play-ready state, but should be sufficiently detailed that you’ll be able to flesh out the details.

Throughout these locations we will be seeding:

INDEX

Hexes A1 thru B6
Hexes C1 thru D6
Hexes E1 thru F6
Hexes G1 thru H6
Hexes I1 thru J6


A1. AVERNIAN TARPIT

A vast tarpit several hundred feet across. The is hot enough to burn (1d6 fire damage) and it is constantly bubbling. Dangers include:

  • A large gas bubble explodes, spattering those within 10 feet with hot tar. DC 12 Dexterity saving throw or 1d6 fire damage.
  • Getting stuck in the tar. (It counts as difficult terrain and requires a DC 14 Strength check to pass safely or a DC 18 Strength check to escape once stuck. If stuck, the victim will slowly sink into the tar, becoming submerged 3d6 rounds later.)
  • Jets of flame spontaneously erupt from particularly strong outgassing.
  • The gas itself can be toxic, requiring a DC 16 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, characters are affected as per a confusion spell, rolling on the custom table below once per minute to determine their actions. At the end of each minute, they can attempt another saving throw.

There are several small outcroppings of rock and solid-ish land dotted throughout the tarpit. On one of these is a giant boulder of gold that gleams in the strange, reddish light of Avernus. (The boulder is actually pyrite; fool’s gold.)

d10Tar Confusion Effect
1-2Uncontrollable laughter, as per a Tasha's hideous laughter spell
3-5Believes the tar is delicious food and will attempt to eat it. (The tar inflicts 1d6 fire damage, or 3d6 fire damage if swallowed. It is also poisonous, requiring a DC 12 Constitution saving throw to avoid an additional 2d6 damage accompanied by vomiting.)
6-7Move in a random direction (possibly motivated by hallucinations).
8Takes no actions.
9-10Attacks a random nearby creature.

A2. OBELISK OF UBBALUX

  • Descent Into Avernus, p. 98.

A set of astral pistons within the obelisk are intrinsic to Ubbalux’ prison. The pistons can only be accessed if Ubbalux is freed.

FREEING UBBALUX:

  • As described in Descent Into Avernus, Ubbalux has heard of the Mirror of Mephistar (Hex I1) and believes Mephistopheles can unravel the riddle.
  • Bel built the prison and could free him. Ubbalux can also point them towards Bel’s Forge (Hex H2). (If it seems reasonable, Ubbalux might still be under the impression that Bel is the Archduke of Hell.)
  • You can also solve Bel’s original “riddle” (see below).

INVESTIGATING THE STONES: Bel told Ubbalux that the secret to escaping the prison was hidden in the arcane runes etched across the standing stones. The trick is that crucial information is located on the outside of the stones, where Ubbalux can’t see it.

  • A DC 12 Intelligence (Arcana) check indicates that each of the outer standing stones is associated with one of the schools of magic.
  • A character who speaks Infernal or succeeds on a DC 18 Intelligence (Arcana) check will notice that each standing stone has a cartouche containing two syllables, one of which is either the first or second syllable of the associated school of magic in Infernal and the other appears to be a nonsense syllable.
  • A similar cartouche appear on the inside of the stone (where Ubbalux can see it, although you can also look across the circle and see them from outside) with a similar pairing of the first or second syllable of the associated school of magic in Infernal (whichever one isn’t on the outside) and a nonsense syllable.

SOLVING THE RIDDLE: Combining the two “nonsense” syllables on each stone forms a command word associated with that stone. You can intuit the correct order of the syllables by looking at the matched syllable from the school of magic. (So the syllable in the cartouche with the first syllable of the school of magic should be the first syllable of the command word and the second syllable should be the second.)

To release Ubbalux, you need to place your hand on each stone and speak the associated command word (suffering the effect described on pg. 98 of Decent Into Avernus). Once this has been done with all eight stones, the energy field drops: Ubbalux is freed and the central obelisk can be accessed.

Stone (by School)Outer Cartouche (Infernal)Inner Cartouche (Infernal)Outer Cartouche (Translated)Inner Cartouche (Translated)Command Word
AbjurationTOZ / BODRIK / XUUNAB / BOJUR / XUUNBOXUUN
ConjurationATH / LADIG / KRIJUR / LACON / KRIKRILA
DivinationLA / ITHROT / IFEDIV / ITHIN / IFEITHIFE
EnchantmentTHOS / UNDRER / ECKCHAN / UNEN /ECKECKUN
EvocationOOD / LEWAR / ARGCAT / LEEVO / ARGARGLE
IllusionTHRUN / JAOZOG / KOUMILL / JAOUS / KOUMJAOKOUM
NecromancyDRIK / ARKTHAL / KILNEC / ARKRO / ILARKIL
TransmutationMAM / YAOTH / ARKMUT / YATRANS / ARKARKYA

A3. OOZE HARVESTERS

Treacherous stone steps are carved into the cliff face surrounding the Pit of Shummrath, leading down to a miserable village which has been built upon a shelf of rock that thrusts out into the green ooze.

A pair of piscoloths and a gaggle of sahuagin overseers dominate a population of enslaved half-fiend goblins who dredge sludge from the Pit and bottle it. These are shipped to the piscolothian cities in the dark waters beneath the ice of Stygia, where the oil-slick-like telepathic emanations of the sludge are a kind of delicacy used to spice food.

Asmodean Cavern: The mouth of a cave at the base of the cliffs in the goblin village leads to several chambers containing ancient fiendish pillars. The four faces of each pillar are covered with worn runes in an archaic form of Infernal and the bas reliefs of various devil faces. Touching the runes causes the devil faces on the matching pillar to animate and recite them. Collectively they tell of the Trial of Asmodeus and the rights given to Asmodeus under the First Law by the ruling of Primus, Lord of the Modrons. This site is recorded as being one of sixty-six such memorials erected to record this epochal event.

The goblins lived in these caverns, but several years ago they were flooded by a sudden undulation of the Pit. Shummrathian ooze still lingers in the depths of the cave, creating a hostile environment for the goblins who still squat here.


A4. ARCHES OF ULLOCH

  • Descent Into Avernus, p. 103

The Arches of Ulloch allow the mass transport of entire armies, but they require the use of a tuned keystone (similar to the planar tuning fork required for a plane shift spell) to align them with a particular plane of existence.

One of the arches currently has an ancient Avernian keystone, allowing teleportation to anywhere within Avernus.

Creating a new tuned keystone requires:

  • Either the original plans (located in Bel’s Fortress, Hex H2) or a DC 20 Intelligence (Arcana) check to reverse engineer the existing keystone.
  • 50 soul coins worth of raw materials.
  • An appropriate workshop (such as those located in Bel’s Fortress, Fort Knucklebones, or other Warlord armories).

Note: There is an unkeyed keystone in the Dump (Hex H1).


A5. WARLORD LAIR: THE LOST GOLGARI

This is the lair of Kolasiah, the Infernal Medusa, and the Lost Golgari, who have come to Avernus from Ravnica. Kolasiah seeks a way of returning home and would value any news of a powerful spellcaster not allied with Zariel.

Entrance Ramp: Infernal war machines come roaring down the ramp and are parked in a cluster around the central stone pillar.

Forge: In the central pillar of the rock at the bottom of the entrance ramp there is a forge and garage run by Malargan the Oni. See Forges of Avernus, p. 4. A set of astral pistons can be found here.

For more details on the Avernian warlords, see Part 7E of the Remix.

Design Note: As written in Warlords of Avernus, the Lost Golgari have been reduced to a fraction of their former strength. You can either lean into that (with chunks of their base here being deserted) or I would potentially go the other way and bolster her to have a larger number of infernal machines and riders.


A6. WARLORD LAIR: BITTER BREATH’S MARAUDERS

For more details on the Avernian warlords, see Part 7E of the Remix.


B1. ARKHAN’S TOWER

  • Descent Into Avernus, p. 110

For Arkhan’s Tower, we would like to prep:

  • A complete map of the tower.
  • An adversary roster of the denizens. (Descent Into Avernus, p. 110-11 does provide a comprehensive list of creatures to add to the roster.)

For the map, I will recommend PogS’ excellent original cartography.


B2a. FERRYMAN’S PORTS

  • On River

There are charonadaemon ferry stations on both shores of the Styx here. There are commissions available for travel up- and downriver, but most regular travel simply crosses the river to the other station.

Sudok’s Mart: The station on the contra-Dis side of the river is larger and contains a small market overseen by a yugoloth named Sudok.


B2b. ALVSKRAEMA CARAVANSERAI

The Alvskraema caravanserai is located next to the bridge which crosses the Pit of Shummrath. It is jointly operated by Brarumoch, Haskari, and Meltrus.

Brarumoch: Operates the common room and runs the kitchen. The caravanserai’s specialty is elf meat. Brarumoch has a supplier who hunts and butchers elves on the Material Plane; here they are considered an expensive delicacy known as alvskraema.

(This doesn’t mean that any elf walking through the door will be set upon and butchered. That’s not the sort of thing you do to a customer.)

Haskari: Operates a weapons forge. He specializes in creating cacophonous weapons, which allow those wielding them to speak and understand Abyssal. (See Forges of Avernus.)

Meltrus: Specializes in repairing and building infernal machines. He and Haskari are constantly squabbling over shop space.

Design Note: Note that the name Alvskraema is more or less “Elfscream” in Old Norse. It’s designed to echo the Elfsong Tavern from Baldur’s Gate. Thanks to Flallen from my Twitch chat for the suggestion of Elfscream Tavern.


B3. WITCH-QUEEN’S ABODE

Tasha keeps a summer home in Avernus, as described in Dance of Deathless Frost. She is aware of Kostchtchie’s phylactery, knows that Baba Yaga knows its resting place, and is able to summon Baba Yaga’s hut.


B4. RED RUTH’S LAIR

  • Descent Into Avernus, p. 107

Red Ruth has a heartstone.


B5. BONE CRATER

A large meteor impact crater formed by a huge skull (more than ten feet across) that’s partially embedded at the center of the crater.


B6. WARLORD LAIR: SOUL COLLECTORS

This is the lair of the warlord Algoran and his gang, the Soul Collectors.

Shrine to Eskarna: Algoran discovered an ancient shrine dedicated to the demon Eskarna. It was built countless aeons ago at a time during which the demons had pushed the front lines of the Blood War deep into Avernus. Long abandoned and forgotten, it was discovered by Algoran and converted into a gladiatorial arena.

Gladiatorial Arena: Watched over by the well-worn statue of Eskarna, Algoran hosts gladiatorial competitions here which attract a varied crowd of visitors and competitors.

Cogbox: Algoran recently acquired a modron slave as a wager during the gladiatorial fights. The modron has a Nirvanan cogbox. The modron might be willing to trade it for anyone who can help them gain their freedom; alternatively, if Algoran learns its value, he will seize it and try to make a deal (or wager) himself.

Shaaksuraar’s Armory: A “mountain of a sahuagin-werebear” called Shaaksuraar oversees a productive weapons forge for Algoran. This is located in the river cavern; Shaaksuraar goes on swims through the subterranean river and also quenches his fresh-forged weapons in the waters here. See Forges of Avernus, p. 3.

For more details on the Avernian warlords, see Part 7E of the Remix.

Design Note: The concept of Eskarna comes from Dyson’s original key for this map, although we have reduced it to an ancient ruin here. In Forges of Avernus, Shaaksuraar manages the Goregut Armory, but the Goreguts’ lair (Hex J3) in the Remix has been destroyed by Princeps Kovik (Hex J5). I’ve reassigned Shaaksuraar to Algoran, but you could also make this part of his backstory: That he worked for Raggadragga until his forge was destroyed by Kovik. (To add extra drama, perhaps Shaaksuraar betrayed Raggadragga to Kovik for a large payment of soul coins before transferring his services to his new forge here.)


Go to Hexes C1 thru D6

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As described in Part 7 of the Remix and the Alexandrian Hexcrawl, I prefer to run hexcrawls as a player-unknown structure: The abstraction of the hexmap is useful to me as the Dungeon Master, but kept secret from the players so that they can engage with the game world as their characters would.

This is not, however, the only way to run a hexcrawl. In other hexcrawl systems, the players are given a hexmap and know what hex they’re in (unless they’re lost, in which case they are misled about what hex they’re in). There are a number of potential advantages to this approach:

  • It can enhance clarity and simplify the complexity of running the hexcrawl. (This can include handling movement by simply counting hexes.)
  • It gives a clear structure to the PCs for creating their own map of the wilderness. (They basically just “fill in the hex.”)
  • It can make it easy to provide a list of “hex actions” that the player can choose to focus on specific hexes. (For example, “we’re going to spend extra time searching this hex to see if we can find anything interesting.” This can be particularly useful in mid- or high-level play if the PCs begin to engage in realm-building game play, because it allows for things like hex-clearing. In fact, even if you, like me, prefer a player-unknown exploration model, it can often be useful to switch semi-diegetically to a player-known hexmap for realm-oriented play.)

But I digress.

The point is that people may want to run the Avernian hexcrawl using player-known hexmaps. After a discussion with members of my Discord, I thought it would be useful to provide blank player hexmaps for use in these campaigns. I’ve included four varieties:

  • Simple White. For easy printing and player note-taking/terrain mapping.
  • Avernian Blank. The flat surface texture that I developed for Avernus. (You may find this version more useful when using a VTT because it has greater visual interest.)
  • Avernian Mountains. This map includes the mountains, defining the edge of the hexcrawl for the players and reflecting, to some degree, the fact that the mountains can be seen from a great distance. This version also includes other decorative elements.
  • Stygian. This includes both the mountains AND the River Styx. I don’t recommend using this one (charting the course of the Styx is probably better for the players to figure out), but some may find it useful.

For each of these map types, I have prepared a version both with Elturel /the Dock of Fallen Cities as a starting location and without.

In addition to these blank maps, the players should still be given the illustrative player map. The players will be cross-referencing between the two maps, trying to figure out exactly which hex each feature on their characters’ map is likely to be in (and exploring accordingly).

(more…)

Over a decade ago, I wrote A Nomenclature of D&D Editions, which provided a definitive breakdown of every edition of D&D that had been published (along with the names by which they are commonly referred). I thought it would be useful to update the list and translate it into a video format.

I also thought that it would a quick, fun little video that I could turn out pretty quickly while working on other, more elaborate videos.

I was completely wrong about this.

First, what can basically just be a quick list in text format just… doesn’t work that way as a video. So the project quickly transmogrified into a history of D&D as viewed through the lens of its many editions. Which is great.

It turned out the most time-consuming part of making the video was actually sourcing the cover images for every edition. I had sort of naively assumed that, hey, it’s D&D. There’ll definitely be easy-to-find scans of these covers out there.

But there wasn’t!

Most of the books have been scanned, but it turns out a lot of those scans are from 10 or 15 or 20 years ago and have just been passed around the ‘net ever since. They’re low-res, blurry, and unsuitable for the video. In other cases, high-res scans exist… but only of copies which were in incredibly crappy condition. Boxed sets were particularly difficult to source: people would either only scan the rulebooks inside; or the box cover itself would be bettered and dented from years of play.

(This was particularly true of starter sets and basic games: These are often the first D&D products people buy, and so even future collectors are not yet treating them with care.)

You’d think the official PDFs would make it easier, but these are frequently the worst offenders when it comes to low-res, fuzzy, badly cropped scans of damaged copies of the book.

So I ended up spending hours and hours and hours sourcing cover images. This included frequently photoshopping images and also scanning in items from my own collection.

The most difficult images to find? The D&D Essentials line from 2010-11. I think partly because it didn’t sell very well and partly because it didn’t hang around long enough for people to write think-pieces about it (and scan covers to illustrate it).

(Also because there were so frickin’ many Essentials products.)

And then, of course, there were hours more of carefully incorporating and animating the covers into the video itself!

In any case, it’s done! Hopefully it was worth it!

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Magical Kitties Level Up!

June 2nd, 2021

Magical Kitties Level Up!

YOU ARE CUTE! YOU ARE CUNNING! YOU ARE FIERCE!

In Magical Kitties Save the Day! every kitty has human, even human has a problem, and the kitties must use their magical powers to solve those problem! To make matters worse, kitties and their humans live in hometowns which are ALSO filled with problems! Problems like alien invasions, velociraptors, fairy queens, and enchanted blizzards! These problems make the humans’ problems worse, so the magical kitties have to deal with them, too!

Originally designed by Matthew J. Hanson, I worked with Matthew and Michelle Nephew to design the second edition of the game. That included designing the River City hometown and The Big Adventure graphic novel solo adventure that you’ll find in the boxed set:

Magical Kitties Save the Day - Deluxe Edition

The boxed set includes the rulebook, River City (including an amazing poster map by Jason Bradley Thompson!), and The Big Adventure, along with dice, tokens, character sheets, and everything you need to start playing!

Pictured here is the Deluxe Edition, which also includes the Alien Invasion and The Wild Ones hometowns; fully illustrated cards for Powers, Flaws, and Talents; and upgraded dice and tokens. The box is practically bursting at the seams with amazing kitty goodness for just $60!

Right now (and for the next week) we are running the Magical Kitties Level Up! Kickstarter, which — with your help! — will fund the creation of:

Magical Kitties Power-Up! a new sourcebook by Matthew J. Hanson which will double the number of magical powers for your kitties, give you the tools to venture forth on epic adventures, and power up your existing magic to all-new levels!

Series Workbooks, featuring an Our Hometown workbook for the GM and a bundle of My Kitty workbooks for your players! These deluxe portfolios give players old and new alike cool tools for exploring their Magical Kitties Save the Day adventures in all-new ways.

Fantastica, a new hometown by Clio Yun-Su Davis, featuring the Nine Kingdoms of Fantastica, each based on your favorite fairy tales and ruled by a Princess or Prince. In the land of the Fantastica, magical kitties don’t have to hide their magical powers, completely transforming the way you play the game!

(This is actually something I’ve emphasized in developing all of the Magical Kitty hometowns: We want each one to present a unique spin on the game, not just in terms of flavor, but also structure. So in Fantastica you can use your powers openly and save kingdoms rather than humans. In Mars Colony you help build the colony’s tech tree. In The Wild Ones there are no humans and kitties instead have obligations to wild clans. In Alien Invasion, node-based scenario design is used to literally take the adventure to a whole new level, at which point the tables are turned and the kitties have to CREATE problems for the aliens instead of the other way around!)

Truth be told, the Kickstarter has already been a huge success. (As I write this, we are at 1000% funded!) But this will be your last chance to grab the Deluxe Edition for just $60. (If you wait, the price will be going up to $75, while supplies will be limited.) And if you want to jump in to Magical Kitties for the first time, the All the Kitty Toys! pledge level will get you absolutely everything! If you just want to sniff the catnip, the standard edition of the game is just $25.

Become a backer today!

 

Magical Kitties Level Up!

FURTHER READING
System Cheat Sheet
Design Notes: Kitty Power!
Character Creation in 7 Sentences: Magical Kitties

Go to Part 1

THE FALLACY OF THE PERFECT CRIME

Something that can really trip you up when trying to create clues is the fallacy of the perfect crime.

For example, let’s say the PCs find an incriminating note that gives them a vital clue.

… but wait. Why would the conspiracy let the PCs find the note? Why wouldn’t they destroy it?!

Well, in some cases it’s carelessness. In others, they’re holding onto incriminating evidence that can give them leverage over their fellow conspirators. Sometimes they’re planning to destroy it, but they just haven’t yet. Sometimes the note has information they need for a job, so they hold onto them until the job is done. Maybe they have a sentimental attachment to the note because it was written by their dead wife. And so forth.

Alternatively, maybe they DID destroy the note and that’s the evidence that the PCs find. Sometimes this is structurally cosmetic (the only information to be gleaned is that the information has been destroyed). Sometimes this can be a consequence of the players’ actions, like in my Dragon Heist campaign where they knocked politely on someone’s door and then waited for them to open it while, inside, the bad guy was shuffling all their papers into the fire. (One of the nice things about the Three Clue Rule is that you can destroy clues with a clear conscience when it’s appropriate.) But often the PCs will be able to pull a clue out of the destruction (they burned the note, but this one enigmatic scrap remains!).

Of course, this logic also extends beyond incriminating notes.

Wouldn’t it make sense for the murderer to wear gloves or wipe away their fingerprints? (Maybe they did and the clue is something else. Or they tried, but missed a partial. Or they’re dumb. Or they panicked. Or they wanted to, but got interrupted.)

Wouldn’t they have disabled the cameras? (Maybe they didn’t spot the camera. Maybe they did hack the cameras and deleted the footage, but left traces from their hack that can be traced instead. And so forth.)

The perfect crime (or conspiracy), of course, would have flawless operational security and leave no evidence. But that’s not how it usually plays out in reality, and doesn’t really make for a great scenario in any case.

As GMs designing scenarios, I think we’re particularly susceptible to the fallacy of the perfect crime: Obviously if the bad guy knew they were leaving a clue, they would destroy it. You just thought of how the criminal could have left a clue, so obviously the criminal would have realized that, too!

What you actually want to do is the opposite: If you’re thinking about the crime and can’t find a clue that gives the PCs the information you need to give them… well, what extra mistake did the criminal make that will let you give them that information?

VARIED CLUES

As you’re designing clues for your scenario, you’ll want to make sure to include a wide variety of them. This is partly about creating a more engaging investigation. (If the PCs are just doing the same thing over and over and over again, that’s just less interesting than an adventure where they’re doing a lot of different things. And a puzzle isn’t really puzzling if the solution is always the same thing.) But it’s also structurally important: If all the clues are fundamentally similar, then it’s not just that the players are doing the same thing over and over again; it’s that the players MUST do that thing. And if they don’t think to do it, then they’ll miss ALL the clues.

The Three Clue Rule is built on redundancy, but clues which are overly similar to each other only provide a superficial redundancy. It’s kind of like monoclonal agriculture: When all the bananas are clones of each other, they’re all susceptible to the same pests and can be universally wiped out by a single disease. Just so with monoclonal clues, which can all fail simultaneously.

For example, if the PCs need to find out that Tony is hiding out at the Silver Rodeo, you might say:

  • They can ask Tony’s girlfriend, Susan.
  • They can ask Tony’s partner, Silvester.
  • They can ask Tony’s mother, Sara.

Those are three different clues. But if the players, for whatever reason, don’t ask the people in Tony’s life where Tony is hiding out — because they don’t want to risk tipping him off, because they erroneously conclude that Tony wouldn’t have told anyone where he was going, or just because they don’t think of doing it — then that one failure will wipe out all of those clues.

Now, the principle of permissive clue-finding means that shouldn’t necessarily get rid of these “redundant” clues. But for structural purposes, they can be grouped together and only “count” as a single clue for the purposes of the Three Clue Rule.

When you’re looking to make varied clues, using clues with different forms is good. But the most important thing is that the clues should be found in different ways – different skills, different insights into how a crime scene should be investigated, and so forth.

As a final note, remember that the problem of monoclonal clues is limited to the clues pointing to a single revelation. It’s fine to design a scenario with lots and lots and lots of clues coming from talking to people, as long as those clues are spread out across a bunch of different revelations (each of which has varied clues of different types also pointing to them).

MULTI-PART CLUES

A common error that I see GMs make when playing around with the Three Clue Rule for the first time is to mistake the Three Clue Rule for a kind of logic puzzle:

  • This clue indicates that the killer was wearing a green sweater.
  • This clue indicates that the killer was taller than six feet.
  • This clue indicates that the killer had gray hair.

If you combine those clues, you know that the only person with gray hair who was taller than six feet and also wearing a green sweater was Peter! So Peter killed Tony’s wife!

These clues can work if each uniquely points at Peter: He was the only one in the green sweater, the only one taller than six feet, and the only one with gray hair.

But if you need all three pieces of information – to eliminate the other people with green sweaters or gray hair or whatever – then this falls apart. Because you NEED all three pieces of information, that means that each piece of information (green sweater, six feet, gray hair) is actually a separate conclusion.

This doesn’t mean that you can’t design mysteries like this, though! Once you recognize that these are three separate conclusions, you can simply follow the Three Clue Rule: Have three clues pointing to the green sweater, three clues pointing to the killer’s height, and three clues indicating the killer had gray hair.

This technique can add a satisfying dimensionality to your mystery scenarios, giving the players a clear sense that their investigations are building towards some central revelation. It can be particularly effective for the Big Truth(s) in X-Files-type campaigns or identifying the location where the big conclusion of the campaign is going to take place. You can see an example of this in my Eternal Lies Remix.

FORMS OF CLUES

Let’s wrap things up by looking at the specific forms that clues can take. This won’t be a complete or encyclopedic coverage of the topic, largely because the cool thing about clues is that they can be virtually infinite in their form and variety, but hopefully I can provide a few ideas.

First, there are some broad categories of form that clues can fall into:

  • Physical Artifacts
  • Glyphs/data
  • Bio-Signature
  • Interrogation
  • Surveillance

These, too, are not comprehensive. And the boundaries between them aren’t exactly razor-sharp.

Here’s a list of specific examples drawn from scenarios I’ve designed:

  • Correspondence (letters, e-mail, etc.)
  • Diaries
  • Ephemera from a location (matchbooks, theatrical posters, tickets, etc.)
  • Official reports
  • Tracks
  • Surveillance (of a person or location)
  • Tailing someone
  • Business cards
  • Fingerprints
  • DNA
  • Blood type (including fantastical types like “Vulcan”)
  • Graffiti
  • Financial records
  • Tattoos
  • Canvassing
  • Video/audio recordings
  • Mystic visions/strange dreams
  • Shipping information (tracking, postmarks, return addresses, etc.)
  • Books (including inscription and marginalia)
  • Bureaucratic records/background checks

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