This scenario for Over the Edge is designed to be run in 20 minutes as an ultra-fast introduction to the game or as a fun micro-game for any occasion.

For players new to Over the Edge, you’ll want to prep a quick introduction to the system and give them a system cheat sheet. The scenario can be played with pregen characters, available on the Atlas Games website, but character creation in Over the Edge is so fast-and-furious that you can easily include character creation in a short session.

If you want to give the scenario a little more room to breathe, you can expand it to a 30-minute scenario by playing out the mission briefing and/or the team’s survey of the site.

MISSION BRIEFING

You are working as a Cloak – a secret agent in the service of one of the many conspiracies crawling over the surface of the Edge. Perhaps you serve many masters. Whatever the case may be, you have received a mission from the Order of the Inverted Compass: A clockwork capsule that slips into your ear, plays a mechanically recorded message (like a music box; any digital medium would be insecure), and then vaporizes (which creates a weird, ticklish, buzzing sensation in your ear canal and which you have been assured will probably not give you cancer).

At 2pm sharp today, a semi-truck belonging to the InMech Corporation will drive west down the Boulevard de Lis in the Flowers District. Hijack the truck by many means necessary and deliver its cargo to Dropoff Alpha B21 Blackjack.

You know that the Flower District on the west side of the Edge is pretty vanilla: Lot of burgers (newcomers) find it comfortingly normal. A little poking around identifies the Boulevard de Lis as lying north of the Plaza of Flowers: It’s one block long, lined on both sides by three-storey tall brownstones, and terminates in a T-intersection on both ends.

BOULEVARD DE LIS

At 2pm sharp, an interdimensional portal opens at the east end of the block. The truck drives out of the portal, down the length of the Boulevard de Lis, and (if it is not stopped) through a second interdimensional portal that opens at the opposite end of the block.

THE TRUCK

• The InMech Corporation logo is blazoned across both sides of the trailer.
• The cab windows are so heavily tinted that you can’t see inside.
• The truck is driven remotely: A robotic lump sits in the seat, with a camera on a tripod jutting up and swiveling around.

THE BACK OF THE TRUCK

• There’s a big padlock securing the back of the truck. (Difficulty 1)
• Inside the back of the truck is a cryogenic coffin containing the offspring of one of the Roswell aliens. You can see her through the window on the top of the coffin: She’s wearing a “Britney Bitch” Britney Spears t-shirt from 2007. (She’s the cargo, in case that wasn’t clear.)

HIJACKING

• Whatever plan the PCs come up with to hijack or stop the truck is probably Difficulty 2.
• The truck defends itself by popping a laser gun on a waldo-like extension out of a concealed compartment from the side of the cab (just above the rear view mirrors). Difficulty 3 to avoid getting shot, but only Difficulty 1 to knock it out of action.

PDF EDITION FOR PATRONS

Character creation in Over the Edge is hyper-fast. It’s so fast, in fact, that you can trivially do it with brand new players as part of a four-hour one-shot.

Character Concept: Virtually any character concept is possible in Over the Edge, but there are a few core principles that your concept should honor.

• They Are Human. They might be mutants, metahumans, prodigies, freaks, or ghosts. But they are fundamentally human.
• They Follow “Hollywood” Reality. Hollywood lies about how the world really works for all the right reasons, and you should, too.
• They Are Not Played Straight. If your character is a common archetype, give it one weird twist: Not just a vampire, but a recovering vampire. Or a vampire who drinks human tears. Or is addicted to sunlight.
• They Don’t Wreck Plots. Your character does not grant wishes, read minds, mind-control people, see the future, stop time, or otherwise trivially wreck plots.

Main Trait & Side Trait: Your character has a main trait and a side trait. You’ve probably already unwittingly picked them with your character concept.

• Traits are not mechanically predefined things. They’re not picked from a skill list. They’re not feats. They’re not classes or archetypes. You make them up.
• The difference between main traits and side traits is that main traits are broadly interpreted and side traits are narrowly interpreted. For example, if your side trait is MMA Fighter then you’re really good at fighting. But if it’s your main trait, then you’re also good at working the crowd, dealing with publicity, knowing other fight performers, sizing people up, etc.

Level: Generally speaking, beginning characters will be Level 2.

Trouble: Your character’s Trouble is what lures or provokes them into doing unwise things from the perspective of the game world that are constructive or exciting for the players. It’s your excuse to do things that are fun instead of pragmatic. For example, you might listen to an imaginary friend. Or brag and say too much. Or take risks to help an innocent in danger.

Question Mark: This is the best part. An adjective or short phrase that describes a major truth about your character’s reputation or personal identity.

• They should not be capabilities (like Persuasive-? or Intimidating-?). Your traits describe your capabilities.
• Generally speaking, the question mark does NOT imply that this is something your character is uncertain or wishy-washy about. It is usually fundamentally true. The function of the Question Mark is to telegraph on the meta level that this fundamentally true thing might STOP being fundamentally true during play. For example, a Priest who is Faithful-? isn’t necessarily fully of doubt at the beginning of the game; but her player is saying that something might cause them to question their faith during the game.
• It’s usually best not to name in advance what will trigger the Question Mark: We want to discover that during play.

A good example of this is Indiana Jones: He’s Brave-? Totally brave. All the time. Until we discover, in play, that he’s terrified of snakes.

Tells: Tells are observable details the correlate to your characteristics. For example, a character with the Linebacker trait is… built like a linebacker. The Semi-Feral Brawler sniffs new people they meet. The Hacker is always wearing AR glasses.

• You assign tells for your Main Trait, Side Trait, Trouble, and Question Mark.

Group Questions: You wrap up character creation with a round of group questions. Every player should ask one question of another player & every player should also be asked a question about their character.

• Open Questions are the gentlest. (e.g., What hobbies, arts, activities, or interests does your character pursue?)
• Leading Questions put the character’s identity under another player’s influence. (e.g., What caused you to suddenly stop painting?)
• Really Leading Questions push hard. (e.g., How do you keep your superiors at the Church from finding out about your sex tourism habits?)

A player is always free to refuse a leading question or to reject the premise and answer it however they like.

And that’s it! Because it involves more open-ended creativity, it doesn’t quite work like Character Creation in 5 Sentences for D&D or Character Creation in 7 Sentences for Magical Kitties Save the Day, but it’s very similar in practice. I can usually get a whole table up and running with new characters in just 15-20 minutes, which usually also includes introducing them to the rules.

REAL CHARACTERS

Because character creation is so quick, I’ve done it A LOT over the past couple of years. I thought it might be fun to share some of these characters from actual play as an example of the sort of crazed creativity the setting and system of Over the Edge inspires. Because of the nature of the game, these are also fully functional pregenerated characters: Just add a starting Level and a round of Group Questions and you’re good to go!

JOJO

• Main Trait: Asasssin
• Side Trait: Ex-Circus Clown
• Trouble: Imagines his own personal soundtrack (and is heavily influenced by it).
• Bloodthirsty-?

I0

• Main Trait: Zen Coder
• Side Trait: Martial Artist
• Trouble: Locks are a challenge, not a statement.
• Structured-?

KEN

• Main Trait: Ex-SWAT
• Side Trait: Youtube Conspiracy Master
• Trouble: The Truth Is Out There
• Self-Confident-?

LODGE

• Main Trait: Spiritual Lodge (channels entities)
• Side Trait: Intermittently Institutionalized
• Trouble: Follows old souls.
• Mercurial-?

LADY

• Main Trait: Anger
• Side Trait: Zombie
• Trouble: Impulsive
• Trusting-?

ED SIMS

• Main Trait: Drifter
• Side Trait: Bad Luck
• Trouble: Enjoys upsetting bigger men.
• Honest-?

DR. ED SEXY

• Main Trait: Sexual Healing
• Side Trait: Kinkomancy
• Trouble: I listen to my dick.
• Likable-?

THE BIG DUDE

• Main Trait: Meta-Tourist
• Side Trait: Elementary School Teacher
• Trouble: Talks down to people.
• Innocent-?

JONATHAN TWEET

• Main Trait: Immortality
• Side Trait: Telling Aloofness
• Trouble: Turns the page.
• All-Knowing-?

(Yes, someone decided to play the designer of the RPG that they were playing. That’s the kind of crazy awesomeness that Over the Edge inspires.)

REE REYES

• Main Trait: Geekomancer
• Side Trait: Barista
• Trouble: Protective of their friends.
• Confident-?

SISTER PROMISE

• Main Trait: Inspirational Nun
• Side Trait: Sees what others cannot
• Trouble: Compelled to help the faithless.
• Selfless-?

RICK LEE

• Main Trait: Accidental Boddhisatva
• Side Trait: Successful Business Consultant
• Trouble: Existentially inquisitive.
• Determined-?

“SLOW HAND” LUKE

• Main Trait: Slow Gunslinger
• Side Trait: Animal Lover
• Trouble: 100% White Hat
• Confident-?

JERRY

• Main Trait: Assembled Man
• Side Trait: Well Read
• Trouble: Can’t Die
• Holding It Together-?

BOOKER

• Main Trait: Noir Detective
• Side Trait: Optimistic
• Trouble: Can’t say no to someone’s face.
• Straight-Edged-?

NEVAEH

• Main Trait: Socialite
• Side Trait: Insect Talking (But Not Wasps)
• Trouble: Can’t Resist Dirt
• Ruthless-?

LITA

• Main Trait: Con Artist
• Side Trait: Ghost
• Trouble: Vengeance
• Greedy-?

GARAMOND

• Main Trait: Crime Boss
• Side Trait: Exotic Artifact Collector
• Trouble: Collection Builder
• Former Criminal-?

EMERIC RAI

• Main Trait: Erotic Chef
• Side Trait: Knife Skills
• Trouble: Seeking ingredients
• Overconfident-?

MINOR TOM

• Main Trait: Astronaut
• Side Trait: Cosmic Abilities
• Trouble: No short term memory
• Expert-?

MORE OVER THE EDGE @ THE ALEXANDRIAN
Over the Edge: System Cheat Sheet
Over the Edge: One Weird Twist
Design Notes: Scenario Hooks for Over the Edge
Design Notes: Scenario Tools
Behind the Scenes: Welcome to the Island

LEAD DEVELOPER: Justin Alexander

Welcome to the Island features four all-new scenarios that can launch brand new story arcs, add intriguing complications to your existing arcs, or explode across you gaming table as exciting one-shots. Each scenario includes custom hooks for agents, burgers, cloaks, gangs, and mystics, making it easy for you to bring the action to your players no matter what kind of trouble they like getting into.

EXPLORE THE ISLAND

BATTLE OF THE BANDS takes you on the ultimate Al Amarjan road trip. There’s only one way to beat this Mover conspiracy. It’s time to get the band back together!

A CONCLAVE OF CHIKUTORPLS, or the Winds of Change Are Blowing (Up), or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Multidimensional Convergence. Place your bets now.

SEVERSEN’S MYSTERIOUS ESTATE is hosting the most important party on the entire Island, and you’ve got an invitation. Unfortunately, so do Dr. Morpheus, an astral vampire, a team of totem champions, and a Presidentials wetworks squad.

SYMPATHY OF THE D’AUBAINNES sees citizens all across the Edge receive a parcel containing a lifelike rubber mask of one of the D’Aubainnes. Once you put it on, you’ll find you can’t take it off. That’s when the killings start.

Produced with a grant from the Al Amarja Tourism Taskforce. Visit the Island today! Once you’ve come, you’ll never leave!

AWARD-WINNING AUTHORS

• Jonathan Tweet
• Justin Alexander
• Nick Bate
• Jonathan Killstring
• Jeremy Tuohy

WHAT I DID

In addition to working as the lead developer on the book for Atlas Games, I also co-authored “Seversen’s Mysterious Estate” with Jonathan Tweet.

It’s a one-shot sandbox.

An RPG sandbox exists when the players can either choose or define what the next scenario is going to be. So published scenarios are basically never sandboxes, because they almost always include a defined goal. Even old school dungeons, for example, are often designed to be included in a larger sandbox (as one scenario that the players could choose to explore), but are usually not sandboxes in and of themselves.

So how do you have a one session sandbox?

Well, in the case of “Seversen’s Mysterious Estate” the scenario is a party. Just… a party.

It uses the Party Planning scenario structure I developed and shared here back in 2015, and it’s chock full of amazing people and places and things that happen.

But why are the PCs there? And what will they do?

Well: That’s the sandbox. It’s entirely up to them.

One of the reasons we can make this work is because of how I’m doing scenario hooks for Over the Edge adventures. The general philosophy is that if you have a truly interesting situation, then there’ll inherently be lots of ways for the PCs to become interested in it. This doesn’t inherently create a sandbox, but it creates the OPPORTUNITY to start juggling hooks in the sandbox.

In addition, if you have a scenario that supports multiple scenario hooks, then it’s far more likely to be dynamic enough that players can choose how to interact with that scenario and what they want from it (rather than having the GM tell them those things).

For “Seversen’s Mysterious Estate,” one of the scenario hooks is literally just, “You get an invite to a party and you don’t know why. (No one does.)”:

Dr. Seversen has been working with the Cut-Ups to develop the Cut-Up Machine (see Over the Edge, page 180). On three separate test runs, the machine’s output consisted of the PCs’ names, neatly printed out on ParaCon invitations.

For a true one-shot, the super-fast character creation of Over the Edge makes it possible for you to create PCs and then directly ask the players, “So why do you want to go to this party?” Literally a sandbox presentation.

There’s also more traditional hooks. Here’s one:

Mystics: A PC’s mystic shit forms an oneiric resonance with the astral vampire (possibly due to a close encounter with the vampire in a coffee shop while it was attached to a previous host). They have premonitory dreams of its attacks at Dr. Seversen’s conference, including perhaps a very clear vision of its first target. They’ll have to finagle invitations if they want to do something about it.

Another cool thing you can do with all these different hooks is to give different hooks to different PCs: Giving the group lots of different vectors (and competing agendas)  will make the scenario inherently more dynamic.

This ALSO makes it easy to use any of the scenarios in the book (not just this one) as a meet-cute for your group: Everybody gets a different hook, they all end up in the same place, and — ta-da! — the party is formed in a team-up of mutual interest(s)!

WHAT ELSE IS IN THERE?

I worked closely with Nick Bate, Jonathan Killstring, and Jeremy Tuohy to create a suite of sweet scenarios.

If you’re looking for a published exemplar of the design principles I talk about here at the Alexandrian — stuff like Don’t Prep Plots, Node-Based Scenario Design, the Three Clue Rule, and the Universal NPC Roleplaying Template — then this is currently THE book for doing so.

One big thing I discovered while developing this book is just how flexible the party-planning scenario structure really is:

• For Jeremy Tuohy’s “Battle of the Bands,” we discovered that you can take the structure on the road, with the entire road trip being built around a variant.
• Jonathan Killstring’s “A Conclave of Chikutorpls,” expands the party-planning structure in time; using party-planning to model a crazed sequence of happenings that take place across several days or even weeks of time.
• We applied many of the same lessons to Nick Bate’s “Sympathy of the D’Aubainnes,” and then expanded it in space, as well, to handle a crazed political crisis culminating in existential riots that wrack the entire island. (Nick also beautifully weds this to a node-based Three Clue Rule investigation.)

(The book actually came out at the beginning of the year. But 2020 has been weird and I’m terrible at self-promotion, so failed to actually mention it here on the site. Check it out. I really am quite proud of it. If you’re buying in print, the deluxe version is very much worth it for the gorgeous full-color art.)

DESIGN NOTES FOR WELCOME TO THE ISLAND
Design Notes: Scenario Hooks for Over the Edge
Design Notes: Scenario Tools

MORE OVER THE EDGE @ THE ALEXANDRIAN
Over the Edge: System Cheat Sheet
Over the Edge: One Weird Twist

The much delayed Welcome to the Island, a collection of four scenarios for Over the Edge, will be releasing later this month. If you’re looking for scenarios that embody the design principles I talk about here on the Alexandrian, then this is the book you’ve been waiting for. Jonathan Tweet and I have collaborated on a scenario built around the party-planning game structure. The rest of the team, many of whom I originally recruited for Infinity, have created some really fantastic adventures featuring revelation lists, node-based scenario design, and a lot more cool stuff.

Welcome to the Island also features a small selection of what I now refer to as “scenario tools.” I first started developing these back around 2000 or 2001, early in my freelancing career, and have been slowly refining and adding to them ever since. If you’re just prepping notes for your home campaign, these are not things that you’d need (or want) to include. But published scenarios, they help bridge the gap between the author’s imagination and your gaming table. This often takes the form of giving you the tools to integrate a published scenario into your campaign: As writers there’s nothing we can do to avoid making a published adventure generic, but we can make it easier for you to take our generic plug-‘n-play module and make it a seamless part of what you and your players are creating.

These tools usually appear in sidebars. This intentionally segregates them from the main text of the scenario so that they don’t muddy up the presentation of the essential information you need at the table.

GROUNDWORK

Groundwork sidebars are used in scenarios to give examples of how a GM can incorporate elements of the scenario into their campaign prior to running the scenario. The idea is that you can make the scenario feel like an organic part of your campaign by properly laying the Groundwork for it.

We tend not to include anything that’s blatantly obvious. For example, you don’t need us to say something like, “This adventure features NPCs. You could have one of them show up before the adventure begins!” (Unless we have a particularly clever or relevant example of how that might work.)

SCENARIO THREADS

Scenario threads are the mirror image of Groundwork sidebars, suggesting ways in which elements of the scenario could be revisited in later scenarios.

In your home campaign, of course, this is something you should be doing organically: Pay attention to the people or places that particularly resonated with your players. If something interests them or is clicking for them, finding ways to reincorporate it into the campaign is an almost guaranteed success.

PLAYTEST TIP

By the time you’ve finished running a scenario, you’ll often have learned a lot about how you could have used it better. Some of these lessons can be applied in future scenarios, but it’s rare for a GM to have an opportunity to run the same scenario a second time. In published scenarios, though, we have the opportunity to share the insights we’ve gained during out playtests. These Playtest Tips are the “best practices” and offer suggestions for how particular encounters can be handled, alert you to potential problem areas, and try to provide other insights gleaned from our playtesting.

INTERSECTION

This is the newest addition my scenario toolkit and one that I picked up from previous editions of Over the Edge. Intersections reference other published scenarios and suggest how the material in that scenario could be tied to the material in this one. (For example, there’s a strange paranormal gadget in one scenario and a mad scientist in another scenario. When describing the mad scientist’s laboratory, we might include an Intersection that points out you could include a prototype or design notes for the paranormal gadget here, suggesting that this mad scientist was the one who developed it in the first place.)

For Welcome to the Island, these Intersections are limited to other scenarios in the same book. But future anthologies can include references between books, too.

FINAL THOUGHTS

The description of scenario tools in Welcome to the Island also includes revelation lists, which have been discussed here on the Alexandrian as part of the Three Clue Rule. I’d have included adversary rosters, too, but they aren’t used for any of the scenarios in this book. This material, along with the other tools described above, will be repeated in future adventure anthologies for Over the Edge because they weren’t included in the core rulebook. You can contrast this approach with Infinity, where I made sure these tools were described in the core rulebook specifically so that I wouldn’t have to explain them in every adventure we wanted to use them in.

(Which would be all of them, because they’re useful tools.)

I encourage other authors and publishers to also make use of these tools when writing scenarios for publication. They’re incredibly useful and I don’t feel like they should be put in a lockbox.

And if you have any suggestions for other useful tools I could be including in my published scenarios that would make them more useful for you to use at home, please let me know!

When I joined Atlas Games as the RPG Producer in December 2018, I inherited four of the best roleplaying games ever published: Feng Shui, Over the Edge, Ars Magica, and Unknown Armies. I knew that to do these games proper justice in the future, the first thing I needed to do was fully grasp their past. These were all games which I had played before (although, ironically, none of them in their current edition), but there was still a lot for me to learn. From day one, therefore, I embarked on a year-long project to not only bring every one of these games to my gaming table, but to also read every single supplement ever published for them.

As I worked my way through the corpus of Over the Edge supplements at the beginning of the year, I reflected on how difficult it is to produce scenario support for this type of RPG. Over the Edge is one of those games which presents an incredibly awesome setting filled to the brim with all kinds of amazing things for players and GMs to explore, but which — for precisely that reason! — doesn’t have a specific scenario structure that’s universally shared by its players. Without that universal scenario structure, it becomes very difficult to create published scenarios that can be reliably used by individual GMs.

(Which is not to say that Over the Edge hasn’t had some truly great scenarios written for it over the years. My personal favorites include Robin D. Laws Unauthorized Broadcast, Stephan Michael Sechi’s Welcome to Sylvan Pines, Jeff Tidball’s “In the SACQ”, Chris Pramas’ “The Jackboot Stomp,” and Greg Stolze’s “The Furchtegott File.” But although I love all of those scenarios, it would be virtually impossible for me to fit them all into the same campaign. Which is kind of my point.)

By contrast, for example, it’s very easy to create plug ‘n play scenarios for Shadowrun: Because every group is assumed to be shadowrunners who get jobs from a Mr. Johnson, all you need to do is frame your scenario as a job being offered by a Mr. Johnson and it can probably be used in 99% of Shadowrun campaigns.

One solution, of course, would be to simply eschew producing published scenarios for the game. There are any number of similar games which have done the same, focusing their product lines on cool setting supplements that give GMs even more awesome options for their campaigns. This , however, would be in significant conflict with my belief that roleplaying games flourish only in the presence of strong scenario support:

• Published scenarios are the single best way for GMs to grok how the game is supposed to work.
• Ready-to-play scenarios are the best way to convince GMs to try running the game for the first time.
• Incredibly cool scenarios are a great way to get people excited about running the game. (There’s any number of scenarios I’ve personally run because I just needed to see what would happen at the table; or that were so amazingly cool that I just had to share them with my players.)
• There are a lot of would-be GMs who, frankly, need the scenario support: Their time is limited and without published adventure material they won’t be able to run the game.

There’s also the fact the fact that I think published scenarios often improve campaigns in their own right, resulting in cool stuff that wouldn’t be possible otherwise.

Nonetheless, I knew that if I produced a typical scenario anthology for Over the Edge, a high percentage of the scenarios — no matter how good they were! — wouldn’t be usable by any given GM simply because they weren’t sympatico with their campaign. That would make the book substantially less valuable to everybody. I needed to fix that problem.

So I reached out to existing Over the Edge GMs to talk about the campaigns they had run and the campaigns they were looking forward to running with the new edition of the game.

What I slowly came to realize was that there were, in fact, several broad categories that most Over the Edge campaigns fell into. The specifics were different enough to create a crazy kaleidoscope of endless possibility, but the categories were tight enough that a GM operating within a given category would generally be able to adapt scenario hooks aimed at that category. So for the upcoming Welcome to the Island adventure anthology, I instructed my writers to include hooks for the following categories:

• Agents: Why would someone hire the PCs to get involved in this scenario? (Or, alternatively, why do the PCs need to do this on behalf of their patron without explicit orders?)
• Burger: How would someone who literally just got off the plane and caught a taxi from the Terminal get involved in this?
• Cloaks: Why would the various conspiracies on the Island care about this scenario (and send their trusty agents, the PCs, to deal with it)? Or, alternatively, what opportunity do the PCs become aware of and how do they become aware of it?
• Gangs: How do street-level operatives get tangled up in the scenario?
• Mystics: If the PCs are focused on mystic shit, how does that angle them into the scenario? Does someone/something seek them out due to their mystic powers? Do their mystic powers trigger or respond strongly to the situation? Does ancient arcane lore or a prophecy point them at the scenario?

It was also necessary to keep the hooks tight: Scenario hook sections in published adventures have a tendency to bloat up and claim more of the scenario’s word count than their utility warrants. This would be particularly true if people started writing up elaborate, multi-scene hooks for five different options. All we really needed was one or, at most, two paragraphs for each hook. (In no small part because, in my experience, GMs are going to heavily customize the hook to the specifics of their own campaign in any case.)

This actually lead to some initial confusion as we put this into practice. There was more than one person who produced a draft featuring stuff like, “Here’s stuff that Agents might find potentially interesting about what’s going on.” But I pushed: Brevity doesn’t equate to generality. A scenario hook needs to be specific. What is the specific thing that gets the PCs involved in the current situation?

HOOKS AT THE END

In the future, I will recommend that writers actually write their scenario hooks last. (Or possibly second-to-last depending on how you look at it.)

It probably won’t come as a surprise to most people reading this, but I want scenarios that are situations, not plots. You don’t necessarily need a specific hook in order to design a really cool, interactive situation filled to the brim with exciting stuff for the PCs to explore and for the GM to actively play. Requiring five different scenario hooks for each scenario actually emphasized this: Since the scenarios could not be dependent on any one on of these hooks, the scenarios quickly became independent of all of them, making it much easier for a GM who didn’t find any of those specific hooks interesting to nevertheless find a multitude of ways to draw their PCs into the situation.

At the same time, the fact that the scenario still needed to hypothetically support any one of those hooks also resulted in a richer scenario no matter which hook you used. The requirement necessarily forced the designers to create situations that were more dynamic, complex, and interconnected than they might have otherwise.

This is where this advice is potentially useful for homebrewers, too: If, for example, you use the Three Clue Rule to offer several options by which the PCs might become engaged with a given scenario, you will find that the need to include those three clues will inherently cause you to design more depth into the scenario. And that depth, in turn, will make it easier to improvise ways for the PCs to become engaged even if the three methods you’ve prepped don’t work for some reason.

For similar reasons, I suspect that even GMs who don’t have campaigns fitting one of the five broad categories I identified will nevertheless find it much easier to incorporate the scenarios in Welcome to the Island into their odd-ball campaigns. Having three to five different hooks makes it more likely that one of them can be trivially adapted to unusual circumstances. Or might feature a GMC similar enough to someone close to the PCs that you can make the whole thing intensely personal instead.