Twisted Cities

I like city crawls with relatively simply tables based around who, what, and where - the "how" is determined by then GM after all the dice hit the table. A simple table is shown below. In practice, these tables are more fleshed out, with much more detail and interesting bits, but I simply need a table to illustrate how this works for a city crawl: d6 Who What Where 1 A small crying child Being kicked and beaten by a small group of folk An abandoned building, dark and creaky 2 A small gang of thugs, looking for action Pursued by a wild animal An alley just off the main streets 3 (a recurring character) Running. Just running A disreputable shop selling stolen goods 4 A blind priest, looking for alms Worriedly consulting some papers and looking about A cafe or tavern, full of people minding their own business 5 A obviously wealthy individual, very out of place Eating a very large meal, and offering to share A workshop full of carpenters an

Adventure roleplaying games, the ones where a group of folks seek treasure, power, or similar reward, often take place in strange wilderness or dark dungeons. Rarer, though, are the games that take place in an urban setting. Urban adventuring has always been my favorite style of play, and that's what I intend to use this blog for. I think there are four great settings that most appropriately capture my idea of a fantasy urban sprawl: Ages ago, I cut my roleplaying teeth on Planescape  and the city of Sigil at the center of the multiverse. The setting excited me because it presented a city where all manner of good and evil existed in a sort of stalemate. No one was really in charge of the day to day, but a handful of factions tried to take over the basic duties. Years later, the Planarch Codex  came into being, presenting the hungry city of Dis that consumes other cities throughout the multiverse. This city was clearly inspired by Sigil and Planescape, and presses the