Have you ever wanted to get involved in running tabletop roleplaying games and thought “But I have no ideas!”? The Big Red Couch is designed to show exactly how easy it is to get from random notions that stick in your mind to playable concepts, all through the medium of the kind of casually weird spitballing that gamers engage in at the best of times. In every issue, the intrepid contributors to the Big Red Couch brave the noisome wonders of The Mystery Box to produce a randomly-selected seed idea, then return Some Time Later to share what they came up with and discuss how those concepts might work as games. If we can do it, anyone can: that’s the whole idea. Along the road, we discuss what RPG systems might work for implementing different concepts, together with reasons how or why. This frequently involves adaptation of systems from their original settings to the point where they creak under the strain.
https://hoarde.net/bigredcouch
Episode One Hundred And Five – Fantasy + Post Apocalypse = ?
When someone on the ‘mad’ side of the Alchemist spectrum releases a self-replicating magic-consuming substance across the land, the high-magic realm swiftly grinds to a halt as Dragons stop flying & floating cloud cities crash into the ground.
On the plus side, the undead menace is gone.
On the minus, those beautiful crystal bridges probably can’t support their own weight.
The utterly generic Kingdom of Niceness has been at war with the entirely derivative Lands of the Dread Lord for centuries. It’s always been a low-key thing, with skirmishes and raids and very little change.
Until now.
Nobody backed down, nobody withdrew, they’ve used more & more powerful magics, it became increasingly difficult to tell the sides apart any more, and they’ve reduced themselves and everything in between to rubble.
As dawn breaks, the remnants of the garrisons on both sides of a minor mountain pass emerge from the cave they’ve been sheltering in, and wonder what to do next.
When a solar flare, or alien invasion, or assault be extraplanar entities makes the surface un-survivable, the denizens of a fantasy realm retreat to the only place left – The dungeons.
The world tore itself apart, and your small band of survivors from all sides of the conflict are trying to make their way in a world gone mad.
Or maybe you’re the ones who’ve gone mad.
Or maybe the world really has become this psychedelic fantasy-land?
A patch of primordial forest, with primordial creatures, is growing rapidly, shutting down any technology it encounters. Right now it’s in the middle of the desert, but if it keep growing it’s going to hit towns and cities.
Can it be stopped?
Can it be turned back?
And, without planes or jeeps, can you even reach the centre of the thing in time?
When a Fantasy Realm started to expand into the modern world, we turned to LARPers & the SCA to find a solution.
The Postman, by David Brin
Postman Pat
Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett
When the Wind Blows, by Raymond Briggs
Transformers
Lindsay Ellis deconstruction of the Transformers movies
And Hobbit movies
Apocalypse World
Earthdawn (FASA)
Thor: Ragnarok
Taika Waititi
Grimtooth’s Traps
The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
Doom (1993 PC Game)
Mad Max (movies)
Yojimbo
The Man With No Name
Into the Badlands
Nick Frost
Black Mirror
The Incredibles
The Day of the Triffids, by John Wyndham
Fief
Manorialism
Log Horizon
Akihabara
Fifth Millennium Series, by S.M. Stirling
Pugmire
Monarchies of Mau (Geek and Sundry link)
Numenera
Reign of Fire
Tribe 8 (RPG)
Tribe 8 (band)
Grunts!, by Mary Gentle
Shadowrun
Dark Sun
Adventure Time
Archer
Twilight 2000
Sword of Shannara, by Terry Brooks
The Shannara Chronicles (TV)
GeoGuessr
Wellington, NZ
Devonport, NZ
Skyline
Slipstream
Apocalypse Now
Microscope (RPG)
The Gone-Away World, by Nick Harkaway
Dungeons & Dragons
Chaga / Evolution’s Shore, by Ian McDonald
Annihilation, by Jeff VanderMeer
Torg
Torg Eternity (Ulisses Spiele Edition)
Hothouse, by Brian Aldiss
Fringeworthy
Emberverse, by S.M. Stirling
DC-3
Planetes
Stargate SG-1