Lost Worlds RPG (1/2): An Unfinished Game
Lost Worlds is a heroic fantasy roleplaying game inspired by Cthulhu Dark, meant to facilitate a large player base, a rotating cast at each session, and a long-form campaign focused on exploration.
Premise
The heroes are members of a storied, fallen, and recently-revitalized order devoted to exploring the myriad worlds connected by ancient portals. Each session sees the heroes embark on a quest; they sally forth from their keep, journey across a lost world, and delve into a trove to recover an artifact.
The GM organizes sessions according to their availability. The players keep records of the sessions, including quest reports and map updates. When a session is organized, players choose a trove to explore with enough warning for the GM to prep it.
How to Play
The GM describes the situation. The players ask questions and describe what their heroes do. When necessary, the GM calls for the heroes to venture or explore. Otherwise, use conversation to guide play and find out what happens.
Rolling Dice
Make a pool of d6’s according to the following.
- +1 die if it's within mortal ability
- +1 die if it's within your calling's specialty
- +1 die if it's covered by one of your talents When you roll, count only the highest die.
Venture
When a hero acts despite danger, they succeed, but roll to see how well.
- On 1–3, they get less impact than they hoped for.
- On 4/5, they get expected impact.
- On 6, they get greater impact than expected. If any dice match, they get a bonus: useful information, a temporary advantage, a helpful twist to the situation.
Push
Heroes can pay a price or invite trouble to push their venture roll one step higher (1–3 becomes 4/5, etc). Pay a price means losing something good. Invite trouble means a new problem or complication is introduced.
Explore
When a hero investigates the environment, they get useful information, but roll to see how much.
- On 1–3, they get the bare minimum information to be useful.
- On 4/5, they get solid information.
- On 6, they get detailed information and follow-up questions. If none of the dice match, they pay a price or invite trouble.
Failure
When the GM or another player thinks it would be interesting for a hero to fail when they venture or explore, they describe what failure would look like and roll d6. If this roll is higher than the hero’s roll, they fail in the way that was described.
Cooperate
Everyone who's cooperating says how they're helping and adds dice to the pool as normal.
Compete
Everyone who's competing says what they do to win and what their victory will look like, then rolls. The high roller wins.
What's Missing
The rules/procedures/mechanics/whatever-they-might-have-been for sally forth, journey, and delve. So, essentially, the actual gameplay loop never saw the light of day.
Frameworks for developing troves and artifacts. The former are essentially a "dungeon of the week". The latter are the treasure or lore or helpful NPC that you're delving for in the first place.
Callings, talents, and anything about making a character. They're referenced, and I made some stabs, but I never hit a framework for them I was happy with. Don't go digging for them in my computer, you'll find only unsettling tableaux...
The Future
Maybe someday, I'll finish this game. It's one of several contenders for my group's next campaign, so there's certainly impetus.
Tune in at a later date if you want to know about the story behind Lost Worlds, and my thoughts on why it remains unfinished.