my downtime rules

(These are for 5e, but can be adapted to just about anything. The most important thing they're meant to do is to make downtime a meaningful scarce resource, and to give players a cast of NPCs for us all to play with. There's also an attempt to attack 5e's five-minute adventuring day and caster-martial disparities, especially around high levels and outside of the combat situations, where they are strongest.)

During a week of downtime you can take downtime actions. You can take actions equal to three plus the number of extra attacks/cunning actions you get. Unless otherwise noted you can't double up on the same kind of action in the same week. These include

• Work: work enough to pay for your lodging and basic needs.
• Rest: get the benefits of a long rest, aside from renewal of spells higher than 2nd level.
• Train: you must spend a number of weeks equal to your current level training to advance to a new level. Half rounded up must be consecutive. Can also be used to acquire language or tool proficiencies. If you have an appropriate mentor, may be used to unlock abilities a level early.
• Build friendship: spend time with an NPC to build up a positive relationship - drinking buddies, romance, business partners, you tell me. (Renew with the Maintain Relationships action, which must be maintained once each moon) You can invent an appropriate NPC or as if it would work with an existing one. Friendly NPCs can help you out, make social introductions, consulted for knowledge, might accompany you on adventures, and so on. They also might expect the same.
• Maintain friendships: spend time with, or write heartfelt letters to, up to (2 + Cha bonus) NPC friends once each moon to maintain friendly status. (You can do this more than once a moon to maintain such relationships with more people.)
• Bully: you can also maintain an intimidating relationship with up to (Cha or Str + Intimidation proficiency) NPCs who are weaker than you. They maintain fear of you and won’t do anything to inspire your ire unless they get assurances from a faction that could offer them protection. (You can both bully and maintain friendship with the same people if you particularly want to invest in their loyalty - this typically looks like putting a lot of work into getting them to accept their status as a valued minion.)
• Study: spend time with a complex book or artifact to understand it better, or research a topic at a library you have access to.
• Stalk: follow someone's movements, or case a building. Typically a Stealth roll to not get caught and Investigation roll to find the information you're looking for.
• Carouse: go down a stress level, and something unexpected happens (most often an unexpected new friend, new enemy, or debt.)
• Prayer: go down a stress level level. Strange dreams may intrude, offering information or other blessings in exchange for more stress or obligations. One week of this is required to renew (as per a RAW long rest) 3rd level divine spells, two consecutive weeks to renew 4th level divine spells, and so on. Might be combined with something else depending on circumstances.
• Arcane Research: One week of this is required to renew (as per a RAW long rest) 3rd level arcane spells, two consecutive weeks to renew 4th level arcane spells, and so on. If you have a new book or other source of arcane lore, get the benefits of the study action as well.
• Something else, you tell me.

If you have a warlock patron, they will typically require one downtime action per week doing their bidding - either "do this specific thing" or "do something that advances this plan" - for you to stay in their favor. If you are out of favor, warlock abilities that would require a short rest require a long rest, or at least a night's rest, instead.

As with anything else, tell me what concrete in-world actions your character takes to do these. In-world logic trumps game rules.

We can typically handle downtime over email. If you're incommunicado I'll assume work/rest/something else reasonable.

1HD = 2 + 1d4

Marcia writes with airtight logic that 1 HD = 4 hp. But hit dice are meant to be rolled!

From my perspective, the ideal is to split out unbloodied and bloodied tracks. The unbloodied track is a known quantity; it represents the minimum level of how much a thing of that order can take. The bloodied track is a mid-combat surprise: you've tested this guy's mettle, and here's how tough he really is.

 This has a couple of benefits from my perspective:

It's an anti-railroading device, much like reaction and morale rolls. If you're mechanically transparent and let the players roll for opponents' bloodied hp, you've removed any worry that players will think you're fudging for dramatic convenience; if for the sake of logistical convenience you want to say "yeah I think you've pretty decisively won this fight we can montage you winning the rest rather than play it out" you can do so from a position of credibility. 

It's a cinch to calculate, either starting with monster HD or monster HP. Starting with HD in an old-school system, you can have unbloodied equal to 2xHD, and then bloodied equal to 1d4xHD (I recommend a single d4, the result of which is multiplied by HD.) If you have a suggested HP, then you can go with bloodied as equal to half default HP and bloodied equal to d(default HP) - round to nearest at-hand polyhedron (good use for Zocchi dice) or take 1d10 and multiply by closest multiple of 10. (So 35 hp becomes 17 ub, d30x3 bl.)

It's a bit gamey but diegetically plausible, as sometimes you don't know how tough someone is until they're battle-tested. 

It avoids the traditional scaling issue of traditional rolled HD, in that as you roll more and more dice as HD goes up, swinginess goes down and there's a lot of calculation to do.

It builds in pacing and surprise into combat, as suddenly things may turn out to be much tougher or easier than expected. Strategies may have to be adjusted.

"new game plus" ability score generation

Here's a small way to make dying more fun. 

When you roll up a new character, for each ability score you can either

1. roll 3d6 raw, or
2. take (21 - your last character's score in this ability)
3. cash in a relevant ability score card for a free 16

 When a character dies or retires, you get an ability score card depending on how they did so:

1. Strength if they died of starvation in the wilderness,
2. Dexterity if they died of a trap,
3. Constitution if they died in combat,
4. Intelligence if they died of a curse, doom, spell, or the like
   
5. Wisdom if they retired to settle down with a family, business, or the like
   
6. Charisma if they retired to nurse their wounds, too traumatized to either live out an adventurers' or a normal life

If multiple categories apply, choose your favorite. If none apply or if the death is really epic or weird, the GM can come up with an appropriate other kind of boon.

(Combine with ensemble cast ability scores as desired.)

It Takes a Village (ability score generation method)

 Rook asks for people's favorite ways of generating ability scores. Here's mine:

1. 3d6, down the line.
2. Give this person a name, something that keeps them busy (rolling on an appropriate background table works!), something they want, and (if this isn't the very first person we know about in this world) a relationship to one other person. Make sure it's all on an index card or a spreadsheet row, but nothing more than that.
3. Repeat (going around the table as you do so) until everybody's bored of it. 
4. All of these are now part of your stable of characters. Anybody can choose any and give them a single class level to start.

If you like, you can set things up for generational play by requiring half the rolls to be for minors - roll 2d6 for each stat and when time in the campaign has advanced enough, give them their additional d6 in each stat and make some suppositions about who they've become by that point. 

save vs. True Love

In those days people fell in love much more suddenly than at present, as all ancient stories make manifest: it is not a matter of wonder, therefore, that the hearts of the three cavaliers were completely captured; especially as gratitude was added to their admiration; it is a little singular, however, though no less certain, that each of them was enraptured with a [a different one of the three princesses].

- Washington Irving, Tales of the Alhambra

Being struck by love in the old stories has a few common features:

•  It's "love at first sight," with criteria that may not be entirely shallow - an intuitive sense of the goodness or innocence of the beloved isn't a contributing factor - but definitely include beauty and exclude, say, a shared history of mutual respect and compatible goals
• There's definitely not a presumption that it's reciprocated; that's for you to figure out, kid. The map of lovers and beloved is neither surjective nor injective and certainly not bjective.
  
• Despite the shallowness of its causes, it's not shallow in its effects; you want your beloved to love you back forever. Any basically decent person will want to enter into a mutually happy and permanent marriage with their beloved. Evil tyrants and other bastards with no sense of mutuality will kidnap and abuse the victim of their infatuation, but even they will be frustrated if the beloved  withholds (as they typically do) the assent of their heart even as their body is stolen. 
• There's an unlimited range of language springing from a very limited range of metaphors: to be struck by love is to be enchanted, bewitched, or completed; to be with the beloved is to have the greatest treasure; to be without is to be sick or struck dead.  

Here are a few OSE-comptaible rules, easily adapted to similar systems:

1. When you encounter a potential love, save vs. Spells with advantage to avoid becoming Lovestruck. "Potential" here takes account of age, species, and if appropriate gender; it definitely requires (1) that you not already be Lovestruck and (2) that this is the most beautiful potential love that you've ever seen (or, if you hear them singing unseen, heard). (Hence why the young are so much more likely to be lovestruck than the old, though the latter is still quite possible.) Players are welcome to set in advance criteria for whom their character might fall in love with, but once this is set, it’s down to the throw of the dice, not convenience to the plot or anyone else.
   
2. Marrying your true love is a treasure worth 1,000 gp, doubling every year that they're alive, faithful, in love with you back, and not imperiled. Them ceasing to be any of these things may result in XP debt.
3. If your beloved becomes definitely not alive, faithful, or in love with you back, save vs. Poison each full moon or suffer the effects of a Cause Disease spell. The death of such a disease is a deep depression that can only be cured, of course, by True Love's Kiss, though mournful elf-song, perhaps, can abate it.

With the consent of the lovestruck person only, being Lovestruck can be obviated with a Dispel Magic or Cure Disease.

simple Δiegetic advancement

With apologies to PbtA, Sam's Zouave achievements, and Justin's Quester.

• Whenever failing at a roll gets you in trouble, make a little mark next to it.
  
• Each time you waste more loot than you have before on carousing/charity/training/something else fun, improve all of those things by one. 
• Or if incrementation by one is a huge deal, maybe flip a coin or somethingto see if any given one advances.
  

Technically this is not Mosaic Strict. But it's light and portable and organic and I hope fits the same spirit!

turbo tag: the simple quick combat system you already know how to run

I've made some quick combat systems before, but they all had a fatal flaw: they take more than a sentence to explain. Okay, then, here's the sentence:

Like trad combat, but all attacks (which can only be against combatants lower in the initiative order) instantly hit to kill and initiative, which is a general measure of combat ability, is rolled every round

More formally, when you'd "roll for initiative:"

1. Everybody can choose to flee or parley, or keep fighting.
2. Everybody rolls a combat check (see below for a few system examples.)
3. Starting with the highest combat check and moving on down, combatants can choose to down one opponent with an equal or lower combat check. Combatants might also take some relevant non-combat action (such as fleeing.)
4. Go back to (1). 

Like all my quick combat systems, this is liable to be "swingy," which some people don't like. I prefer the designation fast and high-stakes, but note that designates the same thing.

General tips

1. Like with other combat systems, quick or not, "kill" doesn't mean actually mean kill. Down and out of combat. Maybe they can get healed later, with or without injuries. This system cannot overcome the fact that random character death can only be fun if character creation is fast, so adjust lethality accordingly.
   
2. Rather than rolling initiative, marking it up, and then going through each combatant's choice, call it down from the top like an auction block. Every number is a chance to die!

Mosaic Strict Version

The combat roll equals (combat bonus) + (1d6 exploding) + (any circumstantial bonuses GM sees fit to assign). 

Your combat bonus starts at 0, or whatever makes sense for your character. It goes up by 1 whenever you down a combatant whose combat bonus is greater than yours in a both absolute and circumstance-adjusted sense.. 

Implementation in D&D 5e

The combat roll is 1d20 + (damage on a successful hit or cantrip attack) + ((AC bonus + attack bonus) x (attacks you can make per round + lowest spell slot of three spells you're willing to expend)). The d20 explodes. 

For monsters, you can guesstimate the total bonus at 6 + (challenge rating * 3).

Implementation in Exalted

The combat roll has a pool of (Median Physical Stat, or highest Approach if Essence) + (combat ability). Each Charm you have in that skill beyond the Excellency raises the Excellency's die adder cap by 1.

an even quicker combat system

 

Unlike my other quick combat system, this doesn't stand alone and therefore isn't MOSAIC strict. Instead, you can graft it on to any other system with a task resolution system where characters have something like skill ratings, like Pottery +5 or whatever.

This represents a small skirmish in which death for PCs is a serious possibility. If you don't want the possibility of death, either change the stakes or skip the rolls and describe how the PCs win.

1. Flee! Parley! Reconsider! Speak now or forever hold your peace!
   
2. Make a relevant skill roll (or make "combat" its own skill) twice. The first represents your ATTACK, while the better of the two represents your DEFENSE. 
3. Take the median ATTACK (rounding "up" if there are an even number of PCs) of the PCs. That's their GROUP ATTACK.
4. Among the opponents of the PCs, take the Nth best ATTACK as their GROUP ATTACK, where N is the order number that gave the median order amongst PCs. (So if there are 5 PCs, you use the third best monster attack just like you used the third best PC attack, regardless of how many monsters there are.) If there are fewer than N monsters, give the lowest monster an additional ATTACK roll and take the lower as their GROUP ATTACK.
   
5. Everyone whose DEFENSE is lower than the other side's GROUP ATTACK is dead.
6. Go go back to Step 1.

To combine this with something else going on - trying to disassemble the Apocalypse Orrery whilst the others fight off laser sharks - have the PCs who are doing the skill check contribute zero to ATTACK (while they roll for relevant other things instead) while still counting as a party member for rolling DEFENSE and counting towards the median.

Example: Alice the fighter, Bob the wizard, and Carla the rogue encounter a Copyright-Nonspecific Floating Eye Creature. Alice rolls 1d20+7 = {11, 20}, Bob 1d20+3= {7, 12}, and Carla 1d20+5 = {24, 12}. The CNFEC rolls 1d20+6 = {14, 20}, and since there's no second creature he attacks with disadvantage at {{14, 13}, 20} giving us raw scores of

	Attack	Defense
Alice	11 (counts as GROUP ATTACK)	20 (> 13)
Bob	7	12 (<13)
Carla	24	24 (>13)
CNFEC	13 (counts as GROUP ATTACK)	20 (>11)

Result: wizard dies from laser beam to head.

 

Mosaic Loose: a personal anticanon of crunch for dungeon fantasy

Here's a bunch of modular shit you can paste together for Yon Dungeon Fantasy. There's too much of it to be proper FKR, the forms aren't signed to make it Mosaic Strict, and there's no GLOG base to make it GL∆G, but the ethos is very much in that space - everything is meant to be modular, diegetic, and (though I'm presenting this as a bunch of rules) "rules-light procedure-heavy."

Only break into any of these procedures when it's called for. For most things the player describes actions → GM describes consequences → player describes actions cycle functions perfectly well.

Obviously, I’m curious what others’ procedure anticanons would look like, and figure I’ll keep fiddling around with this.

 Collaborative Worldbuilding

1. Load up Azgaar's. No rerolls, what you see is what you get (make sure to download the .map file so you can consult it later). Player newest to RPGs picks an a starting area they find interesting.
2. Going clockwise around the table (starting with that newest player) until everyone gets bored, everyone except the GM (whose job is to collate notes) something "everybody knows," or at any rate 95% of people believe, to be true. (If you're playing online, instead of having an order, anybody can go in any order as long as two other people have posted since they last did.)
   
3. GM secretly decides what's actually true.
   

Character Creation, Advancement, and Magic

• my character creation system
• advancement per Sam's Zouave Achievements
• GL∆G wizardry per Michael and Lexi, or GM makes up how this shit works based on what the players came up with last round (don't tell the players what the achievements are!)
  

Equipment

• obviously use whatever list makes sense for your setting but ktrey's chart is convenient for listing weight and slots and even coins, per your preference
• children and frail people can carry 6 slots, the average healthy person 10, people with athletic builds maybe more (or in some cases less) per their type
  

Exploration

• the travel time tables from Justin's Hexcrawl procedures. NB since it's giving diegetic inputs you can plug it into a hexmap, or use the route function on Azgaar's). Add other parts of Justin's system as you find them interesting or they become relevant
  
• John's procedure for wandering monsters; roll every other watch (8-hour period per above), but use a d10 with 7-10 being nothing much
• spelunking per Downcrawl rules when you want to get elaborate; also you can probably adapt those to sea travel without too much difficulty. Roll wandering monsters per above with d6 each day.
  

Interpersonal Interaction

• just roleplay lol
• d666 reaction rolls
  
• Zenosyne's Parley system, for when you want to put a clock on convincing an NPC
  

Combat

• quick combat, for "combat as war"
  
• dueling, for "combat as sport"/tactically interesting fights between equals
• chess-based mass combat 

Domain management

• my neo-physiocratic seeing like a state system
  

General Task Resolution options

• Dreaming Dragonslayer's stopwatch resolution, which is like flipping a coin but with more anxiety!
  
• success and safety, for when those are to be orthogonal to each other and you want to have a little math setup
  

seeing like a state: a system for domain management

For every 100 primary producers (farmers, fisherfolk, miners, craftspeople who are producing materials for the same, traders engaged in transporting goods and otherwise serving the community, their dependent elders and children) who owe their allegiance - or at least a meaningful portion of their produce, whether that's defined in terms of taxes or rent or interest or protection money - to you, you get one surplus.

Multiply the surplus you get by two if the land/fishing/whatever is more than marginal, by four if it's positively lush and productive, and by ten if it's by a rare resource (like mining tin or coal) or during the slack season. Double it if you oppress them, as in rule through institutions designed to squeeze out as much surplus as possible. (You can oppress some section of the producing population but not others.) By default oppressing or not is up to the PCs, but diegetic details may imply that switching from one to the other requires a significant amount of work, quests, whatever.

Each point of surplus represents somebody doing something that has no immediate economic value to the community itself and is instead doing something for your (possibly perfectly benevolent or necessary) ends. You may want to designate these as soldiers or servants.

For the utility of soldiers, refer to your minisystem of choice for dealing with war. "Soldiers" here can refer to anyone permanently engaged in the process of improving your war capacity; actual soldiers as well as armorers and engineers and doctors and so on.

Servants are anybody engaged in showing off the mere fact that you have a lot of surplus to throw around. Other rich people will respect you basically proportional to the number of servants you can muster. 

Miscellaneous surplus might also be spent on something useful that isn't for war or for show; i.e., scholars researching the names of God that will allow you to cast the next spell, or whatever. (Obviously, scholars might also function as soldiers or servants, depending on their use.)

Jeon Min Seok

Passing the Buck

If you're off adventuring, or for every 5000 people you have indirectly working for you, you must appoint an NPC to act as intermediary. 

Intermediaries can be appointed by you or elected by the community. ("Election" might not be literal; at any rate the issue is to whom intermediaries are institutionally responsible. Likewise if there are literal  free elections but all candidates are in your pocket that's appointment in rules terms.)

If intermediaries are elected, or if intermediaries are appointed and you're oppressive, 2-in-6 chance that half the surplus is reported to you as existing, but actually doesn't.

If intermediaries are appointed and you're not oppressive, 2-in-6 chance the intermediary oppresses them anyway, then uses the extra surplus for themselves.

Community reaction rolls

When you're interacting with a community or institution or perhaps individual that's part of your domain, and they aren't oppressed (possibly just: aren't oppressed and have been been for some time), GM can roll on the following table. (Roll a d6, or d8 if they're sorta oppressed or otherwise affronted.)

1. Patriots who are enthuasistic about your rule and eager to come up with ways to help accomplish your goals.
2. Squeaky wheels who want to milk your reputation for benevolence. (If you have an appointed intermediary, they may complain they're being oppressed.)
3. Genuine squeaky wheels who have some problem that only you can fix. (If you do, they become patriots for an appropriate time.)
4. Mistrustful liberty-lovers who are (likely quite justifiably) jealous of the autonomy they've gotten used to and are worried you'll take it away.
5. Preoccupied with something that has nothing to do with you.
6. Opportunists who function as patriots if you've had a string of victories recently and mistrustful liberty-lovers if you've had a string of defeats.
7. Roll on next table.
8. Roll on next table.
   

If they are oppressed, or at any rate have been oppressed recently, GM can secretly roll on the following. (Use a d6, or a d8 if they're only kinda oppressed or have been at least sorta won over ideologically.)

1. Cowed and will do whatever you ask. (Other than be honest with you: they will tell you you're non-oppressive and great.) 3-in-6 chance of turning to open revolt if a nearby community has been in that and won some victories thereby.
   
2. Brown-nosers who want to advance within the ranks of oppression.
3. Trusting in the good of the czar and blaming your intermediaries (if any) for their oppression. 4-in-6 chance they do in fact know whether it's you or the intermediary that's the problem.
4. In open revolt or non-cooperation as soon as you show any weakness. (Give out some exemplary punishments in advance to make them cowed for a bit, while perhaps reducing the surplus they produce for you.)
5. Preoccupied with something that has nothing to do with you.
6. In acute crisis from some problem resulting from their oppression. (Helping them out may turn them into brown-nosers, failing to do so may bring them to open revolt.)
7. Roll on previous table.
8. Roll on previous table.
   

Stating the obvious

Adjust all numbers in accordance with diegesis and GM fiat. This system is Mosaic Strict.

(see also)

a flexible resolution mechanic

I won't say a "universal" resolution mechanic, which would be against the spirit of Mosaic Strict, which this is. But you can use it in a lot of situations - think of it as in the same phylum as Dreaming Dragon's Stopwatch Dueling Game. Works best when there's both reward and risk, but they can vary independently.

Use for finding the research question without your shit getting stolen or for stealing shit without getting noticed. (Howard Lyon)

Materials needed

A bunch of d20s.

Advantage Level

You intuitively already get this, but advantage level is just how many dice of advantage/disadvantage something at. Consult the following chart:

advantage level	dice thrown
+X	best of (X+1)d20
+2	best of 3d20
+1	best of 2d20
0	1d20
-1	worst of 2d20
-2	worst of 3d20
-X	worst of (X+1)d20

What the Player does

I'd say "declare what your PC is doing," but actually the GM should invoke this minigame only after you've declared what your PC is doing. So starting there...

Start with your SUCCESS and SAFETY pools at ADVANTAGE LEVEL 0 (physically represented by 1d20 each.)

For each of the following:

• You do something like this routinely
• You've succeeded at doing something as difficult as this before
• You were present when another PC died trying to do something like this
  
• You've prepared for this exact situation
• Multiple people with complementary skills are working together on this
• You're approaching this in a clever way (can be invoked multiple times, but GMs should consider sufficiently clever approaches to simply succeed) 
• Some other circumstantial advantage
  

increment by one the ADVANTAGE LEVEL of either the SUCCESS or SAFETY pools by one. You can do this by physically adding 2d0s: feels great, right?

What the GM does

For each of the following:

• No one in living memory has done this before
• No one has done this before, ever
  
• Someone's interfering with the PCs
• There's a time limit
• The environment is chaotic
• A tool or ability the PCs would normally have to deal with this isn't present
• They're trying to do something else at the same time
• Some other circumstantial disadvantage
  

decrement by one the ADVANTAGE LEVEL of either the SUCCESS or SAFETY pools by one. Do this by physically taking away and then, once you hit negative levels, adding ominous d20s: makes the players squirm, doesn't it?

Resolution

Roll both pools separately. Interpret each pool as so:

die result	diegetic result
20	as good as one could imagine
11-19	better than expected!
2-10	worse than expected
1	as bad as it could possibly get

a character creation system for FKR and Mosaic Strict

(These are adapted from Kneipen & Knappen, a small FKR game I wrote. Reposting mostly for attestation: these rules are Mosaic Strict. They can easily be combined with Dan's Caretaker module; the below are more about external facts about your character while Caretaker is more about the internal side.)

MICA

Choose one of the following sentences and write it down:

• "I was born (age) years ago to (community)."
• "I was born (age) years ago and have never had a real home for (reason), instead learning enough to get by in (community), (community), and (community)."

Choose one of the following sentences and write it down:

• "I am built like a (type of athlete)." (see for inspiration)
• "I am built like a (type of athlete), but since receiving (permanent injury) I have compensated by learning (skill)."
• "I stay up late squinting at dust-ridden tomes of (subject)."
• "I am aged and weary after a long life of (activity)."
• "I am a child - nimble, cute, and feeble."
• "I am dissolute from my enjoyment of (vice) with (buddy), (buddy), and (buddy)."

Choose one of the following sentences and write it down:

• "I studied (skill) under (master or organization). My relations with them are (either a good relationship that implies continued mutual obligations or a bad one that means you have enemies)."
• "I've worked odd jobs as (profession), (profession), and (profession)."
• "I've achieved the heights of success in (profession), but only through luck and deception that I suspect is on its way out."
  
• "I know very little, but I do have a natural talent for (skill)." 
• "I haven't needed to learn or do much of anything because of (source of independent wealth)"
  

Write down ALL of the following sentences:

• "I'm known in (community) as (reputation)."
• "I owe (somebody or something) a favor for (useful thing)."
• "When people first see me, they assume (things about me)."
  

If you want, write down: 

• "I can (magic); but (lore-relevant price)."
  

List any equipment you have which would follow from the above choices.

Expand on or come up with variations of any of the above, and adjust for genre as needed, but try to pair new good things with new bad things.

a system for carousing

In dungeon fantasy as in life, carousing converts money and indiscretion into experience(s). If you decide to go out for a night on the town and say "yes" to whatever happens, this system is for you. You'll want a Tarot deck and groups of PCs with more money than sense.

idk who made this but it seems apposite

Fun Threshold

Each character has a FUN THRESHOLD. By default, a PC's fun threshold is 10; minors and scolds start at 6; rakes and rapscallions start at 12. Fun Threshold can go up from Partying Too Hard (see below) or go down whenever you take on a serious vow or responsibility. Additionally, you have an additional point of Fun Threshold for each other PC partying with you.

Each context has also has a FUN THRESHOLD, starting at 5 and going up for each digit of people (10 → 100 → 1,000 → ...) present in the settlement, +1 if it is a holiday, +1 if the community as a whole has another reason to celebrate, +1 if it has a reputation for iniquity. (A group of adventurers around a campfire is a settlement, albeit a small one; if so, some creativity in results may be required.)

Rounds of Play

Shuffle the tarot deck and begin with the player of the most rakish PC. That player can boast about some new achievement a comrade has had since their last common carousing; if so, increase the Fun Threshold of the context by one. They then can declare either:

1. that they've had enough and are done for the night (they are Out), or,
2. that they're enthusiastic about going along with whatever opportunity for fun unfolds next, and ask the GM to deal a card into the Fun Pile
   

If the total value of cards exceeds the Fun Threshold of the context, party's over. If not, and the total value of cards exceeds the Fun Threshold of anyone who's still In, they are now Out from having Partied Too Hard, and their personal Fun Threshold increases by one. 

(Minor Arcana have either the obvious value or, if they're a face card, 10. Major Arcana have a value equal to their number.)

If no one else is In, the party's over. If not, go clockwise to the next character that's In.

Don't interpret anything until the next step.

Interpretation

In the morning, characters piece together what happened the previous night. Each card represents something that happened or someone they met, if they were In at the time. Although the GM is the ultimate arbiter of what the cards represent, she should listen to player's speculations first.

If a card brought someone to within two paces of their Fun Threshold (in either direction), they get a boon from it, based upon the suit of the Minor Arcana previous to it:

• Cups represents a new ally
• Pentacles represents a new item they have acquired
• Swords represents some intervention you have made in the community that at least some people will admire you for
  
• Wands represents a new skill they have learned (about as good as someone with a hobby)

(If no previous Minor Arcana was played, wing it. The bigger the total value, the better the boon. If you ended on exactly your fun threshhold, treat all of the cards this way.)

If a card brought them above their Fun Threshhold, causing them to Party Too Hard, 

• Cups represents someone to whom they have new obligations
• Pentacles represents a monetary debt it will be difficult to pay off
  
• Swords represents someone whose enemy they have made
• Wands represents some way they have publicly embarrassed themselves

(If no previous Minor Arcana was played, wing it. The bigger the total value, the worse the problem.)

Attestation

Yup, it's Mosaic Strict!

a system for duels

With a bit of adaptation, this can be used for wizard duels, trials by combat, attempts by nobles to ruin each others' reputation, and so on; you just need a situation in which two roughly evenly-matched parties fight with skill, a personal sense of the other as an opponent, and the real possibility of harm.

My quick combat system is designed for combat as war - a disaster that can be prepared for and used for leverage, but in which no interesting tactical decisions take place. This, by contrast, is meant to be "combat as sport" - a fair fight won by whoever can outthink their opponent.

Physical materials

You'll want either a standard 54-card deck of playing cards or the minor arcana of a tarot deck, sorted by suits. Each player adopts a suit (including a Joker each of playing with standard playing cards) as their hand; the remaining two suits (removing the Pages if you're playing with a tarot deck) are shuffled together into a prize deck. Each player adopts one of the shuffled suits to represent what they have at stake (if you're playing with standard playing cards it's probably most convenient to match red with red and black with black; if you're playing with tarot cards, assign according to whatever feels most symbolically apt.)

Rounds of play

Each round, turn over one card from the prize deck. This represents the possibility of qualitative injury to the party who adopted that suit as their stakes; that player is defending this round and the other player is attacking. Each player places one card from their hand face-down, then both are revealed.

If the defending player's revealed card is higher in value, nothing happens. Put the prize card into the reshuffle pile.

If the attacking player's revealed card is higher in value, they injure the opponent in the way prescribed by the card. Put the prize card into the discard pile.

If both cards have an equal face value (not including surrender cards, per below), both parties receive the injury. Put the prize card into the discard pile.

If one party plays the surrender card - either a Joker or a Page - then that player has surrendered and the duel ends. Depending on how overwhelmed the surrendering party is and how honorable their opponent is, they might choose to take mercy or not, but either way once one party has surrendered you are no longer in a duel.

Players can verbally communicate with each other between rounds (that is, after the cards they placed have been revealed, but before the next prize card is revealed.) Once the prize card is revealed, players can no longer verbally communicate with each other until they reveal the cards they have placed to attack or defend.

Once player's hands are exhausted, reshuffle the reshuffle pile into the remaining cards of the prize deck, and return the cards the opponents have played to their hands (minus the highest-value card they played that round.) Keep going. Play continues until death, surrender (including mutual surrender at some predefined point), our outside interference (which this minigame does not model.)

Example round

Inigo, playing hearts and defending diamonds, is dueling Count Rugin, playing clubs and defending spades. The prize card for the round is revealed: it's the 6 of Diamonds! That means the Count has spotted an opportunity to jab out Montoya's eye and each is making a snap judgment about how much to prioritize enabling or preventing this and how much instead to care about preserving superior positioning. 

Inigo looks at his hand and tries to remember what Rugin has played already, hoping to place a card just slightly higher than Rugin does. He places a 5 of Hearts face down, and Rugin places something unknown. They turn them both over - Rugin had played the 4 of Clubs! Well played, Inigo! His eye is safe and at little loss.

Stakes of play

Below are three example stakes - one for a physical combat, one for a duel between mighty wizards, and another for scheming aristocrats trying to destroy each other's reputation. Players and GMs are encouraged to create new versions of these, especially bespoke versions that relate to the particular contest that might emerge between two particular opponents.

	physical	wizards	nobles
K	major unknown stakes (this round determines the fate of the next two prize cards)
Q	unknown stakes (this round determines the fate of next prize card)
J/Kn	positioning (winner recovers best card played so far to their hand, loser recovers worst)
10	instant death	mind control, geas, or become undead servant of opponent	death of most loved person
9	mortal injury	disintegration and erasure from history	fatally poisoned in embarassing way
8	loss of limb (attacker's choice)	astral banishment (can no longer planeshift, scry, or dream)	title stripped
7	ability to use dominant hand	True Name changed to something embarassing	spouse seduced and permanently turned against them
6	eye gouged out	mental trauma from banishment to Hell Dimension (returns after 1 second in our plane and 1000 subjective years)	major public project collapses in disaster
5	loss of limb (defender's choice)	amnesia	spouse seduced in one-off dalliance
4	ability to use non-dominant hand	next project embarked upon will be disaster	office lost
3	sprained ankle	acquire vestigial twin loyal to opponent	uncool misdeed exposed
2	cosmetic injury to whatever most vain about	hiccups or lisp acquired	acquisition of painful venereal disease
1	cool scar	can never shower again (great excuse if you didn't want to anyway!)	cool misdeed exposed

Attestation

This minigame is Mosaic Strict. Game mechanics are almost exactly those of Goofspiel, with the exceptions that prizes aren't added up for points but represent particular diegetic stakes.

necromancy, exorcism & undead

*places flashlight under chin* oOoOoOoh it's a Mosaic Strict-compatible system for calling and turning undead!

  

Every dead person has a SPOOKINESS rating, and every context has a SANCTITY rating. When spookiness equals sanctity, you can perceive the dead out of the corner of your eye. When spookiness exceeds sanctity, the dead walk, hover, shamble, and creep upon the earth! If a dead person doesn't have its own corpse to use, it might well manifest outside of it, or inside a person. The more that spookiness exceeds sanctity, the more powers the dead manifest.

Spookiness

Default Spookiness is 0. Add one for each of:

• the deceased knew necromantic rituals (see below)
  
• the deceased had ever performed a necromantic ritual
  
• the deceased was a kinslayer, or slain by kin
  
• the deceased died by torture, suicide, or something else particularly tragic
• the deceased had eaten the flesh of sentient beings
• the deceased has unfinished business (either something they deeply care about, or an unfulfilled oath, whether nor not they care about it)
• the deceased would have very strong opinions (in any direction, but strong enough to make it a prospect of daily reflection) about the prospect of showing up as undead
  

Decrease by one for each of:

• the deceased has been properly buried
• the living kin (by blood or by ceremony) of the deceased have honored them within the last year

Or assign spookiness according to GM fiat.

Regularly offering alcohol and sweets to the dead can decrease or increase spookiness, depending on whether you request their presence or slumber. Offer them every night for a week to shift by one, or once a night for a year and a night to shift spookiness by two.

Necromantic rituals exist that can shift spookiness up. These are jealously guarded and dangerous to use, even beyond the danger inherent in increased spookiness. Here are a few:

The Truthful Turret

Dig up the bones of someone who has been properly buried for over a century, and arrange them in a sort of small tower which contains something they have written, but which no one else (including you) has read. Burn it. Increment spookiness of the smoke rising up by 1d6-1.

Voice of the Tunnel

Cut out your own tongue, and place it in the mouth of a corpse that has been properly buried, returning it to its proper place. It gets +1d6-1 spookiness as long as your tongue is there and it remains in its burial spot, and can communicate when you sing out of your tongueless mouth. (The relevant sanctity rating inhibiting this is the one where you are.)

The Stallion Path

Sprinkle the warm blood of a saint, monarch, or unicorn over the dead. (If the being whose blood it is is still alive, they can't consciously approve, unless they're you.) They all get +1d6-1 spookiness. They're bound to obey the being with the highest spookiness or spookiness-conditional-on-death around, though they'll also hate that being and tear them to shreds if they ever get a chance.

The Caul-Sister

Dress up a corpse to look just like you. Then, make sure that no one uses your true name to refer to anything but the corpse. Keep it that way for at least a year and a night.

When you die, your consciousness is transferred to the corpse and you/it combine spookiness levels. Add on an extra one if it is your actual identical twin.

Sanctity

Default sanctity is 8 in sunlight and 4 otherwise. Add one sanctity for each of:

• this is a literal sanctified place
• the largest community within one night's walk has had a feast since the last midnight celebrating life and honoring the dead, and not containing any violence except (1) animals slaughtered according to humane religious procedures (2) small convival brawls
• if it's been a year and a day since something truly awful has happened here (where the boundaries of “here” are determined by lines of salt, stone walls, village boundary markers, bodies of running water, and/or one night’s walk, whatever is most restrictive) but living people have (+2 for a decade and a day, +3 for a century and a day, +4 for a millennium and a day)
•  it's a full moon
  

Subtract one sanctity for each of:

• this was a literally sanctified place, but has been desecrated
• if it's been a year and a night since sunlight or living beings have been here (-2 for a decade and a night, -3 for a century and a night, -4 for a millennium and a night)
• it's the new moon or an eclipse
• just now, someone says something blasphemous without being contradicted
• all living people present are drunk or in panic
  

Or assign sanctity according to GM fiat. 

Exorcism and Turing Undead

If you speak in a strong voice and command the dead to return to their slumber, and no one else has attempted the same thing in the same scene, you can increase sanctity. Roll 2d6 and ignore any pip face greater than your SACRAMENTAL POWER ranking. Sacramental power starts at 0 and increments by one for each of:

• You have never killed anyone by your own hand.
• You have kept an inconvenient oath for a year and a day.
  
• You are wearing the (useless, armor-wise) vestments of office of an ordained priesthood. (You don't actually have to be ordained, ghosts are dumb so vestis virum facit for this purpose.)
• You have tried and failed to turn undead before and experienced either permanent wounds or the death of a comrade.
• You have succeeded at turning undead of this spookiness level before.
• You know the Seventeen Names of God.
  

mass combat: chess-based, Mosaic Strict-complaint

Use cases

These are most relevant for big battles in cod-medieval fantasy settings that your guy is commanding as a general, and which you might plausibly win or lose. Skirmish-level fights, the logistics of military campaigns, surviving or winning renown as a warrior in the midst of mass-battle-as-dangerous-environment, and the like are better served by different rules or none at all.

Physical materials

You'll need

1. A pair of timers, such as exist on your phone, or a chess clock if you want to get fancy.
2. A chess set, or a customizable online version of chess such as protochess.

Army construction

If your army contains...

1. ...seige equipment or fortifications, get a rook. If they occupy a permanent fortification or have the high ground, get another rook.
2. ...a renowned warrior or super tough guy like a giant or something, get a knight. If they contain a whole company of such, get a second knight.
3. ..a powerful wizard or creature with neato abilities like a basilisk or something, get a bishop. If they contain a whole cabal of the bastards, get a second bishop.
4. ...a really powerful wizard, or a dragon or archangel or something, get a queen. 
5. ...a PC who isn't one of the above, get a king for each. (If PCs do fall into these categories, designate the relevant pieces as PCs.)
6. ...x random weaklings, get ln x pawns.

Army placement

Place the GM's screen over the middle of the chess board, then each army is placed however their commander likes... unless they've been caught with their pants down, in which case their pieces are placed randomly (but still secretly.) Pieces representing PCs can be placed deliberately (if the battle commences by enemies hacking at the PCs in their tents you probably want to use a different system). If you're placing randomly on a physical board I suggest literally dumping all the pieces on it and standing them up as close to where they fall as you can manage as a sort of premonition of the disaster that's about to be-fall them.

The "pants down" clause can apply to both parties, as with two armies randomly bump into each other en route and start confusedly fighting.

Timer

Each side operates on a ten minute timer by default. Double that if the fictional general you're playing is decent at being a general, and triple it if they're a brilliant general (half it if they're actively incompetent.) If you, the player, suck at chess, double it, but if you're pretty good, halve it, and if you're actively great, halve it again. (All the same applies to the GM and the NPC general they're playing.)

If the timer runs out, the other side gets three free moves and then you start again.

The battle itself

Play chess like normal, with the following changes:

1. The pawn promotion rule does not apply.
2. Neither do lame made up rules like en passant or castling.
3. Kings can enter check.

There are no victory conditions. Instead, battle ends when one side has had enough and decides to flee, surrender, or otherwise not engage in the kind of mass combat represented by this minigame.

After the battle

Pieces captured in game represent casualties, but casualties need not represent death. Flight, wounds of various levels, shell-shock, and literally being captured are all possibilities. If GM doesn't have any diegetic intuitions for some particular case - which may not be clear until well after battle in the confusion of regrouping - roll a d6:

1. killed
2. mortally wounded
3. wounded, will be fine with proper care, but won't be able to keep up with a march
4. fled
   
5. captured
6. shellshocked
   

Attestation (and the relevant rules of chess)

These are rules compliant with Mosaic Strict, meaning they're compliant with everything. 

 

Unless referring externally to the rules of chess compromises the independence of these rules? Okay, here's how chess works: the game is played on an 8x8 board of squares, each occupied by pieces owned by a player. Players take turns moving pieces from one square to another per the following rules:

• Pawns move one or two squares on their first turn if moving into a square not occupied by another piece, or diagonally one square if moving into a square occupied by an enemy piece. They can only move away from the side of the board on which they were placed
  
• Rooks move any number of squares horizontally and vertically.
  
• Knights move two squares in one direction and then one square in a direction orthogonal to that.
• Bishops move any number of squares diagonally.
• Queens move any number of squares horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.
• Kings move one square horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.

You can't move into a square occupied by one of your own pieces. If you move into a square occupied by another player's piece, that piece is "captured" and removed from play.

quick combat for Mosaic Strict

This is a MOSAIC Strict-compliant variant of something I posted earlier- one that leans into "combat as war" in that combat represents risks that can be managed and prepared for, but there are few tactical decisions once you enter into it. You may also like Emmy Allen's system. 

(Ismail Inceoglu)

0) Like any other Mosaic subsystem, don't open up this minigame when it doesn't make sense. If the outcome isn't in doubt, then you don't need it. If players want something tactically interesting, give them something tactically interesting instead.

1) At points this system refers to Combat Capability, or CC. When it becomes relevant to determine a character's CC, add up the following, or throw in what makes sense to you:

• If you're not sick, +1.
• If you're not tired, +1.
• If you're not injured, +1.
  
• If you're armed with something improvised (including magic not purely useful for combat, like ice magic or something), +1. If you're armed with a real weapon (or have some kind of martial arts training), +2. If you're armed with a cool magic weapon, +3 or more.
• If fighting is the main thing your character does for their background, +1. 
• If you're, like, super big, +1 or more.
• If you have a mount that you're trained in and fits the terrain, +1.
  
• If you're a cold killer - the sort where people can see it in your face and don't trust you - that's also +1.
  
• If another PC has died by your side in combat, +1.
  
• If you've lost a battle on this terrain before, +1.
• If another PC has died by your side in combat on this terrain before, +1.
• If you've lost a battle to these kinds of opponents before, +1.
• If another PC has died by your side in combat against these kinds of opponents before, +1.

For monsters, make up a CC that makes sense. 

2) When combat begins, everybody chooses Morale - a number from 1-12 - secretly passing them to the GM if desired. 

3) Roll 1d6. This represents the decisive factor in battle. If you're fighting under particularly bad conditions (in an avalanche, in a flooding dungeon, in the stomach of a tarrasque) roll a bigger die and interpret everything above a 6 as 6.

1. Numbers: whichever side has fewer combatants loses.
2. Might: whichever side has lower average CC loses.
3. Cohesion: whichever side has lower average morale loses.
4. Leadership: whichever side has the best single combatant - as defined by Morale + CC - does not lose, but rather the other side loses.
5. Positioning: whichever side has worse circumstantial advantage loses. If in doubt, the defender loses, unless they are defending a fortified position, in which case attacker loses.
6. Mutual Ruin: both sides lose.

If no side has a clear advantage on the rolled decisive factor, add up each side's raw Morale + CC total. The side with the lower total score loses, unless the scores are equal, in which case both lose.

4) Each combatant on the losing side rolls 2d6. If they roll over their Morale, they ran away (or are captured if escape is impossible and the enemy takes prisoners - or they successfully played dead, or whatever). If they roll under or equal to their Morale, they're dead (or also possibly captured, &c, depending on the circumstances).

(Note that losing combat is a mechanical condition while winning is not. You "win" if making your opponent lose accomplishes whatever extra-combat goal you happened to have.)

5) Regardless of whether your side won or lost, if you didn't die, roll 2d6 (one red die, one blue) and compare it to Morale again, or Morale + 3 if you lost. If it's under (not equal) to your Morale, you sustain injuries. Unless there's something interesting about the kind of injuries an opponent can give you (as with a basilisk or a vampire), but by default consult the red die rolled and the following chart:

1. Just a scratch.
2. If you had a shield, light armor, or heavy armor, you're fine. If not, roll 1d6 again.
3. If you had heavy armor or a shield, it's shattered. If not, roll 1d6 again.
4. You lost a hand, an eye, or something else useful.
5. You have a deep wound and are grievously injured. You cannot exert yourself for the next day and will need to be under care.
6. You are mortally wounded, and though you can move around, you will need to seek treatment in a center of civilization within 1d12 days (referee rolls secretly) or you will die.

two torches deep: OSRing PF2

Why would you do this? Well, why would you do anything? Games, like life, are an inherently stupid activity where you can do whatever you want. 

The following are quick fixes that don't require too much work. I certainly haven't playtested them. 

design PCs as NPCs

In-depth character build options, while arguably the main draw of this kind of game, make characters dying kind of a pain in the ass. So use the rules for generating NPCs of a given level for PCs. I recommend randomly rolling on a background table of your choice (make one for your setting, or use the careers from Finders Keepers) to determine what tasks you're high/moderate/low; feel free to roll also for race and class. 

Just so you can enjoy the character build minigame at least a little bit, give yourself a heritage feat, a archetype dedication feat if you're level 2+, and a class feat of your highest level.  

(Alternatively: get two archetypes at random, or one at random and the next on purpose. For each, get all its feats, plus an ancestry and its heritage feat. You're average at everything unless noted otherwise.)

Since these include the benefits of permanent magic items, GMs should only hand out consumables and Weird Shit as far as magic items go.

reaction rolls

Unless circumstances dictate a particular reaction, newly-met NPCs and monsters roll 2d6 start with the following conditions:

• 2-3: Hostile
• 4-5: Unfriendly
• 6-8: Indifferent
• 9-10: Friendly
• 11-12: Helpful
  

morale

Each round of a fight, if the PCs are winning, monsters (who aren't immune to the Frightened condition) roll Will vs. 10 + party level. The DC of this increases by 5 for each level of Frightened the monster possesses, so don't hesitate to spend an action Demoralizing the enemy!

xp for gold

Use chart 10-10 on p. 511.

On the interpretation of dreams, or, the rumor table under your pillow

This isn’t about using your own dreams for inspiration -  though I am obviously in favor. (Jennifer Dumpert’s Liminal Dreaming is a fun manual for getting more juice out of that side of your brain, if that’s what you’re looking for.)

These are rules for dreams and dream interpretation by PCs, and presume that such things are, as they are in many human cultures, a relatively ordinary part of the mystical experience of the world.

(I believe these also meet ISO compatibility standards for MOSAIC Strict, and issue all necessary declarations to that effect.)

The dream roll

Make this pertaining to one PC's dreams each time there’s a long rest and either a player is curious about it or the GM wishes. (Or if there’s deliberately induced hypnosis, whatever.) GM rolls 2d6 secretly.

On a 2-5, the dream is random bullshit, albeit random bullshit PCs can read into.

On a 6-8, the dream is random bullshit, unless you’re in an area with Deep Emotional Resonance, or being observed by scrying entities, or surrounded by invisible spirits, or have some other particularly good reason to have your subconscious invaded from without. If you're sleeping somewhere that Something Happened, you get visions pertaining to that; if someone's scrying on you, you can talk to them. If something wants to talk to you, for some reason, they can.

On a 9, at least one unknown but real threat or opportunity appears in the dream in coded form.

On a 10, the dream lies to you. This is different from bullshit; a skilled interpretation will reveal actively false or dangerous intelligence. 

On an 11, at least one unknown but real threat or opportunity appears in relatively uncoded, direct form.

On a 12, you get a vision full of relatively straightforward, useful information. A vision of the villain's evil plans, or where something is, or what God wants you to do, or whatever. There's a dressing of confabulatory bullshit around it, but the core is real and straighforward.

Narrating dreams

Dreams are naturally confabulatory, i.e., we make them up as we go along. This makes them perfect opportunities for characterization, by prompting things like “what’s something you’re afraid of?,” “what was your childhood home like?,” “who’s the one who got away?” and so on. Regardless of whether it’s a true dream or a false dream, do a mix of asking for these confabulations and throwing in seemingly arbitrary details. If it’s a true dream, then at least some of it (both basic emotional cues and surrounding odd details) points to true stuff.

If you’re lazy, just do this with remembering one emotionally cued element with one arbitrary additional detail. 

Interpreting dreams

If the dreamer’s willing to share with someone else, the someone else can try to interpret. As with the dream roll itself, the GM rolls 2d6 secretly.

If it’s bullshit, then on 2-5 you suggest a false conclusion, and on anything else you’re stumped.

If it’s not, then on 2-3 you get a mistaken conclusion and on 9-12 you get an accurate, but likely incomplete, one.

(Note that false dreams are distinct from bullshit ones. Bullshit dreams are all noise so any signal you get from them is coincidental or imposed, whereas false dreams, accurately interpreted, will give you dangerously false information - just as if, if I write down a lie and cryptographically encode it, an accurate decryption will yield a lie.)

Obviously anyone can speculate beyond this, but that’s what rolling per se will get you. You can’t roll to interpret your own dreams.

Bonuses on these sorts of rolls

I’d advise the GM to figure out what bonuses characters get on these, if any. If you’re playing 5e, then perhaps Wis, being a Sorcerer or Warlock, and having a chaotic alignment increase the chances of significant dreams, while Int, being a cleric, and proficiency in Insight improve interpretation slightly. Or you could just make a guess about how dreamy and intuitive each character is. Either way I suggest not telling players the formula; let it be as mysterious to them as dreams are to us. Perhaps your GM is just pretending to roll and it’s all bullshit? One can never know.

Kneipen und Knappen, v. 0.2

Kneipen & Knappen (pdf, gdoc) is an updated and prettified version of Tombs & Taverns - a set of procedures for collaborative fantasy worldbuilding and Free Kriegspiel play in the product of that. It's seven pages, which is at least 6.5 more than it needs to be, but I have no regrets. If for some reason you play it, let me know!