All Things Solo

This example is written for the newcomer who doesn't have any knowledge in any part of RPGs. It aims to create a piece of story first and then determine your character in relation to the story. But you can create your character with a background story first and start creating content if you want. If you already have your character backstory ready, your context is what's in the story.

1. Questioning

• ASK only YES / NO questions about the things you DON'T KNOW in the scene to create a flow of action and surprise. Keep your story/scene context in mind while asking questions. Even if you want to ask HOW or WHY, reform it as a Yes / No question.

Example Questions: Is there any problem in this town? Is there someone who watches me?

Let's say our question at hand is: Is this NPC hostile to me? And we decided that he is.

How to reform WHY Question: Why is this NPC hostile to me? -> Is it because he mistakes me for someone else?

Now, let's say the real question is Does the hostile NPC act suspiciously?

2. Oracle Roll

• Roll 20 sided dice for an Answer in the Oracle below: Note that the Simple Oracle I added below for the purpose of teaching is not a professional one. I will recommend other free and paid Oracles later.

d20	Result
1-4	Critical No
5-8	No
9-13	Maybe?
14-18	Yes
19-20	Critical Yes

• Critical No: No and Something unexpectedly worse happened.
• Maybe: Either ask further questions until you get your answer, or change your question, or note it for later usage, or reroll.
• Critical Yes: Yes and something unexpectedly better happened.

I Rolled 1: Critical No! "No AND Something unexpectedly worse happened." Hmm, what could it be?

3. Freeform Association

• If a simple YES / NO answer is not enough to create content / action / drama, roll your **WORD GENERATOR TABLE** for 2-4 words to spark your imagination. Use this for testing if you don't have a table, yet: https://randomwordgenerator.com Reroll if the word is not relevant.

• Then practice **FREEFORM ASSOCIATION:** Link those words together by treating each one NOT as a word but as a Picture, Abstract, Concept, Symbol, or Meaning to create a snippet of a story within the CONTEXT. Since this is your First Scene, The Context = Your PC.

FFA is just a simple Connect the Dots Game.

Example Words: apple (picture of a red apple), heart (meaning/symbol - maybe the apple is poisoned?), evening (maybe the poisoned apple placed at night?), systematic (definition) hmm.

Example Association: An assassin systematically eliminates his targets by poisoning their breakfast (apple) at night. Symbolic meaning of heart could be "poisoning the heart of the enemy." What if this poison doesn't kill but corrupts the heart! For what sinister purpose? I will find out as the story unravels itself.

Now we're just cooking the background story with basic ingredients to determine everything else.

If you rolled Yes for the question "Does he act suspiciously?", then you could interrogate this man. But how?

4. Interpretation

• Then add the snippet of a story you just created into your INTERPRETATION and determine what exactly happens in your scene.

• INTERPRET the answers (and the Freeform Association results, if any), by **In-game Logic**, within the CONTEXT of your scene to determine what happened.

The snippet of the story is the assassination attempt to my PC's life. And I determined that my PC actually took the bait by eating the poisoned apple, just because I feel like it. His heart is now getting corrupted slowly and he doesn't even know. I think this could be a good story with lots of dilemmas and action. But I don't know who am I playing yet. Let's find out.

5. Determine the Scene

Here's my take on these: I decided that my PC is a chosen champion (Cleric) of some sort of good God (because it creates conflict with the "corrupted heart" part) and there are many like me revealed themselves recently as a response to an ominous threat [this part is to embellish the story]. But apparently, someone is trying to eliminate us with unspeakable ways for a mysterious purpose! And I'm determined to get to the bottom of this!

6. Play the Scene

• Finally, PLAY your characters in the scene accordingly. Remember, you are the GM and the player. You also play your NPCs and monsters according to their nature in the Mode of Play of your choosing.

FIRST SCENE: *The Chase: My PC chases and catches the suspicious man he met earlier to interrogate him. I just use Theater of Mind for the scene.*

What to do: Set an interrogation scene in a castle room. You can do this with a map of a room and placing your tokens accordingly.

My PC (Alan): *frowns* Who are you and what is your purpose here?!
The assassin: You and your puny king will know what is my "purpose" soon enough, false one! *spits*

There must be something that this assassin rely on as a backup plan in case he get caught. So let's spice the game up a bit, shall we?

Question: Is there anyone in the castle that will try to help him to escape?

I Rolled: 6. No.

Follow up question: Will he try to escape by himself?

I Rolled: 15. Yes

* The assassin uses his sneak attack to headbutt the cleric with the paralysis needles that are concealed in his long hair *

Roll for initiative! = The roll to determine the sequence of who goes first in turn based combat.

After the combat, Ask more questions in play to keep creating content. IF... you can survive the fight!