Click Here for a Master Index of “The Forge” and “Vault”!
We're coming up on a year's worth of "Vault" and "Forge" entries. As you can see from last week's "Index to Forge and Vault", that's a lot of content.
So how do you use it if you're going App free and using GM Mode?
How can you use it if you're an author?
View on, dear quest creator or GM...
Let's say we print out our series of Vaults with the Bandit Encounter deck theme. At the present moment, you'd probably want to do this by copying and pasting into Word, adjusting the margins to 0.5, and standardizing the font. I was able to get 3 of the 4 Vaults on Bandits to fit on one standard sheet of paper this way. If we're seated with our friends and want to go in GM Mode (no app), we can choose prompts from these Vaults to craft a quick adventure. If we're very adventurous and our GM is a pro, we can just roll a d20 and improvise. So we rolled on the Bandit Plot Vault (Honor Among Thieves) and got a 12. "Drug War" it is! We mark it with a clip and read the intro description...Only drawback of the clips is that they do slightly bend the paper (as you'll notice on the pics).
Next we'll give some identity to the Boss behind the influx of addictive magical drugs. We roll on the Bandits' Title Vault (Onerous Outlaws) and get an 8. The crime lord known only as "Sneakhand" is our foe, and they will try and steal loot from our intrepid adventurers when first they meet. We mark him or her with a clip and move to the next Vault to select some custom Loot items and Locations for our quest...
Most quests average 2-5 battles. Our group prefers 3 (including the Boss battle), and it'd be nice to have some interesting new Loot after each of the battles leading up to the showdown with "Sneakhand". We roll two d20s and get a 9 and 20. The "Sneak Shoes" seem apropos to the Boss. Perhaps they will let us make a "Stealth" check to get the drop on him at the outset of the final battle. The "Marbles" are a risky item to use, but "Sneakhand" clearly isn't paying his employees well enough for them to have any quality gear. Our final Bandit Vault will provide some locations for our adventurers.
We have three adventurers, so it seems appropriate to roll 3 d20s for our locations. This Vault was the only one that wouldn't fit on one page, and the last roll was a 20--the False Wall. Reinforcements will come to "Sneakhand" in the form of two extra Tier I Bandits during the final battle, but only our GM should know this. Our other two rolls were a 5, the "Toll Bridge" and a 15, the "Forest Hideout". These give us some interesting roleplaying and combat scenarios.
Do we pay the Bandits' toll at the bridge and follow them back to the Forest Hideout? Do we defy their extortion and do righteous battle? Do we attempt a skill check to sneak around the bridge? So many possibilities...
At the "Forest Hideout" we'll be faced with the choice to take the fight to the high ground or risk the lethal bows of the bandit archers. And then we'll have to face "Sneakhand" in his lair, with it's "False Wall" and reinforcements.
And it's that quick and easy! If you were crafting in the Creator you could go the Vault pages and copy and paste the scripts, shortening your workload.
If there is interest out there in creating an easily printable and more GM friendly pdf of the Vaults and Forges, let us know in the comment section below. We could throw something up on DriveThruRPG.
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