Campaign Overview

This will be a 15-rated dieselpunk fantasy intrigue game set in Kaun , where wizards are corrupt, magic is illegal, powerful and sometimes very horrible.

The characters are members of The Anomaly Detective Agency who specialise in finding the culprits of magical crimes while struggling against the stigma of working with magic, and the rivalry of the Ironhands, the local police’s spellcaster hunters. . Ultimately, they are trying to hunt down spellcasters and solve cases to survive as a detective agency. The campaign begins with a Telephone Tip-off to a crime scene.

In regards to building a character, to have most fun:

Players will come to our character building session with a few ideas. The GM will chat on 1:1 basis with each player. Characters will have a reason for working at the detective agency, personal goals, people they know in the city such as family and friends, and 3-4 sentences of backstory.

I'll have a chat to you individually to build on your ideas, and throw some new ones at you. Be imaginative, but trust that we can have a lot of fun and intrigue with even a 'simple' idea. In reflection on my last homebrew, I really want to intertwine your characters into the plot, so you feel integrated and involved, so the more you come up with, the better ( but I can help!) Wanna explore religion? Fantasy politics? Magical implants? Magi-tech police? Illegal magic? Wizard killing? Good old interpersonal conflicts? Maybe your character is having an illicit affair with the chief of police? You tell me. Any and all ideas we can chat through.

Secrets from other players are exciting and encouraged, with players keeping secrets from each other and setting things up with the GM.

To prepare, it would be helpful for you to read at least An Introduction to the Campaign .

A regular session will involve:

• An emphasis on roleplaying
• Situations for characters to react to
• Roleplay with NPCs created by both GM and PCs
• No expectation for combat, but it always existing as a feasible action
• Players deciding what they want to do next to find out more etc.

Play Practicalities

We are going to be playing on Discord (for the moment), on Thursday evenings 4-7, with a break in the middle. (Probably starting late Oct/early Nov) The game will last until the players reach a certain (secret) point in the plot or calendar of the world happens.
We will be using a system called Troika!, which I've edited a bit. The original is a bit wacky so I've made some alterations to fit our tone. There's more emphasis on roleplay and social interaction, but combat still exists. It uses 6 sided dice, but don't worry, we're going to learn together. I (the GM) will provide a cheatsheet to support you.

Support

What you need to do as a player

• To let me know if there's a topic you want covering sensitively, or not covering at all
• To be willing to throw away the idea of 'doing it wrong', and to (with a bit of help from me) come up with ideas on the go
• To take notes, enough for you to know what is going on and what you want to do next

what I will do as a GM

• To stop play if I receive a DM from you saying you're out of your comfort zone
• To provide a place for us all to tell a story together

What next?

Ask me for the Discord link, and I'm going to set a date for an quick online chat together, with me taking each of you for an initial chat about your character ideas.

And then have a look at these (top one is a good start, the others are optional)

• Here's a flavour of the world, with plenty of links: An Introduction to the Campaign
• Here is a folder of character templates to get you started: character templates/ Ideas for PC Roles
• Here is a Pinterest board to give you something to look at: Pinterest Board
• And here is where we are going to start: Telephone Tip-off
• And finally, just a central point for this campaign: https://www.worldanvil.com/epic/the-problem-with-magic