Hey everybody,
I found Mouse Guard late last year (2010) and am loving it! I wanted to share a little system I’ve come up with for creating semi-random adventures for your mice. I came up with it because I got in a bit of a creative rut where I started to implement the same types of things in the same order into the game (ie a couple of simple checks like weather and pathfinder, maybe an argument with a mouse and then a climactic fight against an animal of some sort.)
This way you don’t get to choose the building blocks of the game, or their order, you just get to be creative about how they connect and why your mice should care.
Five easy steps! It only takes one die and about 15-20 min.
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First you need your four major events. Roll the die. One is animal, two is weather, three is wilderness, and four is mouse. re-roll fives and sixes. Do this four times. (I roll one, three, four, and four. I have animal, wilderness, mouse, and mouse)
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Now that you have your four major events you need to figure out if they are conflicts or checks. Roll the die, odd means conflict, even means check. (I roll 2, 6, 5, and 1. So I have an animal check, wilderness check, mouse conflict, and mouse conflict)
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Next you need to find out if each check is complex (multiple rolls) or simple (single roll). Roll the die for each check, odd is simple even is complex. (I get 3 and 4 so my animal check is simple, and my wilderness check is complex.)
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Then you need to figure out what happens if the mice fail each challenge. Roll the die for each challenge . Odd means condition, even means twist. (I get one, six, six, two which is a condition for the failed animal check, and three different twists for the wilderness check, and the two mouse conflicts)
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Repeat the steps for any twists but then assume that they all end in conditions.
And that’s it! After that you get to decide which of the four challenges are known by the mice, a name for the mission, and fill in the specifics for types of animals, places, wilderness types and seasons. Be sure to plug in names of known mice and locations and you have yourself a semi-random adventure in which you get to be creative but still allow for some unknown.
Have fun!