Roguelite campaigns and fishing my white whale out of a hole

Recently I have been enjoying rogue-likes and rogue-lites like Nubby's Number Factory, Dungeon Clawer and Enter the Gungeon. These games are randomly generated so that each run is different from the next. They also have permadeath. Once your little creature dies, you have to start from the beginning in a new maze. There are many disagreements on what a rogue-like is, almost as many disagreements as the question "What is the OSR?".

 

My white whale campaign is a rogue-lite campaign. I thought it would be easy as Rogue, the first rogue-like, the start of the genre, was inspired by the high fantasy setting of dungeons and dragons. Unfortunately I have done nothing but get closer and closer not quite getting close enough. Traditional games like 5e or Pathfinder want the GM to make balanced combats which doesn't find the randomized nature of rogue-likes so they won't do. OSR games are my best bet as they have dungeon-centric gameplay and due to the simpler character construction you can get back into the action very quickly. A Rasp of Sand gets mostly there, I would just like a system tied to the adventure rather than sourcing my own. 

 

From Steam
Permanent death isn't a problem due to how most tabletop games work. If your character dies, oftentimes they don't come back and you need to make another character. That's half of what defines the genre sorted. What about procedural generation? There are two approaches I know of. There is the approach where the shape and contents are random and generic so that the GM can interpret the results. AD&D 1e had a random dungeon tables which didn't have great results. Worlds Without Number are interesting but I need to do further experimentation. There is the depthcrawl approach where rooms filled with set content show up on a random order. I played Garden of Ynn a few days ago and I liked this approach. 

 

From Soul Muppet Publishing
I have the Rogue part of rogue lite down, now to the lite. The lite part of rogue lite is mainly defined as having upgrades that carry over between runs. This was what I am currently struggling with. One idea I had was that the only classes available are fighter and Magic user. If they invest into buildings they get more class options. Marching order does this with how each Rogue costs different amounts based on how powerful they are. Another way of handling it is to give players perks if they invest into outside pursuits like learning or philanthropy. My current idea is to have players find people in the dungeon who will teach them something once they leave the dungeon so that they come into it more prepared. If anyone has other ideas I am more than happy to hear them. 


I am still trying to find the right system that at least interacts nicely with OSR play. I hope to find a system that at least plays nice with all the tools I intend to use. I have more options than I know what to do with so I will start planning slowly. If you want to start your own here's 1d6 reason why the hole always changes. 

 

1d6 Reasons for the Hole Changing

  1. The hole is a creature, that hole is one of many orifices of the creature. It is constantly swallowing and to make matters worse various creatures get stuck and make a mess.
  2. The lich at the bottom is obsessed with interior design so entire sections are remodeled as "that's the trend".
  3. Aliens from afar want to see how species of creatures deal with rapid environmental change. Here is the first test.
  4. A fairy's favorite pastime is to make and remake a marble course that happens to start at a random 10ft wide hole.
  5. Large termites break down and remodel their nest when a new queen of the nest is born. At this point if an adventurer falls in, they become part of the walls. 
  6. The hole has a sense of humor.  It's bored, it's been sitting here for centuries so it decides to be a little bit more silly.

 Clickables

Rise Up Comus has released a new dungeon for His Majesty the Worm.

Method Set Madness asks what if it was GP all the way down? 

Fluorite Guillotine wants to put more explosives in our games. 

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