OSR 24

For me Dungeon 23 was an abject failure. To be fair the whole year was pretty tumultuous. Consistency has always been an enemy for me. Having just finished school I was having a hard time adjusting to a non structured life. Something I am working to change now is how does one live without deadlines. I could create my own deadlines. However, I fear it will be ineffective with out the threat of wasting my tuition. But I am at better place now with significantly more control over my machinations. 

So why did Dungeon 23 fail?

Scope creep

I believe the spirit of Dungeon 23 was not to actually create a workable mega dungeon but to sharpen ones dungeon building skills. Creators were encouraged to just focus on a single room a day. What the heart loves, the will chooses and the mind justifies. Its almost impossible not falling into the perils of mega world building. With in the first week I was planning out which months I would work on which themes of the dungeon. It was going to be a silent hill themed location in which a town summoned a primordial fae god by sacrificing the town beggar. This plunging the town into a fae hell. Each of the four locations was to be based on the 4 tarot suits with the major arcana being god level NPC's and bosses. I would work on each of the locations for each of the four quarters of the year. This quickly demotivated me. The second I skipped a day, a week, a month. It was harder to restart, as I felt I need to go back to make up lost time. 

Eventually I abandoned the idea and started from scrap.

In August I found myself trying again, again ran into scope issues. This one was a lich sewer or some sort. I let myself focus more on the rooms but I still felt myself running to the back of the journal to stat out monsters and write about NPCS.

Time and Space

When I did sit down to work on the project it meant I had time. I felt unfulfilled writing one simple room. And I felt the book did not provide enough space to embellish. I hated flipping to the back of the book to finish writing out the person, object, or monster that I was working on. Also each time passing the failures of the prior month. 

What will be OSR 24?  

I will switch out the Hobonichi Techo for the Hon Techo. The Hon has a grid for each day of the year. Everyday I will create an OSR thing. This could be a monster, a map, a room, location concept, anything really. This will allow me to still work on my OSR skills but doesn't have the constraints of the previous project. I can work on what feels right in the moment. I have space to embellish and explore, but without trigging scope creep. If there is more to an idea I can add onto it the next day. But isn't this just the same a journaling? Yes, but its got more rules. 

Rules of engagement. 

• If a day is skipped it is gone. There is to be no going back. The pain of empty pages needs to be felt. 
• Stealing is ok, its just me and my thoughts. 
• Don't share it with too many people. The second it becomes a performance, the goal will to be to impress, and once someone is impressed the dopamine stops.  
• Also no one cares what you are journaling about. 
• Give your self space to be stupid, there is nothing wrong with stupidity.