Jaw-Break Shore - A Hex

 

Jaw-Break Shore (0706)

A Hex for Prismatic Wasteland's
 Merry Hexmas Blog Bandwagon 

Warning: This Post is a WIP, and will be updated as surrounding Hexes are filled in by other participants in this project! 

    A stony, barren shoreline at the edge of the Swirly Twirly Sea. The weather is permanently somber and overcast; slightly too cold to be enjoyable, slightly too warm for any snowfall to stick. The sugar that washes ashore crystalizes into delicious balls of candy, coated in a rocky shell. It's difficult to determine what's a jawbreaker and what's just gravel. 

Adjacent Hexes 

North: 0705 - The Rime Ridge

North-East : 0805 - Eostre Fields

South-East: 0806 - TBD

South: 0707 - TBD

South-West: 0606 - Swirly Twirly Sea

North-West: 0605 - Swirly Twirly Sea 

Encounters

 1d6

 1 : A Giant Ant-Lion (Stat as Bear) rests at the center of a 30 foot wide gravel pit, waiting to consume any creature that falls down into it's maw. Each turn a PC spends inside the pit, they must make a DEX saving throw or be moved 10 ft closer to the center against their will. Any use of magical fire will begin to melt the hidden jawbreakers amongst the stone, sealing the creature inside a cooling shell of candy.

2 : A beached gumdrop ice-berg. 2d6 Seagulls, dyed vibrant colors from their diet, swarm to carve sustenance from the gloop. If approached, they will become violent and attempt to chase the party away from their prize. (1 in 6 chance it's hallucenigenic and the birds are high as balls)

3 : 1d2 Defectors, Rabbitfolk (Stat as Soldiers) attempting to escape the civil war to the east. 50% chance of being either from Irontail or Cottontail forces. Are traveling with documents that detail potential secret tunnels into their respective side's primary fortress, in the hopes they can barter for their safety should they be found by the enemy. They will give the clothes off their backs if the party can grant them safe passage on a vessel out into the Swirly-Twirly sea.

4 : 2d4+1 Feathered Fiends (Stat as Wolves) Vulture-like creatures, with bare necks and heads and oily black feathers. Aggressive if eye contact is made. There is a 1 in 10 chance of the ringleader being capable of speech, who will share that they're really here because they like the shores' dreary vibes more than actually wanting anything. 

5 : A trio of Elves, Toddy, Toady, and Ted, scheme methods of convincing the Molefolk miners away from their Quarry, intent on taking it for themselves. Their plans range from silly (disguising themselves as leprechauns looking to sell their gold mine) to the outright loony (pretending to be a band of roving Donkey Polishers.) Toady is the smart one. Ted is the dumb one. Toddy is the greedy one, and the only reason the other two are doing any of this. They are just as likely to try to swindle the party as they are to ask for help swindling the Moles. They don't want to sell the Motherload as the Moles do, instead wishing to eat it once it's uncovered.

6 : A gnarled tree with a knot like a screaming face, and one branch outstretched like a grasping hand. If encountered twice, the tree is clearly not in the same place the party last enountered it, but otherwise immobile. Any magic Item placed into it's grip will be drained and rendered inert, but return the Winter Wizard to human form. He was once the Witch-King in Blue, eons before Santa arrived, and seeks to reclaim his throne. He despises Christmas and anything Jolly. Stat as Arch-Mage and give a bunch of Ice spells.

Locations

Sugar Geode "Mine"

    More a hole in the ground than a proper mine. A Quarry, at best. Worked by a trio of Molefolk who toil all day to fill their minecarts with delectable chunks of stone that, when cracked open, reveal layers of colorful candy, the flavor of which changes as you suck. Unfortunately it's a toss up determining what's candy and what's just rock, (3 in 6 chance of it being edible) 

    The Molefolk firmly believe that there is a large deposit of sugar at the bottom of this hole, compressed over years into a single, massive Sugar Geode. This Motherlode is their primary reason for digging, though the loose gravel around them seems to refill the hole as quickly as they can dig. Any attempt to streamline the efficiency of their production will win the party a promise of shared profits once the chunk is obtained and sold. (After one in-game week, notice will be sent out that 1-2: The new system has actually made things worse, and the Molefolk are demanding the party return to try something else, 3-5: Their productivity is up, and they'll surely find the Motherlode any day now; they'll send another letter in a week, 6: They've successfully extracted a large sugar chunk, and have enclosed 1,225 gold pieces for the party.)

Dream Circus 

    A large, green and red striped tent surrounded by festive balloons and covered in tinsel. A large crowd of folk from across the Pole have gathered to watch the show in the three rings below the stands. The performances in the rings feature exotic creatures and stunts unlike anything the party has ever seen, and each act claims to be performing for "One Night Only." The party can locate any previously met NPC from any other Hex within the crowd, though they can never seem to reach them, should they try. 

    The Ringmaster is an androgynous child dressed in deep purple furs and an oversized, twin tailed jester hat, accompanied by a swarm of twinkling sugarplum fairies. Gravity appears to be a mere suggestion to them, and they flit about the tent while juggling a collection of round ornaments in festive colors. They will call for members of the audience to join in the performance; should the party do so, encourage the players to come up with an act, and ask for a few skill checks. Regardless of the results, the audience will cheer, and the Ringmaster will award them one of the baubles they juggle. 

    ITEM: Christmas Memoria - A glass bauble of red, gold, or white, decorated in gold. Once a day, a memory or dream of the night previous may be inscribed inside, appearing as a faint glowing light if inspected closely. The memory can be replayed to an individual holding the bauble and closing their eyes, as if it were their own, or to a large group by destroying the bauble. Once destroyed, the Memoria cannot be fixed. 

    Should the players incite violence against the performers or audience, complete a performance and gain a bauble, or entertain the notion that this circus is a dream, the party will wake up unharmed in the middle of a jawbreaker gravel pit, with the circus nowhere to be seen. 

    Ways to Reach the Circus

    After encountering it once in this hex, the Dreamscape of the circus is accessible by any who slumber in the Pole, though the method of doing so purposefully is unknown. Should the party wish to return, either for another Memoria, or to speak with the Ringmaster, they will need magical help of one form or another. Perhaps a strong enough wish would do? 

The Smash Bros Mansion

 

Art by Port of Zelda on tumblr

     Howdy, Farmhands!

    Super Smash Brothers, a fighting game with party game sensibilities, released for the Nintendo 64 in 1999. The appeal of the title that would go on to be one of Nintendo's most successful franchises, was not only in it's unique take on health bars that left competitors in an increasingly difficult scramble to remain on the stage at massive levels of damage, but in it's roster- Masahiro Sakurai, the game's director, managed to convince his superiors at Nintendo to draw from their collective IP to produce a crossover title that hadn't been attempted before. The end result was watching Yoshi and Mario duke it out with Link and Fox McCloud on stages taken from the likes of Kirby and Donkey Kong. For the first time, some of gaming's greatest mascots could interact outside of tiny cameos in their own titles, even if that interaction was just "cartoon violence." The world would never be the same. 

    It's sequel, Smash Brothers Melee (2001) expanded it's roster, including pulls from Fire Emblem and their Game & Watch handhelds, and increasing representation of the IP from the previous game. This decision brought success in North American markets to Fire Emblem, a franchise that hadn't seen much success outside of Japan, solidifying it's potential as a Kingmaker. Any IP that appeared in a Smash Brothers game could potentially reach an audience that wouldn't have given it a shot otherwise. This assumption has allowed the series to become an expo of gaming history in it's own right, as well as a lucrative marketing opportunity for companies outside Nintendo's network. With the reveal of Snake from Metal Gear and Sonic the fucking Hedgehog joining for the third entry, Super Smash Brothers Brawl (2008), the sky became the limit. Anyone's video game blorbo could show up to duke it out, and oh, did people imagine what that might look like for their faves.

    This is another blog post where it seems like I'm simply using my platform to gush about something that I personally enjoy, but I really do have a point with all this that connects back to TTRPGs. Honest. You can hold on for a couple more paragraphs.

    With the advent of the early-mid 2000's internet, fans of the series took to message boards and forums with gusto to discuss the logistics of their blorbos appearing in the next game. Conversations ranged from in-depth considerations of business relations between rights holders to simple conversation starters of "Wouldn't it be great if X game/character got in?" Nintendo themselves got in on the trend, releasing the roster for Brawl over a series of bespoke blogposts to raise hype for the game. One thing became clear, the process of speculating who would be next became a foundational part of Smash Bros fandom, and nothing was more indicative of that then the invention and proliferation of "The Smash Mansion."

    "The Smash Brothers Mansion" is a concept in fanworks surrounding the Super Smash Series dating back to at least 2003, though this relic of a fanfic could very well simply be the oldest survivor of a trend dating back even further. The basic concept involves the following assumptions: 1. The Smash Brothers Tournaments are organized by a higher power with the ability to summon the Fighter Roster from their respective universes to participate. 2. When not competing, the characters relax, train, and interact in a facility that acts as almost a college dorm. The specific details of how the building is laid out, what resources are available to the characters within it, or if the canonical roster are the only people operating out of it is up to individual interpretation. 3. Shenanigans ensue. An early example of this concept being used that I have personal experience with is the sub-series of webcomic pages found Katie Tiedrich's Awkward Zombie . As Tiedrich's work skews towards comedy, the focus is less on combat and more on situational humor featuring quirks of the video game medium; Link from Ocarina of Time beats up his replacement and steals his outfit in order to continue participating in future tournaments, the Pikmin wreak havoc by collectively throwing Fox McCloud down a flight of stairs, and Roy reacts to not being in Super Smash Brothers Brawl by stalking and critiquing anyone else who joined after his firing.

    This combination of Blorbo appreciation, Hype cycle, Domestic Comedy, and Commentary on the nature of and community surrounding Video Games as a medium is amazingly fertile ground for creativity. I personally joined in around 2013, during the leadup to the release of Super Smash Brothers For Wii U and 3DS. You may never believe me when I say this, but I was a Tumblr Blog Roleplay Girlie. I started off with a collection of OCs in 2010 before branching out to specific fandom spaces. One of my "muses" as we called them, was Resetti the Mole from Animal Crossing, and I had a grand time acting as a grumpy and loud middle aged man, tired of all these damn kids messing with the time-space continuum. Primarily I interacted with other Animal Crossing characters, but many others from Nintendo-adjacent IP would hit me up to write silly scenarios between our little guys. This status quo stayed about the same until the release trailer for "Smash 4" dropped, and with it, a FLURRY of activity, as suddenly folks remembered The Smash Mansion trope, and sought to emulate it. Multiple roleplayers from across different fandoms found the common ground of "Our Blorbos Are In The Same Video Game" and ran with it. Even blogs featuring characters that never appear in Smash Brothers were welcome if their parent IP had even a simple PNG of representation. And it didn't stop with the returning roster, either.

    The hype cycle of Smash 4, and later Smash Ultimate, was intense. Nintendo's infamous "One More Thing" method of ending their presentations kept people excited and hungry for a new reveal- that every character got a bespoke animated introduction turned Nintendo Directs into a proper event. RP Blogs that took part in Fandoms connected to Smash couldn't look away, even if they didn't plan on getting the game itself. Any day now, one of their blorbos could be added, giving them (and their fandom by association) an invitation to the club. Milliseconds after a Direct ended, previously small groups playing niche blorbos with each other would begin posting in confusion as they suddenly had a hundred new followers from, like, Dixie Kong accounts. There was a congratulatory vibe to finding yourself in that position, as if the group had been waiting for you all along, and now was your moment. Come on in, drop your bags at the door. A room has been prepared for you and everyone is happy you made it. Welcome Home, Newcomer.

    I think there is something to be learned here. Not that hype and crossovers are what we should be doing, more of the community thing. Super Smash Brothers became a celebration of video games in their totality, and the inclusion of characters from titles across history has done more to spread that history to new audiences than any ad campaign could have. The joy a fandom has for a property that's fallen into the background suddenly becoming aflush with new folk as the IP is elevated onto this stage is intense, and Smash has personally gotten me into titles I would have never considered trying on my own. Smash becomes an excuse for an outpouring of appreciation and celebration of video game history; because at the end of the day, we're all nerds who love games. Why can't we embody that joy more often?

    This is a post about TTRPGS, despite everything, and while there are significant differences between Video Game and Tabletop fandoms and fandom spaces, they are still spaces with rich histories that deserve to be celebrated. The big names in the room tend to get a lot of the attention, and while recent years has seen a boom of indie titles recieving dedicated followings, there's still plenty of room for acceptance of new blood in those groups. There ought to be a JOY in sharing new systems and styles of play with others, in learning about the paths taken throughout time that lead to both popular and niche titles of today, not because we want to convert others to our preferred way of doing things, but because appreciating them for what they are and what they contributed to the hobby overall can only lead to a better hobby going forward. In a way, we're already all living under the roof of our own Smash Mansion. Maybe we just need to get better at welcoming our new neighbors.

    Until Next Time,

        Farmer Gadda 

 

 Only tangentially related; I wrote a Lasers & Feelings hack about being an Action Figure and deciding if you're going to lean in or fight against the role you've been cast (in plastic). It's free for legal reasons. 

https://farmergadda.itch.io/smashandbrothers