iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

What am I saying? Super-clean layout, minimal art that doubles as illustrations of gear, my own maps, & a ton of promotion.

A d20, roll-high fantasy RPG that's kid-friendly but not cartoony—secretly the best version of D&D. Exploration & problem-solving over combat. Super-clean layout, then what's left over for B&W art, maps, & color booklet of houses, horses, & outfits to spend gold on. Dry-erase character sheets.

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I see what you're saying. If you hit, you hit twice; but if you miss, you miss twice. Rolling twice gives you a third possible outcome of hitting once & missing once. I'll have to think about it; I'm trying to boost martials without adding a bunch more dice rolls.

It occurs to me that, rather than giving martial characters multiple attacks, just give them multiple hits with one attack. You can hit AC 14? There are two different orcs or one orc twice. Mages don't have to roll separate attacks to boost their fireball damage, right? #OSR

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

The OSE GM book has just 3 maps: a hex crawl, a city, & a dungeon. The PF2 core rules has 2: the world & the main realm. ShadowDark has zero. The 5e DMG has 11 but recommends you just reuse existing maps. Why do games about exploring weird places put so little effort into helping GMs create them?

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

You don't have to be an architect. You can just swipe this & put it in your adventure. You don't even have to draw it on your map. Just make a big rectangle & show the players the picture. Boom: it's the great hall of Candlebridge Palace.

Peacock-inspired atrium of the cruise ship Disney Fantasy.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

How does Pointy Hat (Antonio Demico) not have a Patreon account?

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I'm excited about the ecosystem developing around ShadowDark.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

In more than 100 years of systematic archaeology, scientists only found seven +1 swords & three +2 swords... until two years ago, when they finally found a +5 Holy Avenger.

Twitter post from 2024: "A very well-preserved 3000-year-old sword was found inside a grave in the town of Nördlingen, Bavaria, Germany."

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Don't start your adventure in a tavern. END there. It's natural, & you can feed the players 3 leads to choose from for next time. Then—after you've written up the one they chose—they get the full background & start out. That makes it easy to have a meaningful encounter (not always combat) early on.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I played a ton of 2e in the 90s. Most of these splat books were awful.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

TSR's 1990 Campaign Sourcebook & Catacomb Guide: - 50 pages of etiquette, bad DMs & players—2 F-bombs(!) - 60 pages on creating campaigns, maps, & NPCs with no maps or tables - 6 maps of real places—unsuitable for gaming At one point, it suggests getting books on caves & castles FROM THE LIBRARY.🤷‍♂️

cover image of AD&D 2e Campaign Sourcebook & Catacomb Guide

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Why would you use "Coin" as your metacurrency? That's CURRENCY.

monster stat block for a crushing attack that says "Whenever a foe successfully Defends your attack, spend one Coin to negate it."

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Players love to be in the right. Let the heroes… - Gather evidence of a crime or prove their own innocence. - Prove they have/were granted the right to do something. - Prove something about the existence of a certain monster. Let the pedants be pedantic in-game. Say the spectators applaud! #Drama

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Trying to up my dungeon design game. Every video game discussion about level design says the same stuff but doesn't give many examples. The best I find come from Tommy Norberg's tweets(?) Here, 1-3 are inspired by him. In short: provide mechanics to throw opponents & places for that (or archery).

Examples of interesting elevation changes in a dungeon. 1, 2, & 3 came from a graphic attributed to game designer Tommy Norberg. 4 thru 7 are mine.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

"Puzzles don't make sense in a dungeon." You enter the dusty, wood-paneled chapel. There's a loft above the altar with a glint of gold from your torch in a shadowy niche. How do you get up there? Levitate? Climb? One of the wall panels swings in—a concealed door to a tiny, winding staircase.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

"Mount Doom" is a little on the nose? How do you feel about "Death Valley"?

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Ask your players to write down a magic item appropriate for their current level that they’d like to have. But don’t just seed your next adventure with them. Mention them as part of your adventure leads, so they have to choose which lead—& item—to pursue.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Anything that requires specific actions is a puzzle if there are no instructions. Raise a portcullis: The winch handle may be locked or missing. The ratchet (clack-clack-clack) may be disengaged or broken. Do they need to find or sub a handle? Replace the broken chain with their own rope?

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

My favorite idea for a campaign setting is one with realms that have distinct Euro flavors, so you can play a character named Alric Fairdale or Jalêvre Yprênne or Vintero Coronus. Alric has seen the firedrake & troll, Jalêvre the tarasque & gargoyle, & Vintero the hydra & cockatrice.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

A fun thing to do would be to tell the cleric that there’s ONLY good & evil but tell the druid that neutrality DOES exist. The cleric can hold that a creature’s true nature will come out but that creatures can change. And the druid can hold that neutral creatures aren’t changing, just situational.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

1-mile hex is 0.86 sq miles 3-mile hex is 7.8 sq miles 6-mile hex is 31.2 sq miles 9-mile hex is 70.1 sq miles

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

5e Lost Mine of Phandelver map. (Deleted error: There's a fan-made one that adds points of interest from other adventures set in the same area, but this is Mike Schley's original for the official box set.) prints.mikeschley.com/p856083253

prints.mikeschley.com

Lost Mine of Phandelver Maps

Start your campaign off right with these seven unique maps originally created for the D&D Starter Set adventure Lost Mine of Phandelver. Prepare to explore subterranean labyrinths, ruined castles, and...

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

These are 5-mile hexes. That means this region is a quarter of the size of Ireland. 🤷‍♂️

Regional map of Neverwinter and Phandalin.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

It seems like the clothing & accoutrements could be linked to Hero Forge for easy 3-D printing of your exact character in that costume.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

What’s the best catalog of clothing, gear, houses, ships, etc that adventurers could buy?

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Greyharbor doesn't seem to have a harbor. How can a city on a cliff be a port?

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Reposted by Zarban TTRPG

Ty @mindstorm.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

One fun inventory management thing I used once: before heading out to the dungeon, pay the upkeep fee on gear to equip it. Doesn't matter if you end up not using it, just putting on the armor or bringing the rope required the upkeep! To make it easy, it was just 1/10 of the cost of the thing.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

It occurs to me that this can replace "fighter combat dominance" in OSE. At 3rd level, fighting less-than-1HD-creatures, you can trade boosts for extra attacks & treat every hit as a kill. At 5th, 1+1HD; at 7th, 2+1HD; etc.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

- High STR (1 to 3) - Magic weapon (1 to 3) - Every 3 to 5 levels, depending on your class A high-level PC might have several boosts per encounter & turn multiple misses into hits or crits. You could even use boosts defensively to lower an opponent's result with your prowess. Can't boost a nat 1.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Idea: instead of combat bonuses, you can raise an attack's result tier: miss (low roll), blocked, hit, crit. To hit AC 14, you need to roll nat 14+ or use a boost or 2. NO MATH. Advantage/disadvantage still work. Some penalties raise the opponent's AC. Boosts are gained per encounter for…

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Imagine if Necrotic Gnome made a new campaign setting like Dolmenwood but more traditional & included an old-school system like OSE Advanced but with d20, roll-high elements to make 5e kids more comfortable. Seems like an obvious win.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Apparently, crocodilians just kind of smell like their surroundings: swampy, earthy, a bit fishy. Add elements of a breath weapon to that, I'd say.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Here’s an idea: Opening a stuck door requires a character with a strength of 16+ or a strength of 14+ using a prybar, or else two characters with a strength of 13+. A particularly stout door may require several characters with a battering ram or axes.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

My stand-up comedy act consists of just reading bad, old RPG rules. Here’s a piece of D&D 2e’s 8 paragraphs on how to open an unlocked door.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Some YouTubers are only good at reading a script. Make your point & give me something actionable.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Actually, here's something I created years ago to be a spinner for weird dice. Imagine a second hand ticking off endless random numbers.

Concentric circles with randomly laid out numbers up to 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, and 13.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

A cool thing would be a clock with the numbers 1 to 100 around the outside, so you could just look at the second hand & get a random number.

Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

This works against kobolds & goblins at 3rd level, orcs & hobgoblins at 5th, cavemen & lizardfolk at 7th, deep ones (kuo-toa) & bugbears at 9th, & ogres at 11th. Also, the knockouts enable cool tavern brawls. 👊😠

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Here's my version: At 3rd level, once per encounter against creatures of less than 1 HD, you can make a number of melee attacks equal to your level & treat each hit as a kill. At 5th, it becomes 1+1 HD, & rises 1 HD every odd level. Unarmed, these are knockouts.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

I like almost everything but "fighter combat dominance". It's really clumsy to just give fighters 1 attack per level every round against goblins & kobolds & such. It's a genuine old rule that got dumped because it's too slow to roll all those attacks & damage & adjudicate the results.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Hey, include pronunciation guides in your published material. Gygax didn't do it, & we got a whole generation of nerds that mispronounced names & slightly unusual words.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

I only just now looked at the Old-School Essentials Advanced 2026 update preview doc. I can't wait. With just a few house rules, this could be my perfect game.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

thunderclap mushroom: Largish mushrooms that explode for 1d3 damage if stepped on, etc. If sliced cleanly (fail on 1 on d20), they become stable enough to carry & throw for 1d3 damage, but if you fall down, they explode. Primary ingredient in potions of growth & gaseous form.

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Things that actually happened in medieval Europe you could use in your campaign: 🐖Animal put on trial for killing/injuring a human 🧑‍⚖️Trial jury asked to do its own investigating 🪙Outlaw buying a pardon from the king 🩻Executed criminal hanging in a gibbet for years ⚔️Trial by combat as an option

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Zarban TTRPG @zarbanttrpg.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Pro tip: Create puzzles & predicaments where the heroes need a pry bar, mirror, rope, spikes, candle, ball bearings, etc. Make their equipment choices matter.