Purple Index Cards: On-the-Fly Setting and Plot Collaboration

I love this thread, I love the cards (especially the names!) and I'm totally using this idea in my campaign. Thanks for sharing!

Anyone have any links to any more posts about using aspects, fate points, or other metagame systems to encourage roleplaying or share a bit of narrative control in 4E? (Besides this great thread by weem)

Oh my. Those Whimsy cards are fantastic--a great way to bulk up the list of things like "But Soft..." I need to get a new stack of blank purple cards, I think ^.^

I think the necromancy is justified here: I've created a set of documents with all the cards to date that can be printed directly onto 3x5 index cards!

Word 2007
OpenOffice.org
PDF

New since last:
- No more Achievements. They never saw much use at my table, and I didn't have enough of them to be worthwhile, so I dropped them. The heart of the thing is in the twist cards!
- Lots more cards, including a number cribbed from or inspired by the Ars Magica Whimsy Cards. 103 in all!
- Various tweaks and rewordings, generally to make the cards' effects broader, less lawyerly, and more rewarding of players causing trouble for themselves.

Thank you to everyone in this thread for the input you've provided. I always welcome new card ideas, so keep them coming, and I'll update the documents accordingly!

Another system that is less dependant on playing cards but was always good was the "bennies" systems from Savage Worlds. Three ranks of "chips" that gave you various bonuses (in D&D I would hazard +1, +2, +5 for the values).

These were awarded on top of experience to encourage roleplaying and participation above and beyond just playing the piece of paper in front of you.

Advantages: it was more freeform so the DM and players have a little more artistic control over the outcome - say they spent a +1 chip and used it for an attack roll, the descriptive result was in the control of players and DM. In addition the DM could sway the uses of the chip if he/she thought it was going to ruin the game itself.

Disadvantages: It required more artistic control by the players and DM

I've played both systems and they both have merits. What I did find with the Whimsy System was that some players would just sit there reading them and spend a lot of the session "waiting" for the right moment to use them. They ended up not having much fun.

A system I developed which was a combination of both systems was my Tarot System (used in 3.0/3.5 plot driven games). At the start of every session each character would get one Tarot Card +1 or 2 more based on a "luck" roll which was a roll under the average of their stats. If they rolled under they got +1 and if they rolled under half they got another. I found more than 3 was too much.

A Major Arcana was MAJOR - it could change something in a big way (read below). Minor Arcana gave bonuses or slight modifications (like a -2 to an enemies roll etc). You needed a higher number to affect others (even party members).

During the game they could spend these cards (they went away at end of session) to change the plot line somehow. For example in a combat with a powerful enemy in one of his warehouses (side not: the female player's character - my wife actually - had been going on "dates" with a Paladin from the bodyguard's guild in the city) was knocked down and about to die. Just before I got initiative for the BBEG she played "The Lovers". Suddenly through a high window the Paladin bursts through and tackles the guy to the ground giving the party a chance to escape.

She wanted him to turn up and kill the BBEG - I thought that it would be more fun to save her and the party (they still got the XP) but keep BBEG around for a while.

Of course this led to later complications of courting and wooing but it was a blast.

Advantages: very freeform, will not derail a DM's game if he/she prepares well enough.
Disadvantages: requires a lot of quick thinking.

Thanks for the update Sabrecat, I just started using these cards with my group a few sessions ago, and they've been a huge hit.
I agree that the achievement cards are probably not the best, once you've earned them once why repeat them?

Since the 3x5 versions weren't up when I made my own, I ended up copy/pasting from this thread. I found that to save space and my supply of cards I could usually fit two card descriptions on a 3x5 card with only a few font size changes. Then I cut the cards in half. This doubles the number of cards you can print at once, and makes a neat small card deck size of about 3" by a little less than 2.5".

I've changed the names on a few cards to better fit with my group's sense of humour.
For instance, "The Cavalry has Arrived!" is now "Send in the Ninjas!", "WHAT! Did you say be quiet?" is now "I ROLLED A 4!", and "There's always a malcontent" is likely to be renamed "AHH! Curse your sudden, but inevitable betrayal!" as well as changing "because I can kill you that's why" to "To the Pain!". Kudos on working another Princess Bride quote into the revised version.
And a suggestion, is "and it Sucked..." a reference to Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising? If so, I would recommend the title be changed to "which Sucked!..." to better reflect the actual quote. I've also considered changing it to another quote, like "Book of Armaments; Chapter 2, verses 9 through 21."

Here's some more card titles I'm still working on; I haven't come up with good story twists or interesting effects for all of these yet.

Everything's ... Better... with Pirates - Not sure yet

This ... is my BOOMSTICK! - current idea, play this card to suddenly be holding one of your weapons and initiate a surprise round without a check.

Bowties... are cool. - Reveal and describe an embarassing object your character still carries to receive a +2 bonus to your next roll.
“Koona T’chuta, Solo?” - Play this card to introduce a new NPC who will hinder the party at their current task.
Gain Minion XP, or Monster XP if you supply the NPC with a name and history with one or more PCs.

"It's a very distinctive style." - Describe an opponent's fighting style in a manner that tells us more about that character's background and training. If you effectively describe how your knowledge of their style gives your party a way to counter them, grant combat advantage against that opponent either to yourself or one of your allies for the next turn. Gain minion XP if you granted Combat Advantage to yourself, or Monster XP if you gave Combat Advantage to an ally.

"They were both poisoned." - Describe a series of events from your characters backstory that grant you a weakness or resistance to an enemy's attack or a status effect you are under. Reroll a saving throw.
Gain minion XP if you gave your self a resistance and turned a failed save into a successful one. Gain monster xp if you rerolled a successful save and turned it into a failure.

I'd welcome suggestions on how to improve these card descriptions or effects.

Kelvor Ravenstar said:

I found that to save space and my supply of cards I could usually fit two card descriptions on a 3x5 card with only a few font size changes. Then I cut the cards in half.

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Oh, cool! That sounds like the format surfarcher used for his document upthread. If you can come up with a Word or OpenOffice format that works this way, I'd love to see it! (Might tinker with it myself... columns maybe?)

I've changed the names on a few cards to better fit with my group's sense of humour.

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That's a big reason I included editable documents instead of just a saved-off PDF. Some of the card titles are outright in-jokes from my own group (e.g. "Oh, Good, You're Not a Shoe"), so I fully expect people will want to tweak the card titles ^.^

For instance, "The Cavalry has Arrived!" is now "Send in the Ninjas!", "WHAT! Did you say be quiet?" is now "I ROLLED A 4!", and "There's always a malcontent" is likely to be renamed "AHH! Curse your sudden, but inevitable betrayal!" as well as changing "because I can kill you that's why" to "To the Pain!".

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Those are all great! I very well may update my own (the "official"? hah) documents to match those. Clever pop-culture references beat generic wit anytime. ^.^ Is "I ROLLED A 4!" a movie reference, or a group in-joke? It sounds familiar...

And a suggestion, is "and it Sucked..." a reference to Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising? If so, I would recommend the title be changed to "which Sucked!..." to better reflect the actual quote.

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It is supposed to be that, so good catch!

This ... is my BOOMSTICK!

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Nice idea! I don't make enough use of surprise rounds, that's great.

“Koona T’chuta, Solo?”

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Yeah, that's rather a gap, isn't it? I don't have many cards that outright spawn a new NPC (though it could be worked into some of the broader ones), so good call. Is that the actual transliteration from Episode IV? I always thought it was "Oota Goota" or something

"It's a very distinctive style."

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Clever! Combat advantage is a pretty minor and often easy-to-get benefit, and it doesn't stack, though, so this feels a little underpowered. Maybe we could swing something where you get to dictate the enemy's next action, to represent your anticipating their next move or their telegraphing their attacks via their style?

"They were both poisoned."

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Hell yeah. I like.

Thanks for all the ideas! Expect these to be incorporated soon--I'll post again when the documents are updated. It tickles me to hear that folks are putting these into use at their tables!

SabreCat said:

Oh, cool! That sounds like the format surfarcher used for his document upthread. If you can come up with a Word or OpenOffice format that works this way, I'd love to see it! (Might tinker with it myself... columns maybe?)

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In Word I set the page size to 3x5, added columns, and set the page margins to the smallest my printer can handle, which is about 0.25 Inches. I then adjusted the space between the columns as small as possible. I used 12 point font for most of the titles, and 10 for the card text.
View attachment Roleplaying Cards.doc Here's my last version of the file, so you can see how they look, but its not up to date with all of my card ideas yet. I'll probably get to that later tonight. One suggestion I have for cutting them is making little diagonal cuts to remove the corners; makes them easier to shuffle and helps avoid paper cuts.

SabreCat said:

Those are all great! I very well may update my own (the "official"? hah) documents to match those. Clever pop-culture references beat generic wit anytime. ^.^ Is "I ROLLED A 4!" a movie reference, or a group in-joke? It sounds familiar...

Click to expand...

Yep, that's a quote from the early Order of the Stick webcomic strips. They roll group stealth and Elan announces his lack of success for all the monsters to hear.

Is that the actual transliteration from Episode IV? I always thought it was "Oota Goota" or something

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It certainly sounds like Oonta Goota, Solo in the movie, but the transliteration of Greedo's Huttese in the Star Wars book "Galactic Phrase Book & Travel Guide: Beeps, Bleats, Boskas, and Other Common Intergalactic Verbiage" has it as Koona T'chuta, Solo? That funny book also has some great translations such as "Dopo mee gusha, peedunky?" which is Dirty Harry's famous line, "Do you feel lucky punk?"

Clever! Combat advantage is a pretty minor and often easy-to-get benefit, and it doesn't stack, though, so this feels a little underpowered. Maybe we could swing something where you get to dictate the enemy's next action, to represent your anticipating their next move or their telegraphing their attacks via their style?

Click to expand...

Yes, I agree Combat Advantage can be only of minor benefit in combat, but it all depends on the tactical acumen of your group. A +2 to hit can be pretty significant depending on the situation in 4e, and if they aren't used to having leaders giving out big bonuses every round they will appreciate it. I chose only combat advantage because I didn't want the cards to give a significant advantage in combat. Therefore they are so far only neat little tricks about equal to an at-will or weaker encounter power, especially since playing a card doesn't take up one of their actions.

This hasn't come up yet but I'm considering giving options to my group to either exchange cards after a milestone or extended rest, or giving out an entirely new hand in the middle of a long session. A few times we've had all the players use their cards up quickly, and we enjoy their usefulness in plot twists. Like I said in my last post I'm probably going to get rid of the achievement cards in my deck, but I think I'll repurpose them with some tweaks into the regular deck.

My group is still using these cards every session, and everyone loves them. I'm up to 158 cards with effects culled from many similar projects and a few original ones from me.

We've since institute a new rule for card refresh, we play with a setlist of songs on in the background, and each PC has a prepicked "theme song". When their song comes up they get to draw a new card.

*New types of cards in this deck include ones that give new one-use combat powers for the PC. Anywhere they reference damage as Low for instance, refer to P. 42 of the DMG for the corresponding damage for the PC's level. Cards with a big benefit without a possible downside do not give bonus experience.
* The Rod of Wonder is a card, when it gets played refer to your own favourite table for the random effect.

I've attached my current card set, they are formatted to be printed two to a 3x5 index card. I usually cut the corners diagonally about a half centimeter in.
View attachment Roleplaying Cards.doc

Very cool! Thanks so much for the update. Use of the cards has slowed substantially in my game, maybe this is just what I need to jazz it back up. I'll be cribbing quite a few of these! (Though I think I'll add XP bonuses back in just about everywhere--I've never found the added incentive to hurt, however potent the card itself.)

I am totally stealing this when I launch my next campaign.

It is supposed to be a sort of "sandbox-style" game in a largely unexplored and undetailed portion of my campaign world, so cards granting players some narrative control over what lies beyond the horizon will be perfect.

I expect to start within the next couple months (we're still finishing up a story arc in our current game), so after a few sessions have gone by, I will post with an update as to how well it worked.