SRD ☉ GMing

Encounters

Running encounters

In the Grit System, we call any mechanicalized interaction with a non-player character an encounter. We present statistics for NPCs in blocks. These statistics allow NPCs to push back against PCs in combat as well as in social conflicts (via competing CHA and WIL checks).

Some NPCs have powers drawn from PC classes; other NPCs have unique powers; and still other NPCs simply have scores with no special abilities. We encourage you to create encounter blocks for “monsters” (aliens, wild beasts, brigands, etc.) and individually interesting NPCs. We also encourage writing out tables of hostile encounters by region.

Golden rules of NPC design

Fast is better than perfect.

Try strange things (tics, names, goals) up front; backpedal to the useful, plot-wise (switch to nickname, subsume the NPC’s goal into the PC’s goal), as the session wears on.

Don’t be afraid to kill your darlings and/or mothball boring allies or repetitive “monster” encounters.

Random encounters, quick (d6)

  1. Disaster – Random hostile encounter! Roll on the relevant table. Or just pick the worst thing (void elves, e.g.). Or, if you’re currently being pursued by a specific enemy, they find you.
  2. Bad news – Random hostile encounter! Roll on the relevant table. Or just pick a normal-bad thing (bandits, space bandits, e.g.).
  3. Poor omen – Nothing much happens, but the foreboding landscape/voidscape through which you pass leaves you seriously spooked.
  4. Good omen – Nothing much happens, but the pleasant landscape/voidscape through which you pass leaves you feeling confident.
  5. Relief – You encounter some random helpful strangers. These should fit the landscape/voidscape in which you find yourself. They offer respite and company, to the extent that you want these things. They leave you alone if you’re on a secret mission, in a hurry, etc. Or everyone regains d4 GRT.
  6. Lucky break – You find just the thing you need (food if starving, helpful strangers if lost, etc.). Or you find a random useful archaetech item. Or everyone regains d6 GRT.

Encounter tags

Dangerous entities may have any number of strange powers. Instead of coming up with unique narrative powers for every antagonist, GMs may want to use the simpler threat of conditions (see “Rules”) and encounter tags. These can be mixed and matched with class powers, species powers, Weird powers, and encounter-specific (unique) powers to make satisfying threats.

In general, we recommend giving most single combatants 1 or 2 interesting attacks and 1 or 2 powers. “Boss” encounters should have a wider range.

Example encounter tags

  • Draining – Every point of HEA damage inflicted by the attacker drains 1 GRT from them, which flows back to the attacker.
  • Environmental – Strikes every target in far range.
  • Incorporeal – Only harmed by Weird attacks (weapons and powers with the Weird tag).
  • Scattering – Strikes every target in near range.
  • Sweeping – Strikes every target in close range.
  • Tranquilizing – A hit target must make a WIL/resist world check: if they succeed, their MOV die drops by 1 type; if they fail, they fall asleep.
  • Vampiric – Every point of HEA damage inflicted by the attacker flows back to them, healing them.
  • Venomous dX/dY – A hit target must make a WIL/resist world check: if they succeed, they suffer dX additional wounds; if they fail, they suffer dY additional wounds.

Encounter blocks

Full encounter blocks include the following statistics: the number of individual entities encountered, COM (dX), MOV (dX), REA (dX), WIL (dX), CHA (dX), HEA (XX—maxCOM +maxMOV), GRT (XX—maxREA +maxWIL), DR (X, note origin), 3 habits (examples of activities that the entities might be engaged in when encountered), 1 dogma (their core set of beliefs), powers, attacks, gear, and story notes (description, quick facts that will matter).

Each encountered entity has a dogma—principle belief system—that guides their actions along with a matching conviction rating from 1 (willing to give up on their goal at the first sign of trouble) to 6 (willing to fight to the death for their belief).

To use conviction ratings, have the entity roll a WIL/test conviction check whenever they have lost half of their HEA. The difficulty of the check is equal to their conviction rating. If they succeed, they do whatever makes the most sense (e.g., run away if under attack by superior combatants). If they fail, they act according to their conviction, regardless of sense. Thus, an encounter with an entity who has a high conviction rating for any dogma that is not “survival” will lead to an intense, to-the-death fight.

Example encounters (d8)

  1. Clockwork gorillas
  2. Forest shark
  3. Grafted undead colossus
  4. Living microwave
  5. Noodle the iguana-cat
  6. Undying adepts
  7. Void elf “art handlers”
  8. Warmachine

Example encounters (monsters)

Clockwork gorillas

(wild machinic quasi-sapients)

HEAD COUNT

1 (exile) or 2d4 (band)

VITALS

COM d8 MOV d8 REA d3 WIL d10 CHA d8

HEA 16 GRT 13 DR 4 (metal)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Peacefully chewing rocks while picking moss off of each other’s backs
  • Bathing in a shallow, natural (ish) pool of oil out in the Petrol Flats
  • Standing in a circle around an anthill, preparing to ritually kick the shit out of it
  • Curious, ancient programming largely overwritten by familial bonds  (2)

ATTACKS

  • Smashy fists, 2d4 damage.

POWERS

  • Empathic polygraphic hand-ears (free)
    A clockwork gorilla can burn d4 GRT to detect any lie, force an interlocutor to reveal any deep truth, or tame any kitten or kitten-adjacent fauna. Note, gorillas don’t speak symbolic languages, read, or write per se, but they communicate, and they hate bullshit.
  • Repair subroutines (free)
    An injured clockwork gorilla can convert GRT to HEA at a rate of 1 to 1.
  • Whine and/or whir (standard)
    A clockwork gorilla can burn d8 GRT and open up their chest to unleash a torrent of clockwork wasps, inflicting 2d10 damage on all attackers (not friends) within near range, no attack check required. They can keep burning d8 damage to keep inflicting damage. While their chest is open, they suffer double damage from all attacks and triple damage from lightning.

GEAR

None. Each clockwork gorilla’s body is worth roughly 2d20 gl in metal when properly “butchered”—but what monster would kill a gorilla unless they truly had to? The clockwork fruit of the Clockwork Hills is worth money, but the clockwork gorillas never bring it with them when they leave their misty bowers.

STORY NOTES

Families of clockwork gorillas descend from the mist-shrouded metal “forests” of the Clockwork Hills each spring when the petrol-ice thaws. While not violent by nature, clockwork gorillas are machinic: they sometimes become obsessed with objects owned by passing non-clockwork beings, especially precious and/or complicated objects.

 

Forest shark

(apex predaflora)

HEAD COUNT

1

VITALS

COM d12 MOV d10 REA 1 WIL d8 CHA d4

HEA 22 GRT 9 DR 0

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Thundering just beneath the humus and loam, overturning trees
  • Snoozing for a year in the middle of a cold, shallow brook, resembling a boulder
  • Slowly depositing rocklike eggs on the underside of a limestone karst
  • The patient hunger of mosses, worts, lichens, and mushrooms (3)

ATTACKS

  • Bite, 2d6 damage plus bleed 2.

POWERS

  • Roar of rooted fins (standard)
    A forest shark can burn d4 GRT to create a distraction and set up a surprise attack from another direction (a false fin operation), focusing on 1 target: everyone within close range of that target must make a 7+ WIL/perceive check or else act after the shark in initiative (regardless of initiative) and make MOV/dodge checks with disadvantage during the following round.
  • Rush of green teeth (standard)
    A forest shark can burn d6 GRT to charge its prey, focusing on 1 target: everyone within close range of that target must make a 6+ WIL/perceive check or a 7+ MOV/dodge check or else be swallowed whole, suffering d12 damage per round. Each swallowed target can make a contested COM check against the shark to punch their way out (targets win ties).

GEAR

None.

STORY NOTES

A solitary predatory, the forest shark swims through the ground like water, surfacing to feed.

 

Grafted undead colossus

(giant post-humanoid terror composed of many walkers stitched together)

HEAD COUNT

1

VITALS

COM d20 MOV d6 REA 1 WIL d10 CHA d6

HEA 30 GRT 16 DR 3 (natural bulk)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • “Eating” a body freshly stolen from a cemetery, growing larger
  • Stomping through the woods, breaking branches, yet unseen behind great trees
  • Picking up a roof and preparing to hurl it, because why not?
  • A hunger to find objects loved by living humans and destroy them (6)

ATTACKS

  • Flurry of blows, d20 damage, close range. A colossus can attack 2d4 times per round (roll each round), choosing different targets for each attack.

POWERS

A colossus can use this power at will in place of attacking or using another power:

  • Torturous embrace (standard)
    The colossus can burn d8 GRT and attack: if successful, the colossus snatches their target and draws them into its form, inflicting 2d6 damage per round as dozens of clawed hands and sharp-toothed mouths tear into the victim’s flesh. The target can attempt to break away on subsequent rounds by passing a difficult (7+) COM check.

A colossus can use 1 of these powers each round in addition to attacking:

  • Vomit (standard)
    The colossus can burn 3 GRT to make a vomit attack out to near range, rolling WIL instead of COM to attack. If it hits, it inflicts d8 damage plus burn 3.
  • Lamprey fingers (standard)
    The colossus can burn 3 GRT to grab an opponent with its finger-mouths, inflicting d10 damage plus bleed 4. It regains d8 HEA from consuming blood in this way.
  • Pincers (standard)
    The colossus can burn 2 GRT to attack with malformed bone-pincers for d8 damage plus bleed 2.
  • Scorpion tail (standard)
    The colossus can burn 4 GRT to attack with a bony tail, inflicting 2d6 damage plus poison 4.

GEAR

The great body of a colossus contains 2d100 gl in random valuables as well as d3 archaetech or magickal items.

STORY NOTES

A grafted colossus is a huge, grotesque, artificial undead being created by stitching together multiple mutated corpses. When grafted together in this way, the component bodies wake up not as individuals but instead as a single monstrous being. In spite of its size and confusing, tangled body of writhing limbs, heads, and torsos, a colossus is capable of near perfect coordination and brutal attacks, making it an extremely dangerous foe.

 

Living microwave

(Cronenbergian domestic horror)

HEAD COUNT

1

VITALS

COM d6 MOV d4 REA d6 WIL d6 CHA d6

HEA 20 GRT 12 DR 3 (metal frame, flesh-plastic skin)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Spinning slowly in a circle and counting
  • Spinning slowly in a circle and screaming
  • Spinning slowly in a circle and “chomping” (dehydrating an unlucky rat)
  • Absolute panicked urge to die in mortal combat (6)

ATTACKS

  • Maser, d6+1 damage.

POWERS

  • Flood of lightning (free)
    The living microwave burns d8 GRT each time it attacks to overcharge its microwave ability (maser), inflicting double damage.
  • Absence from the hell of Being (special)
    Whenever the living microwave suffers damage but doesn’t die, it begins to overheat in hopes of exploding and rejoining the eldritch spirits in the technobeyond (or something—we’re translating here): starting the following round, the living microwave makes a REA check as a free action on its turn, burning 3 GRT to boost its result if possible. If it succeeds, it explodes, inflicting 2d20 damage plus burn 2 on everyone in near range. If it fails, the living microwave keeps attacking, unconsolable.

GEAR

None, but its parts are worth d100 gl if cleaned up. (The burned-meat smell can never really be removed.)

STORY NOTES

Whoever made or summoned this thing will never be forgiven. Monsters are reflections of those who behold them, and the living microwave is clearly an emergent folkloric trope, a universal fear. (Right?)

 

Noodle the iguana-cat

(intelligent hybrid beast)

HEAD COUNT

1

VITALS

COM d12 MOV d10 REA d6 WIL d6 CHA d4

HEA 15 GRT 5 DR 1 (blisters and fur)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Monologuing to a stuffed animal about her next scheme…
  • Catching a fly with a precisely timed prehensile-tongue-lashing…
  • Rhythmically shattering valuable glass ornaments, laughing all the while…
  • Survivalism, now tainted by sadism (3)

ATTACKS

Claw swipe, 2d6 damage.

POWERS

  • Hybrid death-leap (2-round)
    If Noodle spends 1 round setting up a sneak attack, she makes her next attack check with advantage.
  • Laser-eyes (standard)
    Noodle can burn d10 GRT to fire a beam of intense light at a target, automatically hitting them for 3d6 damage.
  • Spine-dash (standard)
    Noodle can burn 2X GRT to curl up and rapidly spin like a wheel. She attacks X times: each time she hits, she inflicts d12 + Xd4 damage as her spines rip through the slow-pokes!

GEAR

Noodle is protecting a hoard of d4+1 ancient artifacts, at least one of which is a pristine cherry-red lawnmower.

STORY NOTES

Noodle is a menacing oversize animal who never stops moving. Even in her sleep, she kicks her legs, running from something fearsome, devouring small fry.

 

Undying adepts

(cultists who believe mutation is the key to immortality)

HEAD COUNT

2d6

VITALS

COM d6 MOV d6 REA d6 WIL d12 CHA d8

HEA 12 GRT 18 DR 0 or 2 (if wielding a staff)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Experimenting with “resurrecting” a moldy wheel of cheese
  • Experimenting with the power of prayer to protect a new “convert” from being stabbed
  • Experimenting with swapping the head of a dog and another, very similar dog
  • Faith in the New Carnality, the Body-Without-Parts, the Flesh to Come (4)

ATTACKS

Each adept has 1 of the following:

  • Jambiya (curved dagger), d6 plus bleed 1, close range.
  • Quarterstaff, d4 damage plus stun 1, near range. An adept gains +2 DR while using a staff.
  • Quillon daggers (2), d4 damage, close range, throwable. An adept attacks twice per round with quillion daggers, burning 4 GRT each time.

POWERS

  • Distressing mutation (standard)
    An adept can burn 4 GRT and do something vile, targeting 1 onlooker. The adept makes a standard (6+) CHA check: if they are successful, their target makes their next 2 checks with disadvantage.
  • Furtive movement (free)
    Whenever an adept fails a MOV/sneak check to set up an ambush or retreat, they burn 3 GRT to reroll the check. They must accept the second result.
  • Multiweapon fighting (standard)
    When attacking while holding a weapon in each hand, an adept burns 4 GRT to make attacks for each weapon simultaneously.
  • Spearshield (passive)
    When wielding a 2-handed polearm, an adept gains +2 DR. (Included above.)
  • Transmogrified (free)
    An adept can burn d6 GRT to unleash strange new aspects of their body, increasing 1 of their scores by 1 die type for 1 round. They usually do this before attacking to roll a d8 to hit.

GEAR

Each adept has d20+3 gl in silver pennies in their coinpurse along with a random assortment of heretical religious tracts, sewing needles, lucky knucklebones, jerky pieces, and so on.

STORY NOTES

Clad in tattered black hoods and adorned with inverted wood crucifixes draped around their necks, these heretical converts stalk the dark alleys of towns and cities, spreading their dogma. Those who refuse to become converts themselves often find themselves spirited away at knifepoint, to be used as raw material for their growing army of undead—one controlled by the shadowy leaders of the rogue church.

 

Void elf “art handlers”

(diminutive amoral posthumans)

HEAD COUNT

1 (critic) or 4d4 (autonomous collective)

VITALS

COM d12 MOV d10 REA d20 WIL d8 CHA d8

HEA 24 GRT 30 DR 6 (exalted quicksuit dress of hyperdiamond “mithril”)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Filming 4d4 living qhess pieces (humans) as they engage in a battle royale
  • Appearing before a group of quasisapients in messianic garb, pointing at a shining monolith
  • Remote-controlling a saw-drone that is removing the head of someone you know
  • Post-post-post-post-post-postmodernism (selfish aesthetics-worship) (d4+1)

ATTACKS

  • High-frequency sword, 2d6 damage plus nauseating: a struck target must pass a WIL/resist world check or experience severe disorientation and suffer a −1 to hit; this penalty is cumulative.
  • Lightning pistol, 3d6 damage plus EMP: stun 2 against informatic beings.
  • Lightning rifle, 6d6 damage plus EMP: stun 2 against informatic beings.
  • Singularity rifle, instant death on hit.

POWERS

  • Backstab, command, con, slay, steal (see “Example classes,” above).
  • Link thoughts, reanimate (see “Weird powers,” above).
  • Catch snake (standard)
    A void elf can burn 7 GRT to induce paralysis in 1 target within close range for d6 rounds.
  • Counter (free)
    A void elf can burn 4 GRT to immediately prevent one new or end one ongoing Weird effect within range of sight.

GEAR

  • Exalted quicksuits sell for 8000 gl.
  • High-frequency swords, 666 gl.
  • Lightning pistols, 1500+([d4−1] × 300) gl.
  • Lightning rifles, 3000+([d3−1] × 666) gl.
  • Singularity rifles, 8000+([d4−1] × 1000) gl. Singularity rifles are illegal everywhere.

STORY NOTES

These delicate-looking, half-sized humans in light-absorbing baroque armor are chain-smoking bidis and laughing in their song-like tongue at their own “ironic” observations. Strange ray-weapons are holstered at their hips. Void elves have exquisitely evil plans and do not care about you. If they see you, they will attempt to bring you back to their galleryship. They will flee if sufficiently threatened or obviously outgunned—but they will be back… Rarely, void elves’ motivations dovetail with those of other sapients.

 

Warmachine

(old and suffering from hard-disk failure)

HEAD COUNT

1

VITALS

COM d20 MOV d20 REA d20 WIL d20 CHA d8

HEA 50 GRT 50 DR 8 (66 cm-thick ceramic steel skin)

HABITS & DOGMA

  • Attempting to repair its own purgeable volumes, shaking its head furiously
  • Shouting into cyberspace a canto from an epic data-poem about Luna
  • Shaking its force maul at a stray deg; the deg is yipping, playing
  • Now-obsolete warfighting programming (5)

ATTACKS

Against foes within close range:

  • Chainknees, 2d6 damage plus bleed 2.
  • Force maul, 5d4 damage plus stun 2.
  • Radiation flechettes, d6+4 damage plus fatigue d4.
  • Submachine gun turrets, 2d6 damage, 3 attacks per round.
  • Against foes at far or beyond ranges:
  • Gauss cannon, 4d20 damage plus stun 5.
  • Railgun, 4d12 damage plus burn 4.

POWERS

  • Anti-orgone cladding (free)
    When the warmachine becomes the target of the Weird, if it gets a WIL roll to resist, it burns 2 GRT to gain +2 to that roll. If it doesn’t get to resist, it burns 5 GRT to gain such a roll.
  • Mecha-sized (special)
    Each round, the warmachine can target each non-building-sized opponent with any 2 of its close-range weapons.
  • Powerhack (standard)
    The warmachine can burn d12 GRT to tap into any technological system within near range.
  • Scanner (free)
    On encountering another sapient being, the warmachine burns d8 GRT and makes a CHA check; targets roll WIL to resist. If the warmachine is successful, it learns the HEA and GRT pool of its target, their level, and any hidden weaknesses.

GEAR

The warmachine’s salvaged circuits and other parts are worth 3d8 × 1000 gl.

STORY NOTES

Before you witness the dilapidated glory of GUZZA•DUNGUL, you hear its metal-shearing, distorted-signal, blown-amplifier roar... This primitive warmachine has long roamed the wastes, mindless and full of spite against its creators and their imbecilic descendants. It might be reasoned with, theoretically, via bribes of powerful technologies or sources of energy.

The game-world stack

Designing a narrative structure: what the PCs do

  • The world of a given imagination-based game has three levels. Taken together these create a full stack—a vivid overall environment in which to imagine that the action of the game takes place.
  • The highest level and most important level of the game-world stack is narrative structure: this is what the player-characters actually do all day. The narrative structure informs decisions about what character classes exist, how powers work, how goods and money factor into the game, if combat is important, what mechanicalized encounters look like—everything. For example…
  • If the PCs are vampyres reigning at night over a city, then their narrative structure may include non-diegetic resource recovery (dealing with GRT and blood), montage-level social conflicts against other vampyres, scene-level fuckery among the humans, and montage-level faction actions.
  • If the PCs are ex-space marines fighting against or making devil’s bargains with an oppressive Company, then their narrative structure may include resource recovery (GRT and HEA), montage-level discussions of the latest Co. venture and how to sabotage it, scene-level fuckery on alien exoplanets, and montage-level reporting to (lying to) the Co.

Genre: style and tone

  • The next most important level of the game-world stack is genre, or the set of tropes and the associated style and tone that clue the players—not their characters—into what type of game this is.
  • Genres include action (go slay “monsters”), espionage (steal information), exploration (walk around, try to survive, meet strangers, and perhaps report back to some organization that cares), noir (the PCs have already chosen the wrong side, righteously angered the deep structures of power, forever lost the missing golden child, etc.), and romance (broadly, feelings-focused stories, possibly with smooches—probably the most difficult to pull off, requiring discussions of consent).
  • In practice, all genres tend to devolve quickly into comedy, at least at points, at least for many TTRPG groups. That’s fine! Enjoy laughing with your friends.

Setting: geography and culture

  • The level of the game-world that is often least important to the story but most obvious to players is the setting, or the physical, social, political, and cultural place that the game happens in.
  • For one, the characters have a homebase or individual homes, friends and families, organizational allegiances, etc.
  • Setting informs game design in that certain game elements—powers, items, NPCs, and “monsters” (aliens, beasts, etc.)—are likely to exist in certain settings.
  • In practice, the GM and the players can “spam” or invent these elements on the fly, filling in the world as they explore it. That’s part of the fun of imagination-based games!

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