Adventurer's Respite

For now, your adventure is at its end. You’ve come to the valley of Adventurer’s Respite for its restorative properties. Here, you will meet other weary adventurers also seeking renewal, recovery, and transport. But will you find it?

Adventurer’s Respite is a short, GMless roleplaying game of attempted relaxation for 2-6 players. You will need 1d4 per player, and some tokens to represent health.

What if Rivendell wasn't just a stop along the way?

I was inspired to write Adventurer's Respite during a retreat in the Catskill Mountains with a delightful group of fellow writers and game designers. As we sat amid grass and sunlight together, working on our projects, I mused on how hard it is to relax together, even despite our best intentions. I wondered how and why people achieve moments of renewal and release.

Naturally, I started wondering what it would be like to roleplay in a setting like Tolkien's Rivendell. In the books, Rivendell isn't really the site of a lot of dramatic tension. It's a place where we find a break in the action and enjoy a moment of safety before things get intense.

But in my mind, there's tons of drama and challenge associated with healing. Even when we want to heal, it's sometimes incredibly hard.

Roll dice, build scenes

Adventurer's Respite uses a simple d4-based system that I designed. You will build a scene together, and then roll dice to determine the outcome of your actions before narrating them. Each of the four numbers on the die corresponds with a different outcome flavor that you'll narrate with that scene's leader:

1 - Self-Sabotage - Lose 1 Health. Describe an interaction that drains you.
2 - Selfishness - Gain 1 Health. Describe an interaction that feeds you.
3 - Self-Sacrifice - Lose 1 Health, They Gain 1 Health. Describe your exchange.
4 - Collaboration - Gain 1 Health, They Gain 1 Health. Describe your exchange.

As you can see, it's hard to collaborate with people to heal together, but it's not impossible! As your interactions unfold, and your Health number changes, a mutual story of healing and weariness will reveal itself, illustrating how your heroes negotiate for grace amid the chaos of neediness and miscommunication.