Bring your own party
Your boots.
These roads.
You do not need to play one of the Wayward Flames to care about the people beside a road. Start with a difficult crossing and see what your own company notices.
Download the adventure prompt ↓At your table
The Crossing Before Rain
A short, system-neutral adventure outline for a game master and a party of travelers. It is an original website extra, separate from the novel’s plot. Choose rules, difficulty, and character levels to suit your table; this outline contains no balanced combat encounter or complete stat blocks.
- Focus
- Exploration and conversation
- You bring
- Your characters and preferred rules
- The problem
- Medicine, a crossing, and rising water
- The stakes
- Time, trust, and what gets left behind
Your turn · A standalone tabletop prompt
One crossing. Three imperfect choices.
Rain is rising beneath a narrow bridge. You carry medicine to a traveler on the far bank. A ridge path avoids the crossing but adds hours to the journey. A small queue is waiting for someone else to decide. What do you do first?
Choose an approach to consider its cost. There is no scored answer.
An optional scenario inspired by the world’s themes, separate from the novel’s events. Discuss it with your own party.
Game master’s notes · Open when you want to run the prompt
Give every observation a place.
A ferryman knows the current. A cart driver can spare rope but fears losing a day’s wages. A child has watched rainwater spill onto the ridge path. Let players ask questions and compare accounts. None of these people knows everything.
Let plans change the situation.
The party might inspect the bridge, divide the work, recruit help, improvise a delivery, or choose the longer path. Decide the crossing’s condition and the patient’s needs before play. Give visible warnings before worsening either. Use your chosen game’s checks only when an uncertain outcome matters.
Make the ending specific.
Record who received the medicine, who carried a cost, and whose help made the result possible. Success may leave cargo behind or a repair unfinished. Offer a concrete next task and a person grateful enough to remember the company’s name.
Make the road your own.
The character records are reading companions, not complete playable sheets. Bring your own characters and rules to this prompt.
Find inspiration in the world codex →A world by Joel Lomnick. Book One begins the planned six-book journey.
An independent fantasy passion project inspired by tabletop roleplaying. Character and cover artwork created with AI assistance under the author’s direction.