The Empty Mile

Hey there!

Welcome to Volume 1, and welcome back to the workshop.

This week, I’ve got a bit of a story, and a tip for you at the end.

Last week I entered the One-Page RPG Jam hosted on itch.io. The challenge: a complete, playable RPG on a single sheet of paper. This year’s theme was “Fractured”, and I decided to take that literally. The result was The Sundered Page, the little map-tearing game I mentioned in your welcome email. What I didn’t tell you was how the testing went, and testing is where this game got made. If you haven’t seen it yet, bear with me, because it’s relevant to your table regardless of what you play.

We ran the game at six different tables before I submitted. At one of them, the tear got a little enthusiastic, and a whole triangle of kingdom ripped clean out, attached to nothing. The table stared at it for a second, then somebody named it the Empty Mile, and for the rest of the game every route had to answer the same question: does this take us anywhere near the Empty Mile? The best landmark on that map was never even drawn. It was a happy (or not so happy) accident with tape on it.

That wasn’t the only accident that improved the game. At another table, two different fragments rolled the same result, Echoed, and instead of calling it a dud, the table split the difference. One fragment echoed places: crest a hill, see somewhere you’d already been. The other echoed people. Same word, two different hauntings. I didn’t design any of that. I wrote down what they did and kept it.

Here’s the part you can steal even if you never play the game. While we were building it, we almost added a rule that stopped you from retrying a failed crossing at the same spot. It seemed smart (keeps the game moving, right?), and testing killed it dead. Failing twice at the same spot turned out to be where the good stuff lives. One group blew the same river crossing twice, and by the third attempt they’d invented a buried vertical road and a second ferryman with a grudge. The rule got cut. The game got better. The lesson wasn’t “write looser rules.” It was that the table will out-create your prep every single time, but only if the rules get out of the way and let them.

One more thing before the tip. A fantastic DM and creator that I know launched a rad new site: Aetherhold.io. They do all sorts of things, but one thing stood out. They make print-ready GM tools for folks who love running games but don’t have all of the prep time. They also do campaign sheets, NPC and session trackers, combat and loot pages, all built to print clean and sit at the table. I’ve been a player at his table for years, so believe me when I say the man knows prep. His free starter pack is over at https://aetherhold.io

And finally…TIP OF THE WEEK

When something fails at your table, a roll, a plan, a crossing, don’t rush past it, and don’t lock it behind “you had your chance.” Players, try to try again! GMs, let them try again, and make the second attempt change exactly one thing (the cost, the approach, the meaning, etc.) Some examples:

The cost. “You can force it, but it eats the last of the rations.”

The approach. “Muscle didn’t work. Who’s got another idea?”

The meaning. “You make it across, but now the ferryman knows your name.”

Failure that sticks around long enough becomes a meaningful story, or a landmark, or sometimes even the most memorable part of a game. The swamp they couldn’t cross gets talked about for years. The bridge they walked over doesn’t.

Volume one in the books!

If you played The Sundered Page, hit reply and tell me what your torn map did. I’m collecting Empty Miles. And if you haven’t grabbed it yet, it’s free: https://sleepersartifice.itch.io/the-sundered-page

Thanks for being here. We’ll pick up next week.

-J