Hello everyone,

Here is my first foray into game design: “Paris Gondo – The Life-Saving Magic of Inventorying”.

After several teasers on our show, I guess it is time to properly introduce you to this game and even invite you to join an online session via our Playtest Sign-Up Form.

This project is a storytelling GM-less game for 3 to 6 players, designed to be played in a few hours with polyhedral dice and no preparation.

It is comparable to fan-favourites games like Once Upon A Time and The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen.

In addition, the following answers to the BIG THREE questions of game design should cover most bases.

1. What is the game about?

This game is a tongue-in-cheek tribute to encumbrance rules and tropes commonly found in our beloved dungeon-crawling tabletop roleplaying games. 

It does so through the lens of contemporary wellbeing influencers, thanks to the fictional character of Paris Gondo.

This multiplanar being left their physical form behind after they realised it did not “spark joy”. Settled at the elusive Monastery of St Eyvān, they provide organising advice to adventurers from the whole multiverse. 

2. What do the characters do?

The game starts as the Adventurers made their way to the very end of a Dungeon.

They just defeated their final foes and it is time to discover what wondrous items reward their efforts.

However, before embarking on their journey home, they must decide what to keep or throw away.

One does not simply walk home with more Encumbrance than they are allowed.

If Adventurers hold-on to possessions which “spark joy”, they are likely to feel invigorated and satisfied for the rest of their lives…

…but letting go of less emotionally-charged, often more useful Belongings, might prove to be a deadly mistake on their Journey Home.

3. What do the players do?

After devising some details about the Dungeon and their Adventurers, the Players randomly roll the stats for several Looted Items.

In addition to having mechanical implications, these stats are prompts for the Players to come up with colourful descriptions.

Players tell each other of their discoveries before trading and selecting the items they will keep in their inventory.

Finally, Players find out through a series of rolls if their inventory was sufficient to survive their Journey Home as well as to achieve an invigorating and satisfying life.

Great, I love it! What’s next?

Well, thank you…

More seriously, my current goal is to run many online demonstrations of the game while I am in lockdown.

Beyond that, my first big deadline will be to publish a “Quickstart” version of the rules ahead of Dragonmeet towards the end of 2020.

Then hopefully a Kickstarter campaign will follow.

Again, you can join one of our many online playtests (a session normally takes less than a hour) by filling our Playtest Sign-Up Form.

You can also stay informed of the development of “Paris Gondo’s The Life-Saving Magic of Inventorying” through one of the following.

• The Rolistes Newsletter is about everything we are developing such as our podcasts, live events and of course games;
• The Paris Gondo Newsletter is strictly about the development of this game.

I can’t wait to play this little game with many of you.

Cheers

Kalum

Art by Bodie

The Rolistes logo by Rollinkunz