Coming of Age in the Time of Dragons

Coming of Age in the Time of Dragons is a 36-word ttRPG that I ran many hours of for my own children.  It was simple - a little moleskin notebook, stub of a pencil, and two six-sided dice I kept in a little pouch.  When I had two kids, we did it with crayons and pencils and paper at the dinner table.  This might be the most playtested 36-word game ever published.

The two-page PDF you'll get has all you need to play and run the game on page 2, so just print that page, color or B&W.  One copy per player/gamerunner.

This 36-word version is constrained for a game jam, so it assumes the gamerunner knows how to run PbtA RPGs, where there are almost more rules and guidelines for the gamerunner than for the players.  If you're not familiar, please check out the free SRD for other PbtA RPGs or buy and read an excellent PbtA game.  For PbtA nerds, here's the game's Agenda, Principles, and GM Moves!

Agenda:

1. Portray a world of fantasy and wonder, where anything could happen.
2. Let the players' childlike wonder, far-out ideas, and curve balls take things in unexpected directions.
3. Complicate their lives, but not so much they're really scared.
4. Start with a big adventure, and make sure everything works out in the end.

Principles: 

• Address the characters, not the players
• Be a fan of the characters
• Grant a little more authorship to the players than you're comfortable with
• Name everyone
• The main (player) characters don't get killed or too badly hurt
• Chase, scare, and fight, but don't make it about killing
• Write down important things and use them later
• Prep complications, not plots
• Everyone can be redeemed.  Everyone.
• Begin and end with the fiction
• Make complications as big and imaginative as the characters' actions

Gamerunner Moves:

• Put someone in a difficult position
• Take away or break their stuff (but let them get it back or replace it later)
• Capture someone or separate them
• They get lost in a scary place
• Someone does something mean to someone else
• One door closes, another door opens
• An opportunity arises, but it's brief, dangerous, or unsavory
• Test a character's beliefs, values, or courage
• Strain a relationship
• Inflict cartoon violence
• Temporarily disable a supernatural power or hamper an exceptional skill
• Reveal an obvious trap
• A cliffhanger makes them think something worse happened

Cover art: Bob Greyvenstein, Grim Press

As always, use safety tools, especially when playing with strangers.  Find them here!  TTRPG Safety Toolkit.  (I used the Script Change tool for The Colors of Magic -- it's my favorite!)