I am the forever DM of my group. We play 3.5. My players, and I recently started a movie night where we watch anime every week and I run our campaign (everyone’s ~ level 7) every two weeks.One of my players suggested an isekai series for our movie night and now I’m curious about throwing in an encounter with an isekai’d group of adventurers. While I know the trope of throwing guns into the world or having meta knowledge about infrastructure would give away the hook. I’m trying to come up with unique items from our world or meta knowledge that would hint at the fact these adventurers aren’t from this world.I would love to hear examples of subtle items and maybe ways to describe them to my players.Pic semi related.
I was thinking about making one of them pic related. Set in glimmering armor that was lighter than any other, granting him fire immunity. They’re near enough to a mountain range and I think putting this guy in their path would make for an interesting hook provided he can explain that he is a volcanologist (what would the analogue or fantasy version of this be?)
There's a pretty popular trend for chef/doctor/whatever specialist being isekai'd and it turns out their niche knowledge can be used to their advantage.You could have a miracle healer and it's just some guy who's introducing penicillin and washing your hands before stitching people.
>>96855966Sidetracking here but the thread seems slow anyway: There is a spanish rpg that dwells entirely on this idea called "Edén", you keep talking to the players in a way the characters (Cavemen) would understand, while fully aware of the horrors they can't begin to comprehend, I watched a one-shot using the system, an NPC had gotten pregnant by aliens and was being escorted to their clinic to deliver the baby to them, but for the cavemen this was stepping into forbidden territory and be forced to face their god's judgement, I liked a lot the description of this thin, bony animal, either sleeping eternally or killed and kept into this distorted shape by the gods, a punishment perhaps?It was an operating table>>96856023So you could explain it as the geologist being able to garner secrets out of the earth itself without giving more technical answers, with the locals thinking of him as a druid of sorts, heck, if this is an Isekai he might've become a druid by attuning to earth with his knowledge
>>96855966Depending on how fresh the isekai'd adventurers are, just their clothing could suffice to tip the player characters off that they aren't from around here. For more seasoned types, certain accents and word use could tip off a player the same as any artifact.Thinking on it, since you seem to be coming from the genre convention of being transported to a specific media world rather than just another world in general, you could bait the players into thinking they're time-travelers by mentioning events that haven't happened (yet). Maybe they get excited to meet the protagonists of some fantasy schlock they had all read previous to the adventure. Or for a more murderhobo-y main party, your isekai folks get very, very wary of hanging around them for too long. Maybe they even let out details about the party that wouldn't be public knowledge.
>>96855966make them Japanese Teenagers who when asked pretend to be from Kara-Tur/Rokugan, but clearly dont really know anything about it in terms of supernatural elements.One pretty common tope is also Isekai protagonists having an obcession with basic japanese foodstuff like White Rice and Onions Sauce, so you could thro in some ration producing item and a spice jar for example.Another common trope is the isekai protagonists heavily desiring hot baths so maybe give them an item or spell that creates something like an onsen, maybe based on the Create Spring spell from OA.One relatively common thing I've also been seeing in Isekai lately is Slime Familiars, so you could also just add a low CR Ooze to the party.Otherwise you could just give them some uninuitive combinations of different features that only a powergaming player could really think of, reprsenting them having meta knowledge.
>>96855966In one of my games one of the villains is a kid that got isekaid to the wrong world and is playing along until he can find someone who can help him. if encountered, he will be described as using a spellcasting implement which is white and rectangular, and has a smooth metallic like finish.
>>96856023>A strange ritualist who lives on the mountain and protects the villagers below by warning them in advance of eruptions. The volcano has been erupting more frequently than before, for reasons that his "magic" can't explain, and he isn't any kind of warrior, so the party is gifted with some scientific equipment they don't really understand like scanners and hazard suits and sent to investigate.
>>96855966I'm always a fan of people from the future/real world being "casters" whose spells are just day to day objects, with a bit of generosity and leeway into their continued function, and breath of applications. Crucially, making all their "spells" not actually interact with anything that normally interacts with magic itself, like dispels and counter spells
>>96855966Literally what setting/game? In WHFRP it would be extremely simple to make them healthier and taller than whoever execpt perhaps nobility.
>>96855966As someone who has played Numenera, a game where you play a sci-fi fantasy story built eras after the world you know has ended, there's so much arbitrary garbage you can just throw into a world and watch what happens.The real trick though, is making that junk varied and rare. Bizarre objects from another world (even if it's a world the players are familiar with) lose the impact of being unusual if there's a bunch of them lying around. A gun. A record player with a disc of music that sounds like nothing that anyone can make. A knife made out of metal that the smiths can't replicate the qualities of, that is part of an object concealing several other knives and tools. A manual in a tongue that no one can read, but whose diagrams have allowed for good practices in a particular area that is always present but hasn't advanced all that far. There is so much that modern manufacturing can do that couldn't be replicated in a medieval-esque fantasy setting that it exists in basically all facets of life, and would seem peculiar or something like impossible (or at least unfathomable). Imagine an item we use every day that only exists because we designed it for the convenience of modern life, then cast it into a time when no one would have been concerned with that because there were more important things to do.
>>96856607Why would you play a game with unintuitive design?
>>96861163I meant unintuive for characters in setting.dnd 3.5 builds can get pretty wild with Feat, prestige class and item choices in an extremly well syngergized build that wouldn't occur to most people in a setting.
>>96855966I've done this. It's worked pretty well to treat it like litRPG and the players have some idea of how the world works, and when they act too comfortable, go off script.
>>96855966For a memorable isekai *adversary* you need:- Unassuming scrawny guy, but somehow surrounded by fawning girls- Possesses a completely bullshit ability that for some reason has leveled up to be incredibly exploitable when combined with modern day knowledge.- I recommend picking an ability/class in the setting you're running, then thinking of a way to exploit it until it's busted. For DnD just take your pick of the various metagaming techniques (peasant railgun, bag of holding missiles, so on)- Insufferable protagonist syndrome and good guy personality- Can make a little blue screen appear, instantly knows all your players' abilities and stats- T-shirt and jeans
>>96855966>I am the forever DM of my group. We play 3.5It won't work under 3.5, no matter how much you will try to fluff it up, mate.Ask yourself a simple question: what's the actual goal of this exercise. Then we can pick a fitting system.If you can't do that, there is no real point discussing this>b-but I want 3.5!Consult first half of the post. It's 2025. Anyone who isn't insane moved on from that system, and people who still wanted that system advanced to 3.PF over a decade ago (which, ironically, is very good for isekai, especially when you run it in Tian Xia)
>>96864477>How to do C-tier isekai: The PostShamefur dispray
>>96864587I don't really think this is system-dependant, mate. Or even edition-dependant.The tough part would be setting up the joke (assuming the goal is a joke), not fitting the encounter under mechanics
>>96864477Nigga, nobody is doing isekai like this since at least covid. That after producing a metric shitload of shows just like the ones you described. Hell, we reached the point where parodies completely outstripped serious take on this.
>>96855966There's one isekai (forget the title but it's gun-related and iirc the isekai'd dude is a licensed hunter in Japan) where the Goddess who sent him just sends him ammo from a gun store
>>96865203Hunting in Another World With My Elf Wife.Effectively a romance between a Nip hunter and an elven huntress. [[spoiler: Surprisingly decent]]
>>96864620My point is differentOP needs to ask himself following:>Why I even need to do thisIs this for a one-off joke? Is this a recurring character? Is this a rival maybe?>How do I implement it mechanically if this stays for longer than a single sceneWhich in case of 3.5 is make it or break it, and consult >>96864477 for the meta stuff and abusing in-game shit for own purposes>Are my players capable of getting the hintEffectively: how blatant it has to be for the players to get it
A cornucopia quill that creates ink as you write, no need for an inkwell. A ball pen with a feather attached.
I'm always itching to run an adventure with a similar premise at my table.Just a normal D&D campaign but the players play as themselves with all the meta knowledge they have. They would start as normal commoners but would get proficiencies and slight stat changes based on their IRL selves. Anything from their on out (martial weapon proficiencies, learning to cast spells) etc. would need to develop in game and class levels might be obtained through their actions.I wonder how long it would take to just become standard D&D and how fast the premise would lose its edge but I pitched it before and most of my table was at least curious.
>>96864587>It won't work under 3.5Retarded take. 3.5 is second only to GURPS in content anon can pull from.New does not equal better anon. The fact you think it does suggests you can't spin the apple.
>>96872053we once run an one shot at level 3 with my friends. It was the typical transmigrator story. We were playing dnd irl and somehow we lost consciousness or something and woke up in the bodies of adventurers that were apparently killed by a random encounter in the forest. We had created tables for everything, and randomised literally everything, from age, gender, race class, alignment, feats, equipment etc.It was one of the most fun dnd sessions i have played in my life. Unfortunately one of the core group members moved soon after and we never continued it.The memes, the rp, the strategizing, it was pure kino.SO my advice is go for it.Also to answer your question, i dont think it will ever become dnd in the sense of a normal campaign because you will always care for your pc, literally you more than you ever did for any character. At least if the participants buy into the isekai idea like my group of friends did
