Play Regular Folks in a Horror Movie! | FREE SESSION 0

Creating your character

Don't worry about it! Just show up to the first session; I'll guide everyone through the character creation process together in Session 0. If you're joining the game after Session 0, I'll walk you through the character creation process myself before you play. It's a quick process, and it's fun! Kids on Bikes doesn't really have a guided character creation process, so I made one for WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON. It's fast, it's juicy, and it leads you right into gameplay.

Preparing for the session

There's a Discord server to join for communication, materials, and session video-calls. Every player has a playbook and reference sheets for use in-game, both of which you can find on the Discord. For sessions, a microphone is required, headphones are encouraged, and webcam use is humbly requested. I'm a much better GM when I can see you. You'll also need DICE! If you don't have a standard set of polyhedral dice (d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, and d20), I'll have a virtual link you can use to roll digital dice.

What Devon Jade 😁 brings to the table

Your WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON game will include: MUSIC! I love playing soundtrack songs and ambient scores during the game. This system emulates movies I adore; I'll be using lots of music to give our game that same feel. HORROR! This is a scary game. My job as a GM is to confront your characters with their fears and limitations to see how you prevail! Expect unsettling threats, intense moral dilemmas, and devastating consequences to failures. FAST-PACED ACTION! I keep the stakes high and the plot moving. This is not designed to be a long-running campaign; this is a disaster with an end you hope you'll survive to see. CREATIVITY! From character creation to the classic "How do you wanna do this?" at the end, I welcome full creative collaboration from my players. If the rules don't serve the game my table wants, we renegotiate the rules. Additionally, I say "yes" to everything I possibly can. No idea is too crazy! If you've got something fun, say it, and we'll make it work. I promise! My job is to take what YOU want and make it fun for the table. Tell me what you want! CHARACTER GROWTH/DEVELOPMENT! I have no interest in characters that don't change. This is a game about regular people living through horror; nobody comes out the other end unscathed. I'll guide you through what character changes can look like, but you've got to be open to them. Trust me, that's what makes stories worth hearing.

Homebrew rules

WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON is a rather rules-lite take on the already rules-lite Kids on Bikes system, with some key differences: The character creation process is designed to be done as a group, not individually, and it directly affects what kind of horrors you'll be dealing with in the game. In addition to the standard Stat rolls you'd do in Kids on Bikes (Brains, Brawn, Fight, Flight, etc.), you also have Roles you fulfill in your community (Caretaker, Provider, Guardian, Friend, etc.), which give you another die to add to your rolls. There is an active MYSTERY mechanic, which rewards you with "Plot Points" for finding answers to the questions you care about. You can spend Plot Points for all sorts of fun stuff, but mainly to add +1 to a roll. The Place your story will happen in may not be too weird to start. This is very different from Kids on Bikes, which encourages you to create a Place ripe with mystery and strangeness from the beginning. In this game, however, things start out fairly normal before getting spooky, just like in the classic movies we're emulating. Then, once your comfortable world gets flipped on its head, you'll have to figure out WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON. Get it?

How Devon Jade 😁 creates a safe table

Everyone has access to the Lines and Veils list for their table, and anyone can ask me to add something to the Lines and Veils at any time, no questions asked. Because this game is so heavily improvised, the types of content we'd need to be wary of may come up as we play. I like to maintain a culture of open discussion, where we can always pivot in another direction if we come across subject matter that takes the fun out of the game. After sessions, I love a debrief where we can talk about what we liked and what we want to see more of, but I also use that conversation as a chance to settle everyone down and reset our nerves after whatever horrific crap we just played through.