How To Write A Murder Mystery

Someone recently sent me an email asking to use of my murder mystery party games. Sadly my notes are in no way, shape, or form coherent enough to be used by someone other than me. However! I did come up with this pretty thoughtful response, which I thought you on the internets might enjoy. Take this as my apology for not blogging in so long... or don't, like I care.

If you are thinking of writing your own murder mystery, here's the formula that has worked for me (still in development):

1. Start with writing the setting and figure out who will be your victim (usually played by the author)

2. Come up with your suspects - three people with reasons to want him or her dead

3. Figure out three alibis and/or provide exonerating evidence for all three

4. Compromise one of the alibis/pieces of evidence (usually via your supporting cast)

Casting is often the biggest challenge. You need three people who will do the extra work of being suspects and one person willing to take on the job of solving the murder - the detective. I sometimes ask certain supporting cast members to be "allies" and give them a bit of information that may be helpful in solving the mystery. Duplicating clues (providing the same information in more than one way) will probably speed things along. In my experience, if I think my clues are way too obvious they are probably just right.

A few other thoughts - You'll probably want to have other games/activities going on while the detective figures out the mystery, cause people will get bored. These can be tailored to fit the theme, and can help maintain the fantasy (along with decorations and costumes). Themed food is also fun, but can get labor-intensive. Anyway, hope this helps!

(A) Mission Accomplished!

First game night of the new year, woot! We met last night for our Serenity RPG - here's the pre-cap of the mission from Mac:

On New Canton, things break, even when Dao-ming isn't around. Sometimes, a big, expensive piece of machinery will fall into the churning mud and get all full of gunk. Someone needs to clean it up and keep it in working order.

There's a small company in that neck of the 'verse that contracts out all such work. Dao-ming has managed to send a wave to an old friend on New Canton, found out the name of the company and how to reach them. They seem like just the sorta people to clean up a giant weird unidentifiable artifact what's been buried 'neath the desert for a good chunk of time.

The artifact itself currently sits in your cargo bay. The crew has finally cleaned off all the easy stuff. Dao-ming herself just wanted to take a hose to the blasted object, but others in the crew, aware of how easy it is to damage valuable things, have convinced her to let other people do the work for you.

The thing has been stuck in a container now with some padding inside to keep it safe 'til you get a chance to pretty it up and see what exactly it is. Under the remaining grit and grime, the large chunks of dirt, clay, sediment and sand calcified to it in odd places, it sorta looks like it might be made out of some sorta ceramic, maybe? It stands about four feet tall, and the general outline of it is a spiral two feet across, sorta like a braided rope, spreading out at the bottom into a wide base, and with some sort of wider circle at the top.

Only problem is, such professional types as this oft-times require payin'. Convincing them to take a job this small to begin with might end up being a bit tricky, and then you'll have to find some means of recompense.

See this previous post for how we obtained the artifact.

Gaming Digest

Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.

Regina Fierce and the Alligator's Eye: For my birthday week, my friend Kevin ran a game of Pulp-Era Savage Worlds for us at our favorite local watering hole. I didn't love the pre-gen hero, so I revamped him into a strong black woman named Regina Fierce. Why? BECAUSE IT WAS MY BIRTHDAY, DAMMIT. It's an interesting system - no d20s and combat-light, kind of like the Serenity RPG, and the mechanic of "exploding the dice" had pretty hilarious results. Kevin did a good job of balancing genre tropes (apparently the hallmark of the Savage Worlds system) and meaningful character choices. 9/10, would play again.

Once Upon A Crime: Also for my birthday week, Mac wrote a fairy-tale themed murder mystery party. I played the Evil Queen/detective - I wore an old's bridesmaid's dress with a Party City crown and striped wrist-warmers. In other words, HAWT. My goal was to solve the poisoning of my brother, the Dark Wizard (played by Mac). The characters were hilarious, both in writing and execution, and everyone got really into their costumes. We learned our lessons from earlier murder mysteries, and had little games/activities for people to do while I was detecting (cookie decorating, card games, and "stay dry" apple bobbing). I also realized that I REALLY like playing an evil character, especially when I get to play to lead role at the same time. Should I be worried...? 

Regular games (Serenity, D&D: Silver Company, and D&D: Family Ties) after the jump! 

Is it cheating to just post comics to this blog?

Yes. But who cares?

Haters gonna hate

Back to the Black

So, my goal of posting daily throughout November was clearly a bit of a stretch. My new goal: one blog post per blog per week. Sounds easy enough... but we'll see!

In happier news, Mac and I were able to resurrect our defunct Serenity RPG group! It doesn't hurt that we now meet at a bar during happy hour, thanks to the benevolence of our friendly local bartender.

We are the crew of the Pheonix II, a mid-bulk transport vessel known as a Firefly. Our first mission was to travel to a large desert on the planet Capari. The sand of Capari's desert has value in and of itself for making telescopic lenses and the like. Additionally, the violent sandstorms have caused many a ship to perform "interesting" landings on its surface... and I mean "interesting" as in "oh god, oh god, we're all gonna DIE." In other words, the desert is literally filled with salvage opportunities - for those who have the equipment and the testicular fortitude for the job!

 

The crew did well - while Leland and Wire kept a look out for sandstorms and claim jumpers from on board Pheonix II, Rawhide piloted a hovercraft on the surface and Time Bomb operated the equipment to fish the treasure out of the sand. Captain Dao-ming (my character) helped by yelling at everyone (in her mind, inspiring them to greatness). For our troubles, we reclaimed some precious metals worth two units of cashy money, three boxes of high-quality sand, and a mysterious parcel that we haven't had a chance to investigate. The operation was interrupted by a sudden sandstorm, and the "away team" scrambled to get themselves and the cargo to the safety of a cave - and got a bit banged up for their troubles. Still, any mission you walk away from... We decided to celebrate our victory at a nearby saloon with several other slavage crews

 

Next time: the team liberates slaves and Dao-ming loses her cool. 

D&D: Family Ties

The problem with playing D&D as an adult, as I have bemoaned before, is that you have to work around six adult schedules. The problem with playing as a YOUNG adult is that, even when you find a time that works for everyone, some people don't understand the notion of keeping a date book. Of the six people who said they could make it yesterday for D&D, only three showed up (including Maggie, me and Mac - the DM). One of the absentees had a legitimate work conflict that arose earlier in the week. The other two... needless to say, they're getting dangerously close to be being put on my List.

Still, Mac was nice enough to run a short session for us. Our interaction with Rule of Three ends with the magic ring suddenly attaching itself to Kismet's finger (uh-oh) and a gleaming thread emerging from it, which seemed to be invisible to anyone except the party. The party (Kismet the tiefling bard, Valna the half-elf barbarian, and Maggie's other character Marianna the human cleric) followed the thread to one of Sigil's infamous portals, and jumped blindly through. They found themselves in a Githzerai monastery, with the thread leading towards a large Amethyst mountain. The monks warned us about the acid creatures inhabiting the mountain, and equipped us with some ice crystals that could be used against them.

Our first encounter was against a large Ooze and two swarms of insects. Unfortunately, we did not have a controller to do burst/blast attacks - and since swarms resist all other types of damage, it was kind of a cluster. We ended up hand-waving the end of the fight, once we had destroyed the Ooze. Much more successful was our second encounter, versus a different kind of Ooze as well as a MOTHERLOVIN' DINOSAUR. I love this game.

See what you guys missed out on?!?