The Grisly Eye

We make our own monsters, then fear them for what they show us about ourselves. The Unwritten, Vol. 1: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

Since Forbidden Lands became my go-to system, I've been unable to resist the urge to homebrew. I promised myself that I wouldn't, but here we are. We make our own monsters. The monster in question? Random encounter tables that aren't tied to the Forbidden Lands setting. Because, of course, I'm running my own setting. (I really like to make my own monsters.)

The d66 Encounter Die

Himeon leaned in to poke the fire, casually grabbing his bow in the process.
Something watches us and hungers, he said. Forbidden Lands Gamemaster's Guide, from Fria Ligan AB

I'm going to be doing this by adapting Necropraxis' famous encounter die mechanic. (I've always wanted to play around with this.) Now, some of the encounter types are already covered by the Forbidden Lands journey rules, specifically the mishap tables:

• The LEADING THE WAY mishaps table already covers Setbacks, Fatigue and Expiration.
• Expiration and Advantage are also covered by the resource rules and other journey activities.
• Some mishaps would be better suited as Environment encounters (you wouldn't get a downpour in the middle of a desert, for example).
• I feel like mishap tables should only include problems the characters might create for themselves: Fatigue (including Sprained Ankle and Torn Clothes) and exploration setbacks (including Lost and Blocked Terrain).
• Random encounters should include colour, such as rainbows, orchards, warm days, etc. That's fun.
• Percept is covered by KEEP WATCH and therefore redundant.

Given the above, we can adapt the Forbidden Lands d66 table format to approximate an overloaded encounter roll, which will be divided into 6 ranges with the following categories:

d66 Encounter Table Template

d66	Encounter Category
11-36	None/Flavour/Advantage (good weather, bounty, colour)
41-46	Encounter (monsters, NPCs, recurring characters)
51-56	Hazard or Environment (blizzards, landslides, floods, downpours, fog, forest fires)
61-65	Location
66	Adjacent region encounter

Mishaps

Recategorising some mishaps as encounters means we'll have to strip out some of the journey rule mishaps. The modified mishap tables are as follows:

LEADING THE WAY mishaps table

1d6	Mishap
1-2	Blocked Terrain
3-4	Lost
5	Minor Injury (result 25–26 in the table for blunt trauma, FLPH pg. 197)
6	Torn Clothes

FORAGING mishaps table

1d6	Mishap
1-2	Poisonous
3-4	Minor Injury (result 25–26 in the table for blunt trauma, FLPH pg. 197)
5-6	Torn Clothes

Desert Cedars, New Mexico, 1920 by George Elbert Burr.

The Northern Measure

The Northern Measure is a land of choking dust and sharp winds, echoing the chaos of the Grey Waste far to the west. Once verdant, it was destroyed by the Devastation of Inroth, its only inhabitants are faded ghosts, the grey skinned dust-folk and what wildlife that can cling to life.

Northern Measure Random Encounters

d66	Encounter
11-31	None
32-36	Ghost settlement
41	Zone 1 NPCs
42	Perfidious Bastard starlings
43	Dust folk
44	Scolosi
45	Dust wight
46	Starving scavengers
51	Dust storm

52	Circling buzzards
53	Landslide (FLPH pg. 148)
54	Quicksand (FLPH pg. 148)
55	The Withering Inrothian Curse
56	Scorching heat
61	Hustmere
62	The Pauper’s Palace
63	Balfort
64	The Hust
65	The Palsied Tower
66	Adjacent region random encounter

Summary

Try not make your own monsters.