Mostly Harmless Meetings

Mostly Harmless Meetings is a TTRPG zine containing tables for system-neutral random countryside encounters with birds, beasts, trees, plants, and landscapes. You can buy a print copy of Mostly Harmless Meetings here.

The encounters themselves are whimsical and, as the title implies, mostly harmless. They are inspired by the animal and plant life of the English countryside, and associated folklore. Here are a few examples:

Wren: The king of birds, the wren, sings from a branch. Its call is almost deafening, and drowns out all other sounds, generally annoying everyone in the area. If hunted or harried it will rapidly summon thousands of assorted small birds to come to its aid. In fact, it may do so just for fun.

Flea: "Hey! Hey, you! Yes, you, lofty! Wanna know the prince's darkest secrets?" At first, the voice appears to come from nowhere. It takes quite some searching to find the talking flea inside your underwear. The flea is an incorrigible gossip, passing on all manner of stories about the people it has lived upon. Some of them are even true.

Oak: A circle of twisted, ancient oaks. The ground inside the circle, and the bottom halves of the tree, are covered in soft, thick moss an almost unnaturally bright green. This place has a good feeling about it, and would be an ideal spot to camp for the night. Anyone doing so sleeps very deeply, as will anyone who tries to stay awake and keep watch. They will awake feeling more invigorated than they have in years. However, in the night, fairies have been playing practical jokes, a different one on each person who slept here. They may find their shoelaces tied together; their hair plaited with nettles or braided together with somebody else's; clothes may be swapped around, or altered with incredibly fine needlework: perhaps sleeve-ends are sewn up, gussets are removed or tightened, or the words "KICK ME" embroidered upon somebody's back. A very detailed search may reveal the fairies sleeping in acorn cups scattered among the trees.

The zine is 48 pages long, A5, full color, featuring 100 encounters, plus art by dead artists.