Worldbuidling: Geopolitical Hotspots = Human-Scale Conflict

When I see worldbuilding content on the internet, people don't start with the geopolitical hotspots, and that's a problem.

What is a geopolitical hotspot? It's a place where two or more cultures come into military, political, or economic tension. Often due to disputes or competition over territory and resources.

Geopolitical hotspots = conflict

Starting with the geopolitical hotspots is the shortcut you need to make your world map interesting. In fact, throw out the concept of the world map for a second and just focus on a regional map. Your campaign isn't global scale (yet). You only need one region where multiple cultures are fighting over the good stuff. That's what makes a good fantasy map.

What people tend to do is they get lost in the weeds of realistic world map or they want a map that's visually pretty or exciting. They ask, "do the mountains belong there?" and they get stuck. I'm not telling you that it's wrong to ask if the mountains would logically form there like that; That actually can serve to make your map more believable. What I'm advising is to make concessions on realism for the sake of forcing, even contriving a geopolitical hotspot into your world.

Serious man, just put it in!

Sample Region Map - The Celean

Here’s a simple example to show how a geopolitical hotspot turns a plain map into a story engine. Below is a region called The Celean. It's named after the central feature, the Celea Sea. It's a very simple map I cooked up in I don't know, half an hour?

Full disclosure: I traced it from another map found in this video by the YouTuber likealightart9414. I hope he doesn't mind. Then I named everything. In his video, likealightart9414 said he didn't like this map. *Scoffs* excuse me?

For this map, realism, scale, aesthetics, or ready-to-play-ness are not the intent or goal. It's here to teach. 

Cultures

Distinct cultures turn geography into a story. I want you to identify the four major kingdoms / nations: Adamia, Bethland, Erlina, and Gregoria. I know there's other stuff on this map, but these four areas are the main points. Arbitrarily, we're going to ascribe to them distinct cultural identities.

• Adamia: Militaristic, imperial. Value law and order. Lots of noble houses and bloodlines.
• Bethland: Famous for art and science. Value luxury. Perceived as soft. Meritocracy with a raising merchant class.
• Gregoria: Very religious, courageous, humanitarian. An unmatched naval power. A budding republic with a powerful symbolic monarch.
• Erlina: Stubbornly proud, tough, and wealthy. Famously use mercenaries and foreign armies to fight for them. They have resources and you can't take them away.

What's important (to me) is that the cultures are distinct. You can immediately evaluate the aspects of the culture like the colors and mascot of a team in a competition and pick the one you like.

Boundaries

Next, let's look at how geography shapes their relationships. Creating a few boundaries means you have an area where kingdoms may blend without losing their distinction, and where the contrast is most immediate. These are places where political, economic, or military tension is most apparent.  

River Nina separates Adamia and Bethland, and it also coincidentally marks a climate boundary. Which climates specifically? Well, scientifically speaking, Adamia is kind of cold, Bethland is kind of warm. There you go. These are now two distinct areas, and it adds variety to the cultures and political powers.

Gregoria is connected to Adamia by an impassible isthmus where The Stellas mountains are. The logistics of marching an army across are mindboggling, so there are no land invasions. 

Reina Mountains separate Bethland from Erlina. You could say there are a few mountain passes, but it's easier to travel by sea.

The Celea Sea has not one but two choke points: The Delilian Straight controlled by Gregoria and the Felixan Straight controlled by Erlina. If you want to get in and out of the Celea Sea, you have to be on good terms with at least one of these cultures. Naturally, Erlinda and Gregoria compete over Isle Levi which creates both straights.

The fact the Erlinda and Gregoria have a competition going, there isn't one single power who monopolizes passage in and out of the Celea Sea. This competition is important because it makes being on good terms with one nation or the other important.  

Celea Sea

This sea is the main artery connecting everything. That's what's the point of the sea, but why is there conflict here? Resources? Trade? Colonialism? War? Religious conflict? Bad blood? That's up to you, but it is important to define why these powers are in conflict. Try and come up with a few conflicts. Here's an example:

• Adamia and Bethland compete over control of the River Nina. It's an nutrient-rich, important waterway that can take you inland. Adamia claims that their snowcapped Adamant Mountains (just off the map) feed the Nina. 
• Erlina competes with Gregoria over control of the Isle Levi and both straights.
• Adamia competes with Gregoria over silver mines in The Stellas. Both nations are also competing for control of that northern coast.
• Erlinda and Bethland have territorial disputes and the various passages of the Reina Mountains as boundary is unclear. There are smaller cultures here too: Mountain people who make iron goods and practice war, and valley folk who farm goods for them.
• There are also small islands. The inlanders consider themselves part of the kingdom that controls them, but because they are isolated, they also consider themselves distinct from their continental peers and resent the continental conflicts.

Finale

Geopolitical hotspots matter because they give your setting human-scale, actionable content to engage in. It's not "We must take the ring to Mordor" content, it's "The British are Coming!" content. It's "Then the Fire Nation attacked" content.

Checklist

• Major powers with distinct cultures
• Vulnerable minor cultures in between
• Valuable resources
• Natural boundaries
• Choke points
• Territorial disputes
• Competing interests
• Climates, history, terrain as flavor at the end

Use this checklist to turn any blank region into a living engine of story, politics, and adventure.

Related: How to Create a Fantasy Setting (Loria) shows you what to do from here.

The DM Shortage - Why 5e Doesn't Have Enough

First thing's first, I don't actually know if D&D 5e is suffering from a DM shortage, but this topic gets revisited a lot in the YouTube spaces that I frequent. I can't back up this position. I also can't back up if it's just D&D or all TTRPGs.

There is no published ratio of players to GMs, no official report on DM availability, no formal study on how many people want to GM vs play. WotC, Paizo, Chaosium, Mongoose, and Modiphius have never released this kind of data. So the DM shortage is not a documented fact; it's anecdotal.

The closest thing to a real number that we get is Roll20 which shows that 20% - 25% of users ever run a game on their platform. There's also been snippets of interviews from industry professionals saying DMs are the ones primarily purchasing TTRPG products. This implies that data may exist supporting a gap in players to GMs, but it does not indicate a shortage.

But let's suppose it's D&D 5e in particular with a DM shortage and that every other game has just the right number of GMs (yeah right).

Poor DM Support

When is the last time Wizards of the Coast (WotC) released a supplement book for DMs only? That's my first observation. Not a book for monsters, magic items, settings, or adventures, but tools and instructions to teach GMing and to make GMing easier. For that kind of advice and instruction, people go to the internet. Isn't it weird that amateurs on the internet are the ones capitalizing on this, not the industry professionals? You've got The Angry GM who writes a hell of a blog, advice books by independent authors, and not to mention dozens of YouTube channels with a cumulative thousand hours of advice about prepping and running the game. Where is the official DM support? Are you thinking about WotCs' Sage Advice stuff? Pfft.

Where is Dragon magazine and Dungeon magazine or a successor magazine?

Where is the Dungeon Masters Guide 2 and 3? The ones that break down the internal math that the D&D 5e designers use and teach it to you? It's not there. It's these internet DMs who figured out and taught that 5e's design aims for easy rolls to have a 60% success rate, and hard rolls to have a 40% success rate. The should have come from the designers.

How about DM guidance for problem players? I don't mean the kind of players who are sometimes blatantly rude or disrespectful, I mean the ones who make broken characters who spoil the tension and challenge in every scene, or goofy characters who spoil the tone? Where are the hot tips for world building, making after-session notes, or fast prep? How do I read an adventure and break it down into manageable chunks for my notes and prep? Where are the combat hacks? What if no one understands or agrees on a rule? Conventional wisdom says make a ruling and move on. Are we assuming everyone knows how?

How about basic instructions on how to use the books? Something like:

• Players Handbook (PHB) is for rules reference
• Dungeon Masters Guide (DMG) is for instructions on the rules

The PHB lists the rules and defines them, but the DMG explains how to think about them, how to use them, and when not to. You need both. If you're missing the DMG, the rules of the game feels like instructions on how to play, and you get a really rigid, stiff game that eschews DMing skills and DM authority.

To some people, if the official books don't say something, it might not be the legitimate way to play or understand the game. How I described the Players Book and the DMs book above is fair, but it's not explicit in the books; Therefore, some people will never acknowledge this delineation or benefit from it.

GMs Need Authority and Instruction

Maybe the DMG 2 should give the DM more authority so that players aren't walking over them and their games like a door mat? That section should be called Put the Master in Dungeon Master. Did I say section? Maybe it should be a chapter. Players want to pick a spell but it's too powerful? Tell them "not in my game". Players think they should be able to play whatever fantasy race in the book? "Sorry, that doesn't suit my setting". Broken character build? "I'm lowering your ability scores and HP to balance your character". How about a rule that tells players that if they expect the GM to treat their characters seriously, then players should treat the setting and NPCs seriously? And to have respect for game's tone.

Putting the master in Dungeon Master isn't about arbitrary and capricious rulings by a tyrannical DM. It's about clarity, boundaries, and tone protection. It's about being able to establish the kind of game that you can handle running.

DMs, what do you do when the players don't understand what a rule means and they want to fight over it? How about an explicit No Rules Lawyering rule or No Exploiting Weaknesses in the Rules rule? How about a section on game fouls and what to do about them? What does it mean to be That Guy and what do we do about him when he shows up? How about a section on telling players "no" or "not at my table" or "get out"?

How about a section that advises GMs about pacing themselves to avoid burnout or how to prep your players so that their expectations align with your campaign setting? GURPS has a one-page, fillable campaign form that establishes what kind of game you're running. Why not D&D? Where's the official session zero checklist?

The current DM book might cover some things, how about another book to cover them in more depth? How about a section that teaches adventure structure and setting creation? About improv? About creating and portraying NPCs? How about dungeon and wilderness procedure which is actually seriously lacking in D&D 5e. Break this down for me and show me how it works.

DM instruction is a deep well of content, and they put out one dedicated DM book for the 2014 edition and one dedicated DM book for the 2024 edition. They are sorely lagging behind. It's incredible to me.

How about advice or instruction on different playstyles or modes of play? Like the West Marches style of play which accommodates an open table. We need an essay about not building broken characters or exploiting weaknesses in the rules because accommodating these specific things contribute to the workload for a GM.

How do you handle adversarial players, competitive players, and interpersonal conflict? How do you manage schedules and communication? When do you kick people out? How do you handle spotlight hogs, joke characters in a serious campaign, or rules lawyers derailing a session? How do GMs teach players the written and unwritten rules? The best that the 2014 book did was tell you in a very corporate way to be respectful. With respect, that's not advice, that's corporate CYA. It lets the corporation wash their hands of any colorful scenarios that might emerge by letting them stand on a ground of "we encourage respect". And let's face it, 9 out of 10 adults don't need to be taught about respect.

GMing 5e Isn't Fun

Ultimately, if you want to get people to do something, incentivize them. IF there is a lack of DMs, that means the incentive isn't there. The only incentive you should need is fun. The problem with DMing for 5e is it's very effortful to do, and it's not proportionately rewarding.

5e Attracts Tourists

This is not intended to be an insult. 5e is not a niche game for niche people, it's a massive game that's intended to have as much broad appeal as possible. That means tourists can access it. Tourist means people without discerning taste, genre literacy, foundational knowledge, or realistic expectations. It's a cultural outsider of the hobby with low or casual interest. The is a not commentary about their worth. Not everyone who plays 5e is a tourist, and if you're reading this for fun or if you find this enriching, that's not you. Probably. 5e is generic. It has everything about the fantasy genre without any consideration for identity. Its identity is everything and anything all at once. It asks little of you. It gives tropes and it gives you room to insert your own. That's how you get Big Bird from Sesame Street as a Paladin or a Ninja or a Power Ranger. Or Joe Rogan as a Druid. That's why its generic.

Therefore, it could be that the problem is not the system itself, rather it's the people who are attracted to the system. When you run GURPS or ICRPG, you're running a game that doesn't have as broad reach. GURPS is a game that requires a lot more system understanding and it requires the users to have their own genre conventions because the game offers you hundreds of tiny pieces and asks you to make sense of them. You are expected to make them into something. That requires will, effort, and creativity. It takes time to learn all these pieces and it appeals to people who appreciate an intrinsic reward. People who do this make something special for a small, intimate group of people. That's a sign that the participants are not casuals, noobs, plebs, or tourists. ICRPG has massive appeal but it's too indie and needs to be discovered. It's not your first game, it's a game you graduate to when you're ready move on or when you've outgrown D&D 5e. Like GURPS, it requires creativity. ICRPG also asks you to give up your shiny things. There's less player tools and less safety nets. ICRPG asks you bring your heart, wits, and guts. Tourists are less likely to find it and more likely to bounce off.

Tourists aren't bad, but they need the most onboarding and the most initiation into the hobby culture. They bring their own influences from other hobbies or interests and expect them to mesh. It often clashes instead. No one knows what to expect, and they anticipate too much. No one is prepared for what happens when you mix different friend groups together and find out what they're like when they get a to embody a powerful, evil character and have a beer. That's the kind of situation that 5e creates. These could be people who have only played Dark Souls and seen Marvel movies, or they could be people who love watching Critical Role for the jokes, characters, and story, but who don't really care about the game itself. No one is on the same page. It leads to disappointment.

If you're reading this and you don't think that's a problem, either you're really good at this or you have some really good friends. Or maybe you're really easy going. For others, this is hard to manage.

Managing Expectations

D&D 5e is kitchen-sink fantasy. It's very broad and very generic. Because of this, expectations are a son of a gun to manage. Because D&D can be so many different kinds of games and fantasies, you never really know what you're going to get. Imagine I ask you out to a movie and you ask "what's playing?" I list the movies and ask you, "what are you in the mood for?" We narrow the choices down to one specific, coherent experience based on our tastes and mood. A D&D 5e group is like five people who can't decide on which movie to watch, so they overlap five projectors playing different movies onto one screen. 

I've come up with some interesting metaphors to describe D&D 5e before, but I'm really proud of that one.

D&D needs to be something specific. It really does. Why? Because you're not interested everything. You have specific tastes. One of my biggest complaints with 5e is that managing expectations is a massive problem. It's a massively understated problem. Unfulfilled expectations are massively disappointing. I will write ten more essays on this subject specifically before I die. Watch.

No one wants to wake up one morning and realize they've committed to a game and a group they have nothing in common with.

The Likely Cause of a (Supposed) DM Shortage?

It's DM burnout. DM's report exhaustion, prep burden, rules or systems burden, conflicts of expectations, conflicts with personalities, lack of authority, lack of tools, or lack of system clarity.

One of the problems is the asymmetry inherent to the game; one person does all the work, the other four do none.

Every player should take a turn being a DM and they should run their own campaign. This teaches them appreciation for the role. It will enrich them and by extension everyone. Here's a hot take: if you've never run your own campaign, the feedback that you can provide to your DM or fellow players will never be as valued as someone who has. Note that I didn't say valuable, I said valued. If you haven't done it yourself, you don't actually know what it's like and so your opinion hasn't been informed by experience.

DMing is a rite of passage. Every player should be expected to take a turn and DM. No exceptions. Players are consumers. GMs are producers. Being a producer makes you a better consumer. As a thought experiment, I want you to imagine two gaming groups. Both groups are seasoned at TTRPGs. In group one, you have one forever DM and players who have never DMed. In group two, everyone has DMed a campaign. Which group do you want to be a part of? You would rather be in group two because everyone has been a leader, teacher, and a creator. This means some maturation.

Yes, I am suggesting is that players who haven't crossed the DMing threshold are contributing to DM burnout. For anyone keeping score, this is not WotC's fault.

Here's What This All Means

D&D 5e is not for beginner DMs and that's why there could be a shortage. D&D 5e is a mess. It's one hundred games in one. Every game has a hundred variations. There are too many different kinds of players with different tastes, and D&D 5e is trying to appeal to all of them at once. Finding the iteration of D&D 5e that works for you takes trial and error. Now imagine one core rule book set that tries to make that work for groups of five, hundreds and hundreds of times. Now combine that with the task of learning leadership / managerial skills you might not have, and the struggles of having your creative labor scrutinized by people who might not appreciate it on a weekly basis.

Your mission double-oh Joe, average Joe, regular Joe, is to make it work.

Good expletive luck!

Actual Data?!

We have data that shows that the average D&D campaign lasts 6 sessions:

https://www.myarchivist.ai/ai-dungeon-master/how-long-do-dnd-campaigns-last.
What can we infer from this data? I think that the most generous interpretation is that TTRPGs are hard. If you get into D&D or any TTRPG, temper your expectations.

Here's Why This Matters

If there is a DM shortage, it's important to confirm it and then it's important to identify the causes. Naming the monster is the first step to slaying it. We want more DMs. We want this hobby to grow. DMs grow the hobby, not players. We need to take care of the DMs.

Here's What Should Change

If I were in charge of WotC, here's what I would do. I would release D&D 5e Basic. Once upon a time, there was Advanced Dungeons & Dragons which was crunchy and full of tables and all kinds of crap. Then there was the Dungeons & Dragons Basic. I'm bringing it back because less is more.

D&D Basic was the essence of D&D. It was the good stuff without all the mess, the bloat, and the complications.

D&D 5e Basic would not be a starter set. It would be its own product line. It would be fully supported, and published side-by-side with D&D 5e. D&D 5e Basic will have fewer and simpler classes, fewer and simpler fantasy races, fewer spells, fewer magic items, fewer, simpler rules. I'm cutting the crap and I'm giving you what is recognizably D&D 5e, but I'm curating it. I'm giving you to the essence of it. The best of it. It's going to have a more refined tone and genre. It's going to have a narrower scope. It's going to have a setting that's grounded, so you understand what works and what doesn't. I'm restricting alignment to enforce group cohesion. Combat is going to be simpler and faster. Exploration is going to be clear. Social Interaction is going to clear. It's going to logically led to only a few styles of play.

When you look at D&D 5e Basic, you're going to be filled with a sense of wonder, but you're going to know what kind of game this is and you're going to know what kind of game it isn't. And so will the players.

It's going to easy to learn, to run, and to play. It's going to be fun to prep and run.

Conclusion

I want to reiterate my introduction. The DM shortage is anecdotal. We need more data. I think GMing for 5e is a son of a gun, and WotC continues to support players, but not GMs. All of these things contribute to GMing for 5e feeling like hard work rather than a fun, creative pursuit. GMing 5e was the most frustrating and least fulfilling experience in TTRPGs I've had. Make no mistake, the frustration comes from 5e in particular. Other games were smoother.

For more commentary on Managing Expectations, see these posts here:

Managing Expectations in TTRPGs - GM Expectations Framework

Managing Expectations in TTRPGs - Discussing What We Do and Don't Like

Bright-Dark 3d6 Role-Playing Game - Optional Rules

Optional Rules

There are the rules and procedures that people like and use frequently, and then there are the rules and procedures people tend to overlook or neglect. To ease your conscience, I have put those rules in the Optional Rules section. Everything here is indented to be useful and compatible with the tone and playstyle of Bright-Dark.

POINT CRAWL

Imagine arranging the world into a flow chart or a diagram. Locations are points, and the routes between them are lines. Some points are key destinations. Some points are intermittent points representing an obstacle, minor location, rest stop, or a decision point. Pick a line and follow it to the next point. Every time you move from one point to another point is counted as one turn. That's a point crawl. It's simple because it's abstract. The choices presented typically represent the important paths in the world with the unimportant spaces between them being omitted. There's no wandering in circles, finding nothing or getting lost. The GM describes your location, and the players choose a path.

Point Crawls are a middle point between abstraction and simulation. They simplify a complex location; allowing structure and organization without unnecessary precision. Players movement can easily be tracked. The points are treated like a stage for a scene where meaningful information is emphasized rather than a literal location that must be treated realistically. This is why they suit Bright-Dark.

When to Use Point-Crawl, When Not to

You may use point crawls when exploration, discovery and or consequences are emphasized, and when time is a stake. Otherwise, in towns for instance, it's perfectly good to just keep the points as a list, reveal these to the players, and ask where they go.

Turn: When you move from one point to another point, that is one turn. A turn costs player characters in-world time, and the amount depends on the scale of the location. Note that we don't typically linger on the lines. Lines usually represent the stuff in between scenes.

Scale

The scale of the point crawl map depends on the location that the point crawl represents. There are three scales. Dungeon scale is small scale (typically, but hypothetically there can be mega dungeons). Settlement scale is medium scale. Wilderness scale is large scale and can describe a county, kingdom, continent, or even the world.

Dungeon: If the map describes a dungeon, then points are rooms and the paths represent connecting hallways. Moving to a new point and any careful activity in a dungeon (searching, picking locks) is typically a turn and is tracked in 10-minute chunks. Short, simple halls can be traversed in a negligible amount of time, but some halls can be as complex or dangerous as dungeon rooms.

Settlement: If the map describes a village, town, or city, the points are shops, landmarks, major establishments, places of importance, and the lines represent streets. Travel time may be 10-minute chunks to 1-hour chunks depending on the size of the city.

Wilderness: If the map describes a kingdom, county, or other large region of the world, then points might be settlements, dungeons, or major landmarks, and the lines between them are roads and trails. Travel time between points of a region take a number of hours or whole days.

Wandering Encounters

NPCs occupy these locations. NPCs don't just sit around and wait for the player characters, they wander. When the player characters encounter the wandering NPCs, this is called a wandering encounter. In a point crawl, it can happen on a point or a line. Wandering encounters are important because they add unpredictability (even danger) which can make the location feel like a real, believable place.

Rates of wandering encounters are based on scale (dungeon, settlement, or wilderness). The GM may roll for wandering encounters every other turn in a dungeon. Daytime or nighttime may also affect the kinds and the frequency of encounters. In the wilderness, the GM may roll twice each turn, where one roll represents day and the other is night.

Rolls are made by the GM. There is a one in six (1d6) chance of an encounter. On a 1, an NPC (or NPC group) appears nearby. The NPC may appear at the point the PCs are moving to, or they may appear on an adjacent line and traveling towards that point. This creates variability in circumstances. One side may appear first or detect the other side in advanced, allowing one side a choice to avoid the encounter. Quietly assign each path one to two numbers on a 1d6. The point gets the remaining numbers. Then roll to determine where the wandering encounter appears.

GM Tips: Wandering encounters add challenge but that's not all. When done well, wandering encounters benefit immersion and verisimilitude. When done poorly, they slow down the game or make the game get stuck. You may handwave wandering encounters for the sake of pacing and immersion, not to go easy on the players.

Rare magic items have 1 tag. Very rare magic items have 2 tags. Cursed items have one cursed tag and one beneficial tag. Relics have 3 to 4 tags.

MAGIC ITEMS

+1 bonuses in Bright-Dark are massive; therefore, magic items in Bright-Dark rarely have numerical bonuses. Instead, magic items have tags that define abilities. The GM can add one tag to an item. Create your own magic items using these tags below or create your own tags. Magic items should change the story, not math. Keep them rare, personal, and meaningful.

Rare magic items have 1 tag. Very rare magic items have 2 tags. Cursed items have one cursed tag and one beneficial tag. Relics have 3 to 4 tags.

Utility Tags
Lights on Command	This item lights up like a torch on command
Water Walking	The wearer can walk and stop on the surface of water
Floats	The wearer ignores hazardous terrain and moves Fast
Storm Conjuring	This item conjures a powerful wind once
Indestructible	This item cannot break and does not wear
Telepathy	Communicate telepathically with one person
Shapeshifting	The item shapeshifts to fit the wearer or suit the wielder's needs
Animated	The object animates on command and can be controlled remotely
Telekinesis	Limited telekinesis within Near range; costs 1 Stamina to lift heavier-than-handheld objects

Combat Tags
Magic Weapon	Damages enemies resistant to mundane harm
Bane	Deals 1d6 bonus damage to a specific creature type
Flames on Command	Ignites like a torch and deals magical fire damage instead of mundane damage
Life Shield	If reduced to 0 HP, wearer stays at 1 HP (1× per scene)
Keen	Critical hits on a natural 16–18

Protection Tags
Elemental Protection	Protected from fire and cold
Spirit Ward	Protects wearer against possession
Charm Protection	Protects wearer against charm
Regeneration	Regenerates +1 Health per day
Magic Shield	Half damage from magic attacks
Repelling	Temporarily repels a specific enemy type on command

Mystic Tags
Conjuring	Conjures a single, specific creature (genie, guardian spirit, a nearby plant or beast, etc.)
Curse of Compulsion	Item cannot be removed; compels the wearer to...
Curse of Weakness	Item cannot be removed; sets Strength to -3
Of Seeing	Grants visions; sometimes when wanted, usually when needed
Sapient	Item can reason and telepathically communicate
Sentient	Item can feel and empathically communicate
Compass	Points toward a specific object or category of objects

OPTIONAL MAGIC RULES

For optional magic rules such as signature spells, wild magic, and optional magic talents, please see the Magic Section.

SURVIVAL MECHANICS

Bright-Dark 3d6 Role-Playing Game intentionally avoids survival mechanics, but if survival mechanics suits your style, use the following rules:

Food & Water

Quantities of food and water are abstract. Any amount of food or water counts as enough for one day.

Dehydration

• 1 day without water means you're dehydrated
• Dehydration kills in 3 days
• Dehydrated characters suffer:
• -1 situational penalty
• NPCs gain a +1 situational bonus against them

Starvation

• 3 days without food means you're starving
• Starvation kills is 7 days (one full week)
• Starving characters suffer:
• -1 situational penalty
• NPCs gain a +1 situational bonus against them

These penalties exist within the faction. 

Shelter & Exposure

Shelter protects against environmental hazards such as heat, cold, wind, and rain.

Shelter may be:

• A sleeping bag
• A warm blanket
• A tent
• A building
• Any fictionally appropriate cover

Cold

• Mild cold impairs sleep and leads to exhaustion (within the fiction)
• Freezing cold can kill in one night
• Characters without adequate shelter suffer narrative consequences (shivering, numbness, slowed movement)

Heat

• Extreme heat doubles water requirements
• Extreme heat reduces dehydration time (death in 2 days)
• Characters may suffer heat exhaustion, disorientation, or collapse in fiction

Illness & Infection

Illness may arise from:

• Insect bite
• Poisonous plants
• Spoiled food
• Contaminated water
• Untreated wounds

Timeline

• Incubation: 1 day or night
• Onset: 1–3 days of illness (the duration depends on the illness)

Recovery

If the illness is severe (depending on the illness):

• Roll Endurance to recover. The Difficulty TN depends on the illness.
• On failure, repeat the illness duration
• After each repeated duration, either:
• Recover automatically, or
• Roll Endurance again to repeat the duration

Medical Intervention

A trained expert:

• Ends the illness duration
• Allows automatic recovery to begin

This keeps illness narrative-driven while giving players meaningful decisions. If you use Survival Mechanics, consider adding this optional Talent:

Optional Talent: Healer

You are a trained Healer or Doctor. You can diagnose illnesses, identify natural remedies, and prepare simple medicines. When treating an illness, you may end its duration immediately, allowing recovery to begin without requiring an Endurance roll.

INVENTORY MANAGEMENT & ENCUMBRANCE

if you want inventory management, here's a simple system. With this system, characters are assumed to have a backpack or similar carrying container.

Carrying Capacity

Characters can carry a load of 10 + Strength items. At character Improvement, they can choose to improve their carrying capacity by +1 items up to a cap of 20 + Strength items. If characters are carrying their full load, they are encumbered. Encumbrance is condition within the fiction and penalties are situational. Exceeding this load can be done within reason, but the character moves at Slow speed (15 ft / turn).

Weight and Size. Items that are heavy or bulky can be carried within reason. Use your judgment and ask what a real person could believably carry. For example, two suits of heavy armor or ten 10 ft pole-arms sounds unreasonable.

Bulk Quantities. Multiple quantities of small light items are counted as one item. For simplicity, use multiples of 5. 5 Torches. 5 days rations (if used). Rope 50 ft = 1 item. An ammo container holds 20 pieces of ammunition. Coins or gems (if used) up to 500. Don't track individual tools if a tool kit can be tracked instead. Example: a sewing kit or doctor's bag.

Petty items. Items of insignificant size and weight like keys, flint and steel, a personal token like a signet ring, or a holy symbol, can be handwaved unless carried in bulk quantities.

Optional Talent: Strong Back. You can carry 15 + Strength items rather than 10 + Strength items.

HEALTH ALTERNATIVE: INJURY SYSTEM

Instead of rolling for damage and tracking health, we instead track physical wounds or injuries. These are abstract and exist within the fiction as flavor, not numeric or mechanical.

• Any hit is counted as one injury.
• A critical hit causes a severe injury which is counted as two injuries for gameplay purposes.
• At three injuries, a character is unconscious.
• Characters recover from injuries at a rate of one injury every three days.

With this alternative system, characters take one injury if they fall 20 feet, two injuries at 30 feet, and 3 injuries at 40 feet. If they fall 50 feet or greater, they perish.

ALTERNATIVE COMBAT

Bright-Dark's built-in combat rules are intended for fast, simple combat that focuses on the narrative and deemphasizes tactics and strategy. If you prefer a more traditional TTRPG combat system, use this instead.

Surprise

Characters who are distracted, asleep, unconscious, or otherwise unaware of a hostile adversary or unable to react timely within the fiction are surprised.

Surprised characters lose their first turn.

Turn Order

The GM rolls 1d6 to determine which side acts first. 

• 1-3: The NPCs act first. 
• 4-6: The Players act first

Players take their turns clockwise around the table.

Turns

On player turns, players may: 

• Make one action, and 
• Move up to their normal movement as part of their action. 

Attacking ends your turn!

The player declares their action, the GM resolves the action, and then the next player takes their turn.

This alternative combat system is more familiar to TTRPGs and may be easier for them to learn and play.

STRUCTURED MAGIC

If Bright-Dark 3d6's freeform magic system is too unstructured for you, consider using this list of words that describe the shape or form of the spell. This describes who it can affect, and how. Consider that any ranged spells should require the caster to be able to see the space or the target that they are trying to hit with their spell (which is often called line of sight in games). Anything that affects an area (multiple characters or objects) is a major spell.

Touch  

Magic delivered through physical contact.

Examples: healing warmth, burning grip, conductive energy.

Bolt  

A narrow, focused projection of magical force.

Examples: a streak of fire, a lance of light, a crackling spark.

Blast, Cone, or Line

A sudden, explosive burst of magic. It affects an area with a diameter of one pencil.

Examples: a fireburst, a shockwave, a concussive flare, a cone-shaped breath

Aura  

A field of magic that surrounds the caster or a target with a diameter of a pencil.

Examples: a glow of protection, a haze of heat, a shimmering veil.

Mark  

Magic that leaves a lingering effect or symbol.

Examples: a sigil, a brand, a glowing rune.

Field

Magic that effects a specific area and persists for a short duration. Diameter: 1 pencil length.

Examples: a concealing fog, a hazardous outcrop of rocks or plant growth, an illusion, 

Remote

Magic that crosses space without affecting anything in between.

Examples: Telepathy, a charming gaze