Crimson Renegade

In honor of Weird Frontiers, I have selected Redwest's Crimson Renegade as the next album cover to give the "Raven Crowking DCC" treatment to.

In this case, we have the titular gunman, those goggles, and that machine pistol to stat out. Also, why has the sky turned completely red? I am sure we can come up with some sort of half-baked but fun answer!

The Crimson Renegade

A legend along the Weird Frontiers of the West, the Crimson Renegade is said to be a fallen angel, a demon from the dark side of Paradise, walking the world in mortal form. Some say that the Crimson Renegade, sickened by the horrors of the Seven Days of Night, tried to leave the Path of the Damned and walk the Path of the Righteous. 

How successful that change of paths has been depends greatly upon who you ask. Violence follows the Crimson Renegade wherever he goes. Behind his angelic features is a soul drenched in whiskey, gambling, the pleasures of the flesh, and a river of spilled blood. If your hombres meet him, prepare for Hell itself to join in the dance.

The Crimson Renegade: Init +7; Atk bowie knife +4 melee (1d6) or machine pistol +6 ranged (1d8); AC 19; HD 5d10+10; hp 55; MV 30’; Act 1d20; SP immune to fear/madness, healing, dead speak, side-step, death throes; SV Fort +5, Ref +7, Will +4; AL POD +2. Crit Die d12; Fumble Die d8.

The Crimson Renegade is immune to all fear and madness effects, and never needs to make a Grit Check. 

He can heal others with a touch, but only by taking their wounds upon himself. Each round he can heal 1d8 damage to a single living creature, but then takes that damage (and identical wounds) upon himself. He can cure poisons, diseases, broken bones, and paralysis by remaining in contact for a longer period, but likewise takes those conditions on himself by doing so.

The Crimson Renegade can speak to the dead as can a Calavera.

He can also side-step in a manner similar to that of a Sin Eater but at much higher cost. Instead of Personality damage, attempting to enter the spirit world causes the Crimson Renegade to weep blood. The Crimson Renegade makes his attempt with a +8 bonus to his d20, but takes damage equal to the total of the roll, whether it succeeds or not.

When the Crimson Renegade dies, his death throes depend upon what he was doing at the time. Either a shaft of light pierces the clouds, giving him a look of peace as he fades away, or the earth swallows him to the sounds of malicious laughter and cries of pain coming up from below. The judge should decide depending upon circumstances, or just determine randomly. What do you believe in more, Redemption or Punishment?

McTinker's Goggles

Let's say you catch the Crimson Renegade in a talkative mood, and you ask him where he got those fancy spectacles from. He might just tell you about a Bedlamite called McTinker. Or he might tell you some other tall tale because, truth be told, McTinker sounds like a lie, doesn't it?

Either way, the wearer of the Goggles can stare at the sun unblinking, or count the spots on a bluebottle's arse across a smoky saloon. By which I mean to say, nothing stays hidden from the wearer  of these Goggles and trying to hide will do you little good. If you're lucky, they might even stick around when the Renegade dies, instead of being caught up in his death throes.

The Machine Pistol

This beauty isn't even magical, just a thing stuck in this world way before its time. The machine pistol takes .36 ammo with a 20 shot load and a 6 shot rate of fire. It does 1d8 damage with a range of 15/50/80. There is a -1d penalty to concealment, and the weapon is beyond price. Although you can't fan the hammer with this weapon, for some reason the Crimson Renegade likes to pretend that you can. I mean, look at him in that picture; that ain't no single-action weapon!

The machine pistol takes 5 full rounds to reload. If damaged, a Bedlamite might be able to repair it. Hell, a Bedlamite might even be able to reproduce it, or something near enough, but the judge should set the cost and complexity DC high.

The Red Sky

There's an old rhyme that says

Red sky at night, sailors delight

Red sky in morning, sailors take warning

A little less well known is the third line

Red sky at noon, Death coming soon

When the sky looks like it is awash with blood, even under the noonday sun, that is a sure sign that something unnatural is walking the earth. The judge can feel free to introduce any adventure they want, and maybe this is the time for something especially wicked.

Saddle up.

You can listen to the full album here.

Journey to the Sandsea

In remote places, as well as in the dark bowels of great cities, the Lungsmen ply their trade in illicit substances, including the Covenant Weed whose powerful fumes transcend space and time. Those who partake overmuch of the Covenant Weed find themselves in the deep sandscape of the Sandsea - an alternate plane where twin moons share the sky with unending sunlight. The desert stretches on forever, cut by oases and fertile river-washed plains whose waters come from some unknown birthplace and to some unknown end.

Crossing the Sandsea forever are the Creedsmen of the Covenant, carrying tightly-bound bundles of the Covenant Weed across the desert sands, making forever for the Holy City where they will find smoke-induced rest.

Lungsmen: Init +4; Atk breath drug powder or smoke (special); AC 14; HD 2d6; MV 40’ or climb 20'; Act 1d20; SP drugs, immunity to drugs, death throes; SV Fort +4, Ref +4, Will +4; AL N.

This stuff isn't going to sell itself. 

The Lungsmen may look human - if a bit thin and unkempt - but they are not. They creep into our worlds from the Sandsea, bringing with them the Covenant Weed and other drugs. If the judge has access to Narcosa, she may wish to convert some of the illicit substances described therein, and allow the Lungmen to travel to and from that plane as well.

The Lungmen spread the Covenant Weed as part of their religion. Although they demand payment for their wares, this is only because they have learned that humans (and their ilk) are less suspicious of those pleasures which are dearly bought.

If forced into combat, a Lungsman can throw or breath drug powders or smokes in an attempt to confound its enemies. When a Lungsman uses this ability, roll 1d7 and consult the following table:

1:    The Lungsman tosses a handful of black powder at a single target within 10'. Target must succeed in a DC 15 Fort save or lapse into pleasant unconsciousness for 1d3 turns.

2:    The Lunsman breathes out a pale green smoke in a 15' radius centered on the Lungsman. All within the cloud must succeed in a DC 10 Will save or be numbed and unable to act for the next 1d3 rounds.

3:    The Lungsman throws a pale yellow powder in the air, affecting up to three adjacent targets within 10'. Targets experience indescribably ecstasy for the next 1d6 minutes, and make all rolls at a -3d shift on the dice chain during this time. There is no save.

4:    The Lungsman blows a line of thick grey smoke at a single target within 30'. Target must succeed on a DC 15 Will save or take a -1d shift on the dice chain for all rolls until they have spent at least three rounds eating.

5:    The Lungsman tosses an amber-and-orange colored power onto a target within 5'. Target must succeed in a DC 20 Fort save or be effectively blinded by hallucinations of strobing psychedelic colors lasting 1d30 minutes.

6:     The Lungsman breaths a cone of mauve-hued smoke 15' long with a 10' base. All caught within it must make a DC 10 Will save or be so overcome with peaceful goodwill that they cannot make an effective attack for the next 1d5 minutes.

7:    The Lungsman throws an emerald powder at one target within 10'. Target must succeed in a DC 15 Fort save or take 1d5 points of Strength, Agility, and Stamina damage. This damage is recovered at 1 point per minute, and cannot reduce a character to 0 in any ability score.

A Lungsman itself is effectively immune to all drugs. If slain, there is a strong odor of potent smoke as the creature passes out of existence, disappearing entirely. Roll 1d7 on the table above; all targets within 30' are affected.

Note that Lungsmen do not harm or molest those who fall to their drug-induced stupors. They are not violent as a rule.

Covenant Weed

The Lungsmen usually charge 5 gp per dose of this substance, although it is possible to acquire cheaper doses cut with impurities that may remove its potency or even endanger the user. Covenant Weed is smoked, requiring about 5 minutes to fully partake of a dose. It has the following properties:

• Each dose can be used to add +5 to a single spell check made within the next turn.
• Each dose adds 2 temporary hit points to the partaker; all damage comes from these hit points first, which fade after 1d3 x 10 minutes if not used.
• Each dose cause 1d3 temporary Agility damage, which recovers at the rate of 1 point per turn.
• Each dose requires a DC 5 Fort save to avoid the permanent loss of 1 hp.
• Each dose requires a DC 10 Will save to avoid a permanent -2 penalty to spell checks.
• Each dose gives a cumulative 2% chance of falling into a dream in which the character's spirit is transported to the Sandsea.

The Sandsea

There is endless sand everywhere. The sun is hot. Characters not equipped for the desert take 1d3 damage from exposure each hour. Wandering or standing still, it takes a full hour before a Creedsman caravan finds the character.

The judge may rule that other creatures - giant scorpions, serpents, or giant sandworms - might pose threats when characters are not travelling with the Creedsmen.

Creedsmen: Init +2; Atk hookah pipe +0 melee (1d4); AC 12; HD 1d8; MV 30’; Act 1d20; SP immune to drugs and the Sandsea, death throes; SV Fort +2, Ref +2, Will +2; AL N.

The Creedsmen are humanoids whose features are never seen. Their creaky rasping voices suggest that they are some form of insectkind or arachnids, but if slain they simply fade away, with only their robes and their hookahs remaining. They spend their time marching toward the Holy City, refreshing their hookahs, repacking their beasts, and preaching the pleasures of the Covenant Weed and the glories of the Holy City.

Each hour spent in the company of the Creedsmen caravan grants a wizard or elf a +1 bonus when attempting to learn a new spell within the next 30 days.

Beasts of the Caravan: Init +0; Atk butt +4 melee (1d4+2) or kick +0 melee (1d5+2); AC 12; HD 3d8; MV 40’; Act 1d20; SP immune to the Sandsea; SV Fort +5, Ref +1, Will +1; AL N.

There may be some strange circumstance that brings these beasts into the deserts of the mundane world, or where creatures from the Sandsea attack a caravan - but such circumstances would be unusual indeed. It should be noted that these creatures have human intelligence and speech, and wax poetic of their service to the Creedsmen and the Green Herbsmen (who- or whatever they might be). They too dream of the Holy City, where, according to the Beasts, night will finally fall and they can rest.

Ending the Dream

Time continues, hour after hour, in the Sandsea, and little changes. Each hour, the damage from the Sandsea continues unabated. The Creedsmen of the Covenant do not tire, nor do their beasts, but every three hours the damage taken by PCs travelling with them (unless they have protection from bowing sand, heat, and dehydration) increases the damage per hour by another die. PCs traveling with the caravan for more than 6 hours must make a Fort save (DC 10 +2 per additional hour) to keep up. Those left adrift on the sands may become prey for other creatures, at the judge's discretion.  Usually, the drugged travelers only awaken when their hit points reach 0, or they would otherwise die within the Sandsea. The judge may also allow the trip to end when it becomes boring for the participants invovled.

The judge may also allow the PCs to meet other strange creatures from other worlds travelling with a caravan before the PCs awake, although these events should not occur on more than a 1 in 7 chance. The Sandsea is vast, the caravans many, and the visitors at any given moment are few.

Visitors to the Sandsea slumber in a drug-induced haze within their own worlds. During this time, their bodies are untenanted and vulnerable. The dream lasts a little longer than an hour in the mundane world, no matter how long the dreamer's spirit spent in the Sandsea.

When a traveler to the Sandsea awakens, they have the benefits of having slept a full night - including restoration of lost spells, healing, and Luck (if applicable). Clerics find their disapproval ratings reset. Any damage taken within the Sandsea 

However, not all voyagers survive the experience. The dreamer must succeed in a Will save (DC 2, increased by a cumulative +2 for each subsequent trip to the Sandsea). Failure means that the slumberer never arises. Their body dies and, if the Lungsmen are to be believed, their souls complete the journey to the Holy City where they may rest in smoke-shrouded temples.

Finding Magic Items in this Blog

 This is an attempt to help judges locate magical items that I have created for the blog or similar sites.

Last Updated 16 August 2024

Altar of Woeful Consumption

Bag of the Fates

Blackrazor

Blightbane

Brick of Pleasure and Death

Buckle of Pesh Joomang

Control Ring

Covenant Weed

Cup of Saint Nazrat

Curative Potion

Cursed Half-Plate of the Death Dealer

Draugmere, the Demonglass Blade

Drow Equipment

Elf-flenser

Enchanted Mistletoe

Fairy Stone

Flail Snail Shell

Gold Ring of Protection +2

Graveyard Wand

Healing Potions (Various)

Helm of Darkness

Honor

Instrument of Malmsteen

Libations of McBones, the Skeletal Bartender

Lothfelag

Mårtenson's Ring of the Eagle's Shape

Mask of Terror

McTinker's Goggles

Obsidian Dagger

Orb of Temptation

Potion of Armor

Potion of Cure Light Wounds

Potion of Extra-Healing

Potion of Strength

Potion of Super-Heroism

Qullan Swords

Ring of Magic Shield

Ring of the Silicon Minds

Rod of Striking

Sanguine Hourglasses

Scroll of Bafflement

Scroll of Flaming Hands

Seven Keys

Shield of Chaos

Silver Swords

Sodoutym’s Bracers

Soul Circlet

Sphere of Time

Spinal Cat of Nine Torments

Staff of the Serpent

Stargates            

The Sword of Spartusia

Terror Runes

Time Destructor

Tunic of Pesh Joomang

Wave

Whelm

Wolfbiter

Wormstriker

Ygorl's Scythe

Designing Magic Items

Let’s talk about magic items.

The following ideas are completely appropriate for the Dungeon Crawl Classics game and were written with that lens in mind, but are similar to my approach with magic items in earlier editions of Dungeons & Dragons and their simulacra. You can find similar ideas in my work in Dragon Roots Magazine for 3^rd Edition, and in Petty Gods or The Dungeon of Crows for other OSR-type games. D120 Treasures also contains (unsurprisingly) some items with a similar philosophy of design.

Design Principle 1: Magic can do anything. It doesn’t matter what your system of choice allows or does not allow. Magic can break the rules. In fact, arguably, that is the thing that makes it magic. Now, you know and I know that there are games where, when a magic item is introduced, the GM is expected to know what the PCs would need to recreate it. Perhaps a combination of feats and spells. Perhaps something different. This is a straight jacket on what magic can be, and you should ignore it. If you want to include a magic bird bath that attracts avian creatures, go for it! Likewise, if you want to include a ring with a weird power no spell can match, you do not need to know what was required to create it. Perhaps the gods don’t even know. Or, if they do know, perhaps the gods work to keep that knowledge from mortals. You don’t have to justify it.

Design Principle 2: Follow a theme. Even though magic can do anything, it is all the better if the item in question follows some form of theme both in form and function. My answer to the wand of wonder, for instance, not only creates random affects, but has a random appearance whenever you look at it. If you decide to make a powerful necromantic item look like a child’s stuffed bear, you may wish to make its powers linked to children or childhood in some significant way. The players should experience a frisson with your item; it should feel right. A wish from an angel should not feel like a wish granted by a demon.

Design Principle 3: Use the mechanics. Expressing a magic item into game terms requires engaging with the mechanics of the game, however obliquely. Consider how to put whatever it is into game terms, even if it is to say “the angel will not grant selfish wishes, but will grant selfish wishes in the best possible way”, you need to know how it will play out at the table. If your game has Luck checks, corruption, patron taint, mercurial magic, or similar effects, feel free to use them when designing magic items. For that matter, consider designing items that affect those systems. A ring that changes your mercurial magic effects to one of 20 frost-themed effects would be cool. So would a portrait that assumes your corruption for you until, one day, it has had too much and comes out of the frame….

Design Principle 4: You can steal mechanics from other games. If your game doesn’t have feats, for instance, you can have an enchanted earring that allows its wearer to gain the effects of a feat. You can be blatant about that or disguise that as you wish. And you don’t need to limit this to other d20-based fantasy games, either. The item might offer a Gamma World mutation, so long as you can express that mutation in the mechanics of the game you are playing.

Design Principle 5: Limited Use Items are Cool. Potions, scrolls, a hunk of magic cheese, a globe that must be broken to release its power, a glass sword that shatters on a fumble. All of these can have cool powers, with the interesting choice for the players being “When do I use this?” If you want the choice to actually be interesting, make sure there is some way that the players can figure out what the item does before using it! Which leads to….

Design Principle 6: Magic cannot solve all of your problems. No matter how powerful an item is, it has limitations. Those limitations might be that they are single-use or have a set (or random, as for instance with the glass sword example) number of uses available. It may be because the item is only usable under specific conditions (at night, under the full moon, when the user is undressed, on a beach, etc.) – avoid easily met conditions like “in a dungeon” here! It could be because the item weighs several hundred pounds and is difficult to carry around. It could also be because using the item offers a significant drawback. This in turn leads to....

Design Principle 7: With Great Power Comes Massive Drawbacks. You can do this wonderful thing, but every time you do, you suffer corruption. At first it is minor corruption, but the type of corruption has a chance to grow with each use. The sword offers you power, but it offers the same to everyone around you, on the off chance that one of them might take it off of your corpse. The ring does some neat things, but if you die while wearing it you will return as a vampire to plague your friends. Every time you use the staff it permanently removes one (or more!) of your hit points. The item demands sacrifice to operate; the greater the powers, the larger the sacrifice. Suddenly the question is not “How do I use this?” but “When should I use this?” or even “Should I use this at all?” If you get the balance right, the temptation to use the item, and the reluctance to use it, should almost balance out, so that the players are always faced with an interesting dilemma.

That isn’t all that goes into designing a magic item, of course, but 7 is a thematically potent number when discussing magic. I hope that these principles are of some help!

 

 

Signal Boost

If you are interested in computer games, Vagabond Dog has a Holiday Pack, which may or may not be as exciting as watching the shenanigans going on in Washington D.C., but will almost certainly be more fun and do you less harm!

Also, the creators are good people.

Journey to the Crypts of Orderly Death

IF YOU NEED A PREGEN AND HAVE NOT RESPONDED TO MY EMAIL, CHECK YOUR SPAM FOLDER!

For the first time ever, I will be running the same adventure more than once at a convention. For the first time ever, I will only be running that same adventure. It is a playtest; first run at Storm Crow Manor before the pandemic, and planned to have run at last Gary Con before 2020 became what it was!

You find yourselves at the Inn of the Twisted Horn, about a mile east of Blacktree Dale, where the road east meets the road to the north. You have been here before, but never has it been so quiet. Even the innkeeper and his daughters are often gone to the pantries, and it is hard to get anyone to take your order.

Kovacsian Wizard Snowman

Kovacsian Wizard Snowman: Init +4; Atk scratch +0 melee (1d3) or snowball +3 ranged (1d3 cold plus possible Stamina damage) or harmful spell; AC 12; HD 6d8; MV 20’; Act 2d20; SP snowballs, harmful spells, burst, immunity to cold, fire vulnerability, hat; SV Fort +5, Ref –3, Will +8; AL C.

These evil snowmen can hurl snowballs up to 30 feet away, which cause 1d3 points of damage due to intense cold. If the target does not make a DC 10 Fort save, he also suffers 1 point of Stamina damage due to cold. When a snowman is slain, its three snowballs burst into a spray of cold in a 10' radius which causes 1d3 points of temporary Agility damage unless a DC 10 Fort save succeeds.

A Kovacsian Wizard Snowman can also cast spells, and prefers this method of attack. Whenever a Kovacsian Wizard Snowman casts a spell, roll 1d7 to determine the result:

1.    The snowman creates a ball of green energy and hurls it at a foe with a +3 attack bonus. If it hits, it does 2d6 damage and the green energy turns blood red before dissipating (Fort DC 15 for half damage).

2.    A Green Whisp is summoned, and remains for 1d5 rounds before folding in upon itself and vanishing. Green Whisp: Init +4; Atk bite +2 melee (1d5); AC 8; HD 1d3; MV fly 40’; Act 1d20; SP immunity to heat and cold, immunity to non-magical weapons; SV Fort +0, Ref +4, Will +0; AL C.

3.    A Green Whisp is summoned (as above), but it continues to attack the snowman's enemies until slain or otherwise dealt with.

4.    The snowman creates a green portal field and hurls it at an enemy. The enemy must succeed in a DC 15 Reflex save or be captured by the portal and sent elsewhere. The judge may choose where the hapless adventurer is sent, or may roll 1d5: (1) The depths of space, (2) the Meat Planet, (3) Flammable Hospital, (4) on the track of Inferno Road, or (5) a lonely asteroid ruin in the midst of a Dog Storm!

5.    A barrage of 3d3 emerald icicles shoots forth, each of which can target a different foe! They are +3 to hit and do 1d3 damage on a successful strike. 

6.    A great wave of cold washes out from the snowman. All within 30' take 1d12 damage (Fort DC 15 for half).

7.    One target within 30' must succeed on a DC 20 Fort save or take 1d12 points of cold damage each round until the Kovacsian Wizard Snowman is slain. If the unfortunate target should fall to 0 hp before the snowman is defeated, they are transformed into a second Kovacsian Wizard Snowman, which immediately attacks their former allies!

Kovacsian Wiazard Snowmen are vulnerable to fire, taking twice the normal damage from heat-based attacks. A snowman who dies due to fire damage does not burst into a spray of cold, either.

The hat of a Kovacsian Wizard Snowman can be removed with a successful Mighty Deed. This causes the snowman to slow down (a cumulative –2 to initiative count each round), and its magic becomes less powerful (roll at -1d on the dice chain per round to determine spell effects, so 1d6 on the 1st round, 1d5 on the 2nd round, 1d4 on the 3rd round, and 1d3 on the 4th round; the snowman cannot thereafter cast spells unless it recovers its hat). The snowman ceases to be animated when its initiative count reaches 0, unless it can recover its hat. Placing the hat back upon its head restores the snowman to its original initiative count. A Kovacsian Wizard Snowman is not “slain” if it stops moving because of losing its hat, and does not burst.

(This creature is based off of the evil snowmen in The Perils of the Cinder Claws and the awesome artwork of the fantastic Doug Kovacs, which is used here with love but without permission.)

Killer Christmas Tree

 

Killer Christmas Tree: Init +4; Atk spinning slam +5 melee (2d6); AC 14; HD 2d8; MV 20’; Act 1d20; SP camouflage (surprise 2 in 3), festive music, can destroy intervening objects, construct (immune to poisons, mind-affecting, paralysis, etc.), vulnerability (x2 damage) to sonic attacks; SV Fort +4, Ref +4, Will +0; AL N.

Frodo, Bilbo, Conan, and Aragorn

 

A lot of the advice I write is for Game Masters, because I spend a considerable amount of my gaming time on that side of the screen. The other night, though, I was thinking about Sword & Sorcery characters, Appendix N, and the Fabulous Baggins Boys.

Frodo is a character fleeing from danger and into greater danger. He does take responsibility for his choices, but he is largely reactive to the greater forces acting on and around him. He loves to talk about adventure with his uncle, but his greatest achievement is his willingness to sacrifice himself. Interesting to read, yes. Interesting to play? Probably considerably less so. 

Conversely, Bilbo, while initially a reluctant adventurer, really takes to it once he has decided his course. He tries to pick the troll's pockets due to a sense of professional pride. Once he has escaped the goblins, he really does consider going back under the Misty Mountains to look for his party. And, of course, he ends up having plans of his own - eventually becoming the driving force of the narrative (at least until the Battle of Five Armies). If you don't know what I am talking about here, forget the movies and read the book.

Frodo is driven by the pressures of the narrative. Bilbo takes the pressures of the narrative, and bends them to meet his personal goals. The closest that Frodo comes to this is when he chooses to accept Golum's aid - and, in the movies, this is played as though Frodo is a patsy to the wily Smeagol, whereas in the novel, he knows exactly what he is doing.

It is completely okay to play a reluctant hero. Both Frodo and Bilbo are examples of that trope, but unless you want the GM to continually drive your character's decisions, it is better to model a PC off of Bilbo than Frodo. Don't allow the needs of the Valar to move you; allow your own goals and dreams to determine what you do. 

It is important to have goals. 

Robert E. Howard's Conan is a fantastic example of a character who drives his own fate. Even when others hire him, or attempt to manipulate him, Conan always has his own goals. There is more than one Conan story where a fundamental source of tension occurs because Conan's goals are not those the people around him want them to be - even is their coin is in his pocket!

It might not be obvious the first time one reads The Lord of the Rings - and they changed it in the movies! - but Aragorn is not a reluctant hero. He is, in fact, eager to sit on the throne of Gondor. Only when he is king can he wed Arwen, who he has loved for decades. The need to thwart Sauron is an impediment to his goals. Once he is able to finally act on them, he never loses sight of either the need to defeat Sauron or his hopes for the throne and marriage thereafter.

In game terms, a PC like Frodo is reacting to whatever the GM throws at him, whereas a Conan is actively forcing the GM to react to what he does. And an Aragorn or a Bilbo is actively trying to turn the narrative toward the direction he desires.

Have goals. It makes the game more interesting for everyone involved. And, if you have goals, the GM can use those goals as adventure hooks, making a game far more personal for your character (and, by extension, you). It doesn't even matter if your goals sometime conflict with those of your party members - that tension will add spice to the game so long as it remains in the game, and we all try to remember that everyone is there to have fun. 

If you want to make the game more fun, have goals. Be prepared to add goals. Be prepared to turn the game to meet your needs. Take possession of it. Just don't do so to make it worse for the other people at the table. And be prepared to meet a particularly grisly or heroic fate if your goals demand it.

"Quest For It" is the beating heart of Dungeon Crawl Classics. Really, it is the beating heart of role-playing games. Quest for something.