1D100 modes of traveling/mini-encounters along the way on Prospero’s Dream

Wardens! Looking for flair to add to your Prospero's Dream game? Fear not! I just finished this for my campaign usage, so here it is to share-- much of it is mine, but I also used the "1d20 modes of traveling on Prospero" pdf from user [trying to find] on the Mothership Discord, and bits from the absolutely indispensable, free, cannot-be-praised-enough Augmented Reality supplement. I tried to give it a very Prospero's Dream vibe, add colour, and in some cases give game mechanics. The "travel modes" also involve some elements of "encounters" for possible PC interaction, and indeed one could combine them with an actual Encounter from A Pound of Flesh to complicate matters.

1D100 modes of traveling/mini-encounters along the way on Prospero’s Dream

00.           You round a corner and the reek of sewage hits you. The street is almost closed off by a jagged sinkhole into The Veins, exposing burst sewage pipes. Luckily, a Teamster’s Union crew has set up a rickety bridge on the left side of the sinkhole so the sparse foot traffic can cross. [Body save or +1 Stress; or detour 2d10 minutes]

01.           You travel a short distance in a tuk-tuk. You pass ramen restaurants, beauty surgeons and traders with handcarts until the alley becomes too narrow and you must get out.

02.           A rickety elevator operated by a single motorcycle takes you up a few floors. A wide, brightly lit corridor opens in front of you. People stroll between bathhouses, pawnshops and chess tables and there are even a few cars driving around.

03.           You turn into a gloomy alleyway that is so narrow that you have to walk in single file. Above you, you hear loud voices from open windows and see laundry drying above your head.

04.           You reach a lower floor via a long ladder. A labyrinth of winding alleyways opens up in front of you. Through open doors you can see into opium dens, BDSM clubs and tea kitchens, but nobody pays much attention to you.

05.           A rusty cable car, whose windows are so scratched up that you can barely see out, takes you up a few floors. Between a soup kitchen with a long queue and a shabby hostel, you enter a large hall where a Novo family has set up an exhibit of expensive art, guarded by heavily armed Droogs, but attracting many onlookers who pause to inspect it.

06.           You cross a series of large rooms on gangways and bridges. Below you, you can see one of the power stations that produce electricity for the Dream and one of the many union pubs. Dirty people stand in front of it drinking and staring up at you.

07.           A long, wide staircase also leads to one of the lowest floors. The steep steps are lined with reaper fences, cabarets and luma tattoo studios.

08.           After a long wait, you board a small, packed train that will take you much closer to your destination. It stinks and people avoid eye contact. A distorted voice announces the stations ahead: Blue Line Apartments, Holding Cells K19, Oracle Tunnel, Sewage Treatment Plant 81.

09.           In front of you is a flooded tunnel. For 3cr, gondolas will take you to the other side with dry feet. You see people who can’t afford the boats wading through the waist-high water with their luggage on their heads.

10.           The wide road in front of you is very busy. Rickshaws, motorcycles and bicycles zoom by. Pedestrians keep to the wall as close as possible. Every now and then someone is swept along by a passing vehicle.

11.           A winding ramp leads steeply upwards. Rascals on motorcycles offer their services to take people up. At the side of the road, people offer their goods and services. You see acupuncturists treating their patients on blankets, mod mechanics in tents and palm readers loudly vying for customers.

12.           Between a slaughter factory and a shooting range, someone has cut a hole in a wide pipe that runs at a right angle to the path. People rent a skateboard for 1cr, crawl into the pipe and lie on the board on their backs. Then they use their hands to shimmy through the pipe to the other side of a thick wall. There, someone helps them out of the hole and takes the skateboard.

13.           Crammed together with many other passengers, you stand like sardines on the back of a van. You race past gambling dens, burger joints and second-hand clothes stores at breakneck speed. After a few minutes, you arrive at your destination and get out with weak knees.

14.           Suddenly, the tunnel you are in ends. You see that people start pulling climbing harnesses out of a crate, clipping themselves into a steel cable with a carabiner and hurtling down a zip line. They are caught at the bottom by the people in charge, where they pay 2cr.

15.           You notice how it is getting colder and colder. You are in a cooling tunnel. The people around you are wrapped up in thick layers and icicles are hanging from the walls. A priest from the Omega Church, an android who is oblivious to the cold, is trying in vain to lure people into his prayer room.

16.           The hall you pass through has been transformed into a confusing jumble of poor dwellings with tents, corrugated iron huts and simple wooden structures. Dirty garbage collectors climb around on stinking mountains of trash trying to find something usable.

17.           A steep spiral staircase made of sheet metal leads to a higher deck. The entire structure vibrates with every step. Around the stairs hang improvised platforms with cookshops, from which delicious smells and acrid smoke waft. A shivering woman begs for 10 credits to avoid ending up in the Choke.

18.           An old man operates a hand-operated winch to pull up a small elevator cage. The journey takes a long time, and below you see an argument breaking out between a rikshaw driver and a scrap dealer.

19.           An improvised rail system runs through the lowest levels. Workers transport building materials in flat wagons, and the passengers cling to them from the outside in order to be taken along. In the carriage in front of you are two boozing thugs who are dividing up the bounty they received when they delivered a poor soul to the Court who couldn't pay his O2 costs.

20.           The artificial gravity seems to be defective in this area of the station. People are floating around swaying and trying to keep their belongings together. Opportunists on long ropes try to collect lost goods to make a profit.

21.           Your path down a main street is blocked off by an emergency cordon where there is an active gunfight between Tempest mercenaries and some street gang. So you wind your way through the gawking crowd and navigate some side-streets lined with rows of vendomats and scorched shells of gutted vid-phone kiosks, all coated in layers of Waffen Bosses gang tags, going back many years.

22.           You cross over a skywalk covered in colourful, cartoony advertising animatics from Al Emaar Phoenix Personal Services, looking down into thick smog that has congealed, strangling the streets below.

23.           Pedestrians are flooding across the nearest intersection, en masse, both ways. Passage is slow, compounded by the fact that every underlit face on the street is concentrating solely on responding to a holovid ad projected above them that is offering a live “SanctoCorp” 120kcr lottery for those displaying their credsticks. (partake for 10cr: within 1d10 hours find out, 1d100 on 00 win 1d100kcr; otherwise lose; crit fail = hacked and lose 1d10 kcr)

24.           On a long stairway down to a lower level, an ancient-looking geriatric woman lopes past strapped into a squeaking linear assistance frame.

25.           Two local gangs are holding a no-holds-barred grudge-rugby game at a street intersection and a vid-blogger in full, wearable array is blatantly recording the scene.

26.           A nearby building compound, unmarked with identification, has an intermittently flickering security light. A darkened tower and autoturret look down on the winding pavement thoroughfare.

27.           Your passage is temporarily blocked (2d10 mins) by a lumbering hi-vis recycling collection robotruck, busy collecting from neighbourhood bins with Teamster assistants.

28.           As you move with the crowd through a skyway, five armoured Tempest Co. mercs bundle a violently reluctant vagrant into an armour-plated squad car.

29.           You take a Dreamline bus (1cr) and near your destination get off at a bus shelter made entirely of screens showing flashy commercials for the “Stratojogger” video gaming event.

30.           You cross a wide, spacious street. Searchlights are playing across the cloud cover and projecting surreal branding for De Santo Eco+ Cosmetics.

31.           A brightly lit Bellerophon Corp. aerocab is taking off in a cloud of exhaust fumes, rainwater and trash, causing pedestrians to scatter. [Speed check or +1 Stress]

32.           Vents in the sidewalk are emitting a thick cloud of vapour and people are covering their mouths as they cross. There is an unnerving muttering coming with the vapour. [Sanity save or +1 Stress]

33.           There is a metallic screech above and a heavy, steaming hot rainwater cascade falls from damaged guttering. [Body save or 1d5 DMG]

34.           Passing a corner, you spot a cluster of kids vaping, making LED-lit clouds from under designer pollution hoods and playing hip brassorcery music.

35.           A pair of Eaglequick bicycle couriers race one another through crawling traffic, shouting trashtalk as they go.

36.           Gritty, chemical-infused sediment is sloughing off a nearby rooftop and a Teamsters Union crew have put up safety barricades to keep foot traffic filing past.

37.           An old suspension bridge spans buildings en route to your destination, offering a shortcut. A large building-mounted flatscreen above is showing a “system error” message with an animated cartoon pig acting humorously upset.

38.           Traffic snarls around unattended roadworks, the area coned off and lit for safety for no clear reason. There is a lot of shouting and frustration. Pedestrians and drivers navigate a sluggish labyrinth.

39.           An automated “Silly Noodle™” vending truck, jingle playing, folds open and deploys nearby in a wide alley, and people hastily queue up for a 2cr selfserve snack or matcha tea.

40.           Above the shadowy alley you traverse, a flock of scabrous-looking pigeons suddenly takes flight, croaking and rasping.

41.           You stroll past a busy metro platform, full to capacity with disgruntled, rain-soaked commuters and “CrumbYum Cookie™” vendor robots.

42.           An abandoned cybernetic arm lies forlornly by the kerb of a long, deserted staircase down to the next street. It sparks and twitches.

43.           Animated street art of a heroic vibechete-wielding figure battling a many-headed mechanical serpent twists and turns across two adjoining walls of a series of alleys lit by flickering filament lights.

44.           As you wait for a pedestrian crossing light, you see that industrious homeless people are washing vehicle windscreens and accepting 1cr O2 credstick payments before the streetlights change.

45.           The road and pavement here are rippled as if frozen in fluid motion. Frantic homeless people are packing up their few belongings as a Tempest Co. O2-debtor patrol pushes its way along the streets toward them.

46.           The flashing orange lights of a fat, dirty-yellow street-sweeping remote dapple the narrow thoroughfare as you file through. A Novo punk is spray-painting the avenue wall with a mauve “Union 32819L sucks ass” tag.

47.           An abandoned rail tunnel now allows foot traffic over the road. A data terminal midway through is missing its screen and is stuffed with trash. A synthetic rat slips out and hurries up a wall.

48.           Your way is barred by a precarious heap of obsolete electronics, which two androids are picking through. (Have to turn around and detour; +2d10 minutes)

49.           The rainbow incandescence of oil dances to the vibrations of the street on a large puddle of dirty water. On the pavement nearby, a young street artist is making colourful chalk drawings inspired by it.

50.           The substandard cheapcrete here is pockmarked by years of corrosive rains from faulty atmosphere regulators above, and road traffic shudders past. It’s uneven footing and you pick your way through.

51.           An upper-class pedestrian-priority lane, clean and free of ads, allows passage through vehicular traffic. A loaded “Zorba’s Zoomies” pizza delivery drone hovering about three meters above the ground wobbles past.

52.           The walkway circles a roundabout. A grizzled old man yells at an O2-debt terminal in the central circle, then breaks down crying. No one slows down as they pass.

53.           Your attention is drawn to movements of an orange, multi-limbed, window cleaning robot that clambers up the building façade above you. A scruffy kid watches in rapt attention out another window from an apartment across the road.

54.           A long, silent queue has formed for a blocky, exhaust-stained, kerb-side “Downtime Euthanasia Booth™”. A golden-robed, bald Solarian preacher exhorts them to turn to Invictus Sol instead.

55.           All the nearby street signs are gang-tagged over to the point of being useless. An enterprising Navimaker Corp. android is offering directions to confused drivers and pedestrians for 10cr.

56.           Filthy red and white plastic Jersey barriers block most of the sidewalk. Blood is splattered on the wall and ground behind them. A tired Tempest probie is asking passersby if they witnessed a shooting of a Novo droog here.

57.           A group of screeching street kids is running along the overhead rail lines, hurrying to make it across before the next Dreamscape metro comes. A hawker is trying to solicit bets from passersby but is getting few takers.

58.           A thick pea soup fog is rolling down the streets and alleyways and people are hustling away. [Speed check or make Body save vs. 1d5 DMG unless protected from gas]

59.           All the streetlights for this entire block just went out. One by one people light up what illumination they can. Someone shouts about being pickpocketed.

60.           Rivers of rain-borne trash race along in the choked gutters, and a child’s squeaky-toy green lizard drifts past.

61.           A small crowd of people at a street corner are gawping upwards at a potential jumper. Sirens are closing in, heralding Tempest Co. arrival, and someone shouts that it’s a sniper unit coming.

62.           A tight formation of Tempest Co. armed response drones races down the street, just above head height, sirens wailing. People stop to gawk or cringe.

63.           A group of sex workers are on a nearby street corner, approaching cars and other traffic. They are lean, attractive, and loaded with hallucinatory pheromones that waft around.

64.           An out-of-order O2 credit machine threatens violent action to passersby who stray too close on this side street. A deranged vagrant is yelling threats back at it.

65.           Unnervingly, as you turn a corner there is absolutely no-one about, and somehow all sound is dampened. [Pass through? 50% chance of Violent Encounter; otherwise a regular Encounter]

66.           You’re walking down a quiet backstreet. A pedicab operator in creaking leathers is struggling with heat exhaustion and his two grumbling passengers exit prematurely.

67.           A GeV taxi takes a corner hard, throwing up polluted water, trash and crud. [Speed check or filthy]

68.           Strolling a boulevard through a middle-class residential area, you see a energetic street preacher android, sporting oversized optics, giving a digital presentation on witnessing the coming “Cybernetic Jesus®”.

69.           The sidewalk consists of slabs of flickering screens, showing adverts for the new line of EverBaby from Daedalus Robotics Labs. “No more messes, sleep-deprived nights or frequent feedings! Just the joy of parenting your very own baby that never grows up, only cries on command and loves to play!”. A few people are gathered loudly debating the ethics.

70.           A juddering motorized walkway speeds pedestrians along. A Jensen-Hung Pharmaceuticals corpo neon sign arcs overhead, flashing an advertisement for a claimed ACMD cure, “Cybocreme™”, offering the afflicted 10cr to be test subjects. (it does not work and Sanity save or +1 Stress)

71.           The street intersection has been overlaid with a colour-changing checkerboard for a free Nakatomi Solutions Inc. corpo-sponsored session of dance, with new tar-trance hits by DJ Shadowbunny. People are really getting into it.

72.           A cycles-only bridge crosses busy traffic and the local Novos are sponsoring free bicycles to cross it, as a public service, but also with a cursory check of O2 credsticks.

73.           The city block here is in ruins and bears radiation warnings, so 4x4 lead-shielded taxi hires are offering speedy but bumpy crossings for 2cr.

74.           Solarian Church promoters are hosting free solar-powered electric motorcycle rides through a traffic jam, with motorcycle speakers broadcasting prayers to Sol Invictus along the way.

75.           A crew of six Teamsters Union 32819L workers are busy fighting a tenement fire while two others hurry traffic around it, through choking smoke.

76.           Background ‘Muzak’ softly plays in an upper-class fashion market lining the streets, and Novo drones are humming just above the crowd filing through, dropping down to check O2 credsticks and take a poll about the latest, modest upgrade to O2 terminal interfaces.

77.           An underground subway allows pedestrians past snarled traffic, and access to an exclusive “Swing Away” old-fashioned ice cream stand playing swing music. A few people are dancing along while others buy softserve.

78.           Something knocks rubbish bins down a staircase to the left of the pavement, causing an awful clattering and spilling stinking refuse as they go. [Fear save or +1 Stress]

79.           There’s a sudden chill as you turn down a side street. There, children are playing in artificial snow drifting down from a hovering robocar playing audio advertisements for top-of-the-line cryopods offered by The Jump-9 Club corpo.

80.           Three Tempest Co. probies are busy dismantling a long Blackshield Mercenary Group advertisement screen on a wall along this walkway through towering residential blocks.

81.           There’s a Dream water supply canal crossed by an automated cargo transport barge (2cr fee; or 2d10 minutes detour). A Hylix-Ventross Systems vidscreen plays an ad for slick new “Marathon Blitz” portable wireless phones; only 5500 cr per year subscription, minimum 5 years contract.

82.           A garishly illuminated party truck, packed with revellers and loud Glitchcore music, offers a free, priority route through traffic slowed by a Dreamscape metro crossing, and 2cr stout beer shots.

83.           A squad of Tempest Co. mercs, shouted at by a presiding sergeant, are providing a public relations exercise by giving Armoured Personnel Carrier rides around the block, with intermittent stops.

84.           A struggling towtruck slowly hauls a long flatbed truck down the road and people are leaping onto the flatbed for free rides.

85.           There’s a traffic accident between two cars that is clogging traffic. Some fistfights have broken out in the mounting tension. Two Novos have pried open a sewer cover and are ushering pedestrians down into a sewer tunnel that bypasses the trouble. [Watch closely and notice them doing some pickpocketing]

86.           Novos are stopping vehicle traffic for contraband searches. The driver of an armoured black limousine is arguing with one to get through quickly. Luckily, there’s a footbridge over it all, featuring shiny Arbitration Limited billboards that offer legal advice, lawsuits, or Adjudicator hiring.

87.           University of Idalia Minor meteorologists are providing air quality statistics over a live viewscreen overlooking the extensible bridge spanning two residential towers. Current local air quality is excellent, thanks to Novo-funded ventilation upgrades by the Teamsters Union. But the air quality doesn’t feel so great.

88.           You grab seats on an armoured city segmented bus for 1cr, set up because of local gang warfare with Tempest Co. Along the way you see and hear several gun battles and the bus endures a burst of automatic gunfire. [Fear save or +1 Stress]

89.           A polychromatic jeepney overhauled from a retired Tempest Co. jeep gives you a quick ride along a poor-quality road for 1cr. A surreal CANYONheavy ad for Slug creeps across a small vidscreen in front of each seat.

90.           Neon-lit trishaws give you 1cr rides through complex back alleys packed with street food vendors and vendomats offering headphones, batteries, phones, torches, cameras and radios.

91.           A city block is slick with a major oil leak from crisscrossing pipes, making the ground dangerously slick and flammable, so 1cr rides via E-sleds are offered, sliding gracefully across the spills as they play  loud Chip Hop music.

92.           Sickening, cute, GIF-heavy, juvenile holo-animations clutter surfaces in an underground subway eluding heavy road traffic. A dozen mimes are practicing their craft in unison with the nearest characters.

93.           People are stopping to watch a big vidscreen in a plaza. It is playing the hit sitcom “My Two Sleeves”, which is in its penultimate episode of the season. There are cheers and jeers and sobs as the plot swiftly moves along.

94.           The pavement along this street is new, but unpleasant, with a sweaty, earthy smell and slightly compliant surface. Advertisements explain that this is Ousia Co.’s latest blend of Meatcrete™, lab-grown slabs of flesh chemically calcified and robotically sliced to provide precise architecture. A giggling pair of punk-fashioned teenagers are poking a particularly hairy patch of Meatcrete™ with a stick while camcording it. Elsewhere, a suit-clad corpo is vomiting.

95.           Stairs descend into a tiled underground hall, reclaimed from a former sewage processing plant, where Black Ambient genre bands battle for listeners and votes via local terminals.  Stairs on the far end return to the surface. Stimulant vendomats offer cigarettes, cigars, e-cig fluid, patches, caffeine tabs, rehydrated espresso, alcohol and more.

96.           The escalator between an upper and lower level of this part of The Dream has broken down and is closed, so some locals are having fun riding a metal slide they’ve set up, and another group is preparing a zipwire, while others press up or down the rough stone stairs. A Slacktivist forum has set up at the top of the stairs, drawing angst-ridden passersby to join in discussions of the lack of need for direct political action on The Dream.

97.           An impromptu anti-synthetic-person protest is growing in this Solarian food market you’ve entered, and Church members seem at a loss what to do, or try to carry out business without heeding it. There’s a gigantic glittering golden sun suspended on wires above, warming and illuminating everything below with artificial sunlight.

98.           A printer-fair has been set up along the pavements lining this business area’s street. Both independent vendors and corporations offer a wide array of services from simple custom-made art, to inks and paints and brushes, to different paper products, to dot-matrix printers and slickware-interfaces and more. A couple of tattoo stalls have taken the opportunity to set up here, too.

99.           The Novos have declared a Prospero’s Dream holiday in this district, celebrating Yandee’s infallible leadership! Businesses and vehicular traffic are closed and Novos have set up stalls offering services such as drinks, drugs, gambling, cyber-tuneups, slickworld trill-hubs, weapons licensing, business protection, black market goods, corpo-hacking competitions, presentations of Yandee’s latest missives, and brawling lessons.