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Our 'heroes'
"So far, our party includes an insane troper who has telekinesis and hallucinates ghost pirates with posh British accents and a double amputee burn victim janitor who beats people to death with a mop. And this is in the "real" world."
Gatleos

A Roll to Dodge game with a unique premise, Roll to Roll to Dodge, A Meta Adventure was created by Gatleos on December 26, 2010 on the Bay 12 forums and may be found here. Sadly, as of Turn 125, it seems to have been abandoned.

The story begins with five people waking up in a cell. They are promptly informed by a mysterious voice that they are going to be playing a very exciting game of Roll to Dodge. Meanwhile, in another Dimension, five people find themselves in a tavern.

What follows is an epic story of mass murder, insanity, and well thought out- then abruptly derailed- plot.


Roll to Roll to Dodge contains examples of:

  • Artifact Title: The 'Roll to Roll to' part references the fact that the real world characters had computer screens from which to control their fantasy world counterparts. Gatleos removes them a few turns in due to Rule of Fun leading to nobody knowing quite how they maintain the connection, aside from a few mysterious signals centered around communications array. Now it's more like 'Play two RTD's, die in one, die in the other.'
  • Breaking the Fourth Wall:
    • Inverted, or something. Instead of the fourth wall being broken from the inside, it seems to be assaulted from the outside by ghost pirates. Ghost pirates that existed only in the mind of one character in the META Adventure have suddenly turned up in the Fantasy Adventure.
    • As of TURN 100, this has been shattered by Edgar. It seems the FANTASY world might be a little more "real" than first given credit. It seems the ghost pirates are dwarves from a simulation and they want to break free of the simulation. So you can now say the main goal of the characters in the FANTASY word is to break the (inner)-fourth wall once and for all.
    • This has practically become a standard feature of the adventure whether META, FANTASY, REAL, HOLO-DECK, ON STAGE, or (for scalability) ETC.
  • Complexity Addiction: Gatleos, and we all love him for it. As of turn 115 he's admitted that there are plots that have been revealed, some that have been stealthily snuck in, and still more that haven't shown up yet. He just hopes this goes on long enough to get through all of them.
    Gatleos: You know, I'm actually getting to the point where I'm going to need to make a flowchart or something to keep track of all the layers of narrative going on. Not to mention the time shenanigans.
  • Fluffy Tamer: Derm has trained and commanded several creatures ranging from mundane to "what the hell is that".
  • Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Not only have all these things literally appeared in the game, but the spirit of the trope is abound in spades. Amphibian Peg-legged Giant Mutant Scorpion Rat. Check.
  • No Fourth Wall: Turn 116. Kyle, during the FANTASY turn, asks the GM what he should do next in the FANTASY turn. Kyle also comments on Gatleos's sprite being higher res than everyone else's, which causes Gatleos to leave, thus not finishing HEN's (Kyle's FANTASY alter-ego) turn. HEN complains and Kyle tells him to shut it.

The individual Universes provide examples of:

    open/close all folders 
    Real world 
  • How We Got Here: A recent set of "turns" in the "META META" world revealed the condition of Earth and Derek prior to being kidnapped. It seems to involve Dwarf Fortress version 0.99.42's release becoming sentient. Granted this may simply be a joke, but ultimately shows Derek being kidnapped by a mysterious figure and ends with the first couple lines from the very beginning of the story.
  • Improbable Weapon User: Kyle, the Janitor, gets bonuses for using cleaning implements as weapons.
  • The Power of Rock: Derek creates a sonic cannon/guitar activated by EPIC RIFFING! Not bad for a computer specialist.
  • Show Within a Show:
    • The whole premise of this RTD adventure. A group of people are kidnapped and try to escape in a RTD Adventure and at the same time are playing a fantasy themed RTD adventure.
    • The shortlived minigame 'Textyman' Derek played when the players didn't post actions fast enough. There was a sequel in the roleplaying forum.
  • TV Tropes Will Ruin Your Life: Literally true In-Universe. The player character, Monk, will become distracted and gain a penalty to his mental rolls thanks to this.

     Fantasy world 
  • Arm Cannon: Edgar replaces his right arm with a harpoon gun.
  • Body Horror:
    • Derm kinda sorta makes his kitty into a meter wide writhing mass of tentacles.
    • Derm himself gets an arm replaced by a twelve foot length of muscle tissue. The other is now a long purple tentacle. This strangely doesn't appear to have any penalty applied to it.
    • Derm is also making the other members of the team into body horrors simply because he prefers shooting absurd levels of summoning magic into their wounds instead of, say, using the team doctor. It does get results, though.
  • Dynamic Entry: This is what Derm was sort of attempting when he killed the Goblin Chieftain.
  • Eldritch Abomination: Mutie, a spherical mass of tentacles with the head of a cat, that even speaks in Zalgo.
  • Healing Hands: Surprisingly, Urist, to an extent. He used his martial trance to get a bonus in order to beat Frelock back into shape. And somehow, he succeeded.
  • Interface Spoiler: When the bag holding the Demon Mayor was tossed in Mt. Helmath, there was no reason to believe he was still in that bag except that the goal was marked as accomplished.
  • MacGuffin Escort Mission: The second major goal of the game was to escort the Demon Mayor to Mt. Helmath and toss him in.
  • The Men in Black: Three agents confront the player characters and seem to think they are breaking the rules. Wonder what gave them that idea? Turn 100 confirms there are more than just the three shown previously.
  • Off the Rails: "To be honest, killing that chieftain completely changes the path this story is taking. I just wasn't expecting Derm to immolate him beyond recognition before he could even say a word. Not sure why I wasn't expecting that."
  • Person of Mass Destruction: Derm has created Typhoons, sunk a ship, created genetic abominations, burned down entire forests, caused massive explosions, and had obtained the Necronomicon, but lost it later.
  • Power Glows: An agent steals one of the player character's abilities and it takes the form of a glowing green orb.
  • Our Liches Are Different: Frelock becomes what ammounts to a good aligned Lich.
  • Real Life Writes the Plot: As new features are added to Dwarf Fortress, similar things begin to appear in the FANTASY adventure.
  • Status Quo Is God: Regardless of what they do, the adventure party members are good guys and the heroes of this tale. Anything bad they may do, whether intentional, unintentional, or somewhere in between, will be for the greater good. The author even says he takes it as his personal challenge in creative writing to accomplish this feat.
  • Summon Magic: Derm's other modus operandi. The bulk of his atrocities seem to stem off him trying to do stuff that Summon Magic doesn't actually do.

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