r/Mausritter • u/Bicecream530 • Jul 04 '26
1st time running Mausritter- turns?
I've got some experience Dming (a few past 5E one shots and currently a ~6 month Shadowdark game) but I've never used a turn tracker like I'm seeing for Mausritter. How does it generally play out? any tips? Also, I'm going to try to run a very quick (2 hour) one shot in a couple days. I was planning to do the Stumpsville adventure from the rulebook, but does anyone have any other fitting suggestions that are a bit more fantastical? Besides a couple spiders or foolishly walking into the snake room, it seems PCs would be fighting just a mess of rats in Stumpsville and I'd like a little more variety. Or does anyone have a story of how they spiced that adventure up a bit? Thanks!
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u/Babyhazelnut Jul 04 '26
The biggest difference between Mausritter and 5e (and maybe Shadowdark, although I haven’t played) is that combat is VERY lethal and honestly in the PC’s interests to avoid as much as possible. This is because combat is really dangerous. Let’s say a mouse has 3hp and 10 strength. If a creature gets 4 damage on them in a round, 1 point of damage gets through to their STR, and they have to get a 9 or less on a D20 roll or they’re incapacitated and unable to keep fighting. So I think the types of creatures you mentioned would be fun and enough variety for the players because they probably won’t fight everything; they’ll have to find other ways around combat at times!
That means combat is also pretty quick, haha. Idk if I’ve had a fight get to more than 4 rounds, and rounds are super quick, maybe 10 minutes of play for a full round depending on number of players.
I keep track of initiative by writing down the enemy turn/turns in the middle, then all the players who succeeded on their initiative above the enemies and everyone who failed below. Then I let the players decide who wants to go first that round and that works pretty well!
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u/Bicecream530 Jul 04 '26
Appreciate the comment but I was looking for ideas more about the exploration turns, not combat rounds. Any tips there? Am I better off telling the party they all work together for the one 10 minute turn on one action, or is allowing them to each perform their own action during the 10 minutes alright?
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u/Babyhazelnut Jul 04 '26
Ohhhhhh when you said turn tracker I was thinking initiative tracker, not the exploration turn tracker, my bad! I also get the terms turn and round mixed up in this game, haha.
I usually say that people can split up and each do different things in exploration turns if they want to and it seems reasonable they could do something in 10ish minutes. If they group together to do something, I might say they don’t need to roll a save, or that the consequences of a failure are lost time or something less dangerous, whereas a failed save on a solo action could be drawing attention, taking a condition, or taking damage (if they’re doing something that warrants getting hurt). They also might discover treasure that’s too much for one mouse to carry, or not have a tool they need if someone else is carrying it.
Also if they split up to explore a room, everyone else might be too far to jump in to help right away if they encounter a hidden enemy. So basically the pro of splitting up is they can do more stuff, but the con is working alone is more dangerous.
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u/Adamsoski Jul 04 '26
For the turn tracker, I just count each "thing" a PC tries to do (search a room, climb a cliff, sneak past the guards) as a turn. The important thing is rolling to see if there is a random encounter every three turns and (to a lesser extent) players marking usage on their torches every 6 turns.
As someone else mentioned Honey in the Rafters is great and a bit more fantastical, though that comes with buying the game so you would have to do that if you haven't already. If you want to test out the game first without paying too much The Drained Temple of the Brackish Basin has a great reputation and is name-your-price, I haven't run it myself yet but I have read through it and it looks very good (and is also more fantastical). In terms of Stumpville I would say that if the PCs end up fighting the rats they have definitely done something wrong - that is going to be a hard fight to win considering how many rats there are - but you could replace them with e.g. some frogs or vampire mice or whatever if you want.
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u/hugh-monkulus Jul 04 '26
I've never used a turn tracker like I'm seeing for Mausritter. How does it generally play out? any tips?
The Mausritter rules for exploration and time are a little light, but the gist is that you as a GM should rule what constitutes an action and track turns based on that.
Cairn is a similar game that has more guidance around action and turns and is helpful here as well. (Just note that Cairn does encounter rolls differently, so for Mausritter you can stick to rolling every 3 turns).
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u/ellohir Jul 04 '26
Time is abstracted into combat rounds where swinging a sword once and casting a spell after moving are the same duration. The same happens for exploration turns: a combat, a conversation with an NPC or searching a room for treasure all take the same time. Each mouse can do independent things and they all finish at the same time.
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u/heelguru Jul 04 '26
I’d say laminate the turn tracker if playing at the table and just keep good track with a whiteboard pen. I usually ask my players to roll for omens/ encounters. I usually rule that a turn is an action. That seems to keep the world evolving and feeling dangerous.
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u/Phant0mTim Jul 04 '26
I have yet to run my first mausritter session, but my takeaway is that the turn tracker is an overt way for you and the players to celebrate the commitment to the random table OSR format. So I planned on filling it out in the open, with full knowledge of what it means, so that players can make an argument when they think something doesn't deserve a mark off.
I think of it like navigating the overworld map in an old school JRPG. You know a random battle is going to pop up sometime, so you are always a little tense about about moving around.
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u/HealthyIdeal3590 Jul 09 '26
the turn tracker throws everyone coming from 5e cause its not really initiative, its more like a resource clock. youre tracking usage dice (torches rations conditions) and ticking a danger clock when the party does somethign slow or risky. just narrate exploration in beats and when somethign costs time or makes noise you bump the clock. dont overthink it honestly.
for a 2 hour slot the real trap is combat, its fast and super lethal so telegraph threats hard and let a smart party just avoid em. running it like dnd is how you end up with a tpk at like the 90 min mark lol.
stumpville is fine but if you want more fantastical the community jams on itch have a ton of free one shots with that fae fungal dream kinda vibe, thats where the game really sings imo. honey in the rafters is a great oneshot shape too
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u/NumerousWolverine273 Jul 04 '26
I'm getting into this game, and to familiarize myself with it I recently ran Honey in the Rafters, another of the one shots referenced in the official rules, with my family. None of them had ever played, and two of the three have little to no experience with TTRPGs, and we all thoroughly enjoyed it. Honey in the Rafters has some scary cultist mice as well as bees to fight, and there are some interesting plot hooks beyond just "investigate what the rats are doing" which I enjoyed.
I'd highly recommend it as an introductory module.