Solo Tabletop RPG – Worldbuilding: Solo Microscope

Read our previous world building session with The Location Crafter here.

Microscope is not a solo tabletop RPG by design. As I didn’t come to ttrpgs until I was nearly thirty years old, I got tired with Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition (the current version at the time I started) and began seeking out other games. Microscope was one of the first I found – a game centered around collaboratively building a timeline. I’ve been lucky enough to play it a few times with other people, but now in my solo era I wanted to see if I could shape it to fit that. I also wondered how better to shape it for a superhero campaign as I am working on one. I found that with Signal Light, a superhero-specific Microscope add-on.

Part of Microscope is establishing Periods. These are notable eras defined by a theme, event, or something similar. Think of the Renaissance or The Roaring 20s or The Black Plague. Beneath these periods come Events and within those are Scenes. Like a microscope we can zoom in closer and closer. Game play is non-linear directed by the Lens, a role that rotates between players who chose a theme for the round. By the end of a session of play, you’ll have an evocative timeline that can be used to create hooks for a campaign in another system.

I changed things up for solo play by using random rolls. I would do a Generation Roll using the table below, modified from the generations included in Signal Light.

The Golden Generation
The Silver Generation
The Bronze Generation
The New Century Generation
The Modern Generation
Player’s Choice

For the role of the Lens I decided to use the Descriptor tables from Mythic GM Emulator 2e. I rolled, took the two words and used them as inspiration for what content I added to the timeline.

As for elements to add, I decided to take some of Signal Light’s suggestions and have a looser structure than Microscope traditionally has. Instead of nesting things, I made it so only Locations were nested. I love Signal Light’s inclusion of Covers as they give a snapshot of a key moment that’s not as developed as a Plot (a whole story arc). Here’s my Element table below:

Supers
Organizations
Covers
Locations
Plot
Player’s Choice

I did a First Pass, which was an opportunity to pick and choose the starting Elements. After that, I used my tables to roll and guide what I added to the timeline. At the very end, I screenshotted the timeline by each Generation so you can see these pieces in order:

First Pass

Plot: The Incursion
A cabal of alien races antagonistic to Earth’s superheroes attempt to invade & conquer the planet. It ends in their defeat, but not without tremendous loss of life. The aliens’ tech is left behind and becomes something both hero & villain alike are rushing to gather up.

Organization: The Victory Vanguard

When Emperor Neuro attacks Forge City, only a handful of heroes retain control of their minds thanks to the magical aura of Omen. They work together to take down the foe, deciding to remain a team when peril beyond their individual capacity strikes.

Super: Captain Quantum

Young Aiden Bell discovers the mysterious quantum whistle after running away from the orphanage. With a single blow he swaps places with Captain Quantum, a cosmic hero who shares Aiden’s memories but also fragments of another life.

Cover: The Forever Cataclysm #8 – “Jack B. Nimble, Jack Be Quick”

The speedster Jack B. Nimbles stands in the center holding an unconscious Vortex by his collar and looking up. The legs of Apex Convergence, the entity responsible for the Cataclysm, frame the edges of the cover. Behind Jack we can see the purple ribbons of fire caused by the incursions. Jack dies in this issue.

Full Play

Lens: Gently Damaged

Generation Roll: Player’s Choice- The New Century Generation
Element Roll: 6 – Player’s Choice: Super
Super: Slingshot

Christopher Kelly discovered he could generate powerful energy tentacles from his hands shortly after the death of his scientist father. A cursory investigation has led Chris to realize his powers were imbued in him by his father…somehow. He is now the youthful, tentacle-swinging hero Slingshot.

Generation Roll: The New Century Generation
Element Roll: 1 – Super
Super: Bloodhound, Hunter of the Dark Gods

Born into a cruel subterranean society that had lived beneath Forge City since prehistory, Bloodhound was raised to be one of Gehenna’s hounds. He rebels after discovering the surface world and uses his keen senses & esoteric weapons to hunt down the very gods he was intended to protect.

Generation Roll: The New Century Generation
Element Roll: 2 – Organization
Organization: The Summit

The Eternal Flame, Sea Queen, Franklin Forge, Tiger Blue, and Scutter come together without telling their allies & compatriots. As The Summit, they seek to shape the destiny of Forge City and Earth by fighting battles behind the scenes. But they can’t stay in the shadows forever.

Lens: Aggressively Scary

Generation Roll: The Golden Generation
Element Roll: Plot
Plot: “Caught in Cobweb’s Clutches”

Scrapper, the boxer, investigates serial murders in Dead End Alley only to discover the lair of the ghostly Cobweb. By luring the villain to a nearby church he manages to subdue them with a bowlful of holy water.

Generation Roll: The Silver Generation
Element Roll: Location
The Quantum Corridor

The pocket dimension where Quantum and Aiden swap places. It is also the home to the Nebulons, predatory creatures who feed on the lifeforce of those from the material plane.

Generation Roll: The Bronze Generation
Element Roll: Organization
Horror, Inc
Jacqueline Bloodthorn realizes that the dread vampire lord Count Morvant has risen from the grave to terrorize Cemetery Hill, an older neighborhood in Forge City. She recruits a team of paranormal investigators including Mister Phantasmo, Moonlighter (werewolf), and Madame Yaga to fight back the darkness.

Lens: Ceaselessly Mighty

Generation Roll: The Silver Generation
Element Roll: Player’s Choice – Cover
Silver Sentry #9 – “Behold, the Leviathan…”

The android superhero Silver Sentry is pitted against the brute monster hero Leviathan, who is under the sway of the sorcerer Prospero. It’s during this battle that Prospero deduces that Silver Sentry lives under the human identity of Hal Hansen, race car driver.

Generation Roll: Player’s Choice – The Bronze Generation
Element Roll: Player’s Choice – Plot
Plot: “Passing the Torch”

Several of the original members of The Victory Vanguard watch as their children and proteges take up their mantles. A new version of the team comes together made up of Jill B. Nimble, The Sphinx, Shortstack II, The Blue Scorpion, and Vanity Fair. They compose the first class of the unofficial Vanguard Academy.

Generation Roll: The Silver Generation
Element Roll: Super
Redbolt

Tim Langley witnessed an alien spaceship crash in the New Mexico desert. A beam of energy erupted forther when the ship exploded striking Tim and giving him the ability to store up kinetic energy and release it in the form of massive bursts of speed. When he returns home to the small town he grew up in Georgia, Tim finds civil rights protestors being targeted by the police & local thugs. He uses his powers to become Redbolt, a blur of energy taking down the scum before they can harm the freedom fighters.

Lens: Strangely Young

Generation roll: The New Century Generation
Element roll: Organizations
The Anomalies

A Forever Cataclysm incursion in the early 2010s results in teenage versions of Forge City’s greatest heroes becoming stuck in the present day. Kid Exemplar, Princess Apollonia, Space Cadet, Redblur, and a young version of The Seer. They became entangled in a long-running fight with the villain Old King Crow. After around half a dozen arcs, the timeline was restored to normalcy and the Anomalies were disbanded.

Generation roll: Player’s Choice – The Bronze Generation
Element roll: Cover
The Seer #238 – “Little Deaths”

The Seer takes on the menace of Mr. Mannikin, a mobster with a stunted growth issue. Mr. Mannikin and his goons attack a regional science fair in Forge City to steal a revolutionary device that would reverse the minds of full grown adults into those of children. The Seer stops Mannikin but the villain is seemingly killed in an explosion caused by a ruptured gas line.

Generation roll: The Silver Generation
Element roll: Player’s Choice – Super
Apollonia

Apollonia, the only daughter of the cosmic god Kronus, was exiled to Earth as punishment for attempting to join the men in the Great Celestial Hunt. She assumed the human identity of April Long, a doctor at McNider Memorial Hospital. When the world is threatened by its greatest threats, April transforms into Apollonia to protect her new home. One day she knows her father will call for her return.

Lens: Helplessly Messy

Generation roll: The Bronze Generation
Element roll: Plot
“The Rise of the Unwanted”

The twisted science experiments of the villain Sinew create over a dozen animal-human hybrids. They escape into the sewers beneath Forge City when the authorities show up to shut Sinew down. Five of these creatures: Koffin the Bat, Hydra the Crab, Scutter the Pillbug, Yo Yo the Parakeet, and Pom the squirrel are cared for by the kindly iguana mutant Baku. He teaches them to use their powers to protect the innocent. But the world seems unwilling to embrace beings as strange as these.

Generation roll: The New Century Generation
Element roll: Plot
“Marked for Death by the Time Agents”

Superhero Timekeeper seeks the help of Slingshot & Apollonia as he’s hunted by the Time Agents. These soldiers from outside the Multiverse seek to repair the damage being caused by the rolling incursions. Timekeeper’s ability to move slightly backward and forward in time by minutes has been linked to the most recent incursion and the sentence is death.

Generation roll: The Silver Generation
Element roll: Organization
The Victory Force

Inspired by the heroes of a generation past, the Silver Gen’s greatest form a team that will become the stuff of legends. Exemplar. Apollonia, The Seer. Sea Queen. Redbolt. Space Ranger. and Captain Quantum become the first roster of many that make up The Victory Force. But unknown to these heroes their alliance is part of the manipulations of the dark god Golgotha. One day it will be The Victory Force that destroys the world.