The Loom: Narrative Framework -Full
A downloadable game
Your game is good. Your sessions keep forgetting that.
Campaigns fall apart between sessions. Good moments with nothing connecting them. Characters who changed but it didn't stick. A dungeon that mattered last week, forgotten by this one.
The Loom doesn't replace your system. It wraps around it. You keep fighting monsters, tracking hit points, arguing about the left corridor or the right one. The Loom just asks what it all means when you're done.
Three threads track what your character actually cares about. Four questions connect your sessions into something that holds. Two world forces keep moving whether you engage with them or not.
That's the whole thing.
Here's what it looks like when it works. The GM doesn't stop to run a procedure. She just says: wait, that symbol. Isn't that the same mark from your brother's letter? And the dungeon changes. It isn't a random goblin cave anymore. It's your character's goblin cave. None of that was planned, it just emerged from the character threads.
WHAT'S IN IT
The complete Loom system from first session to endgame campaign: thread tracking, world forces, four questions, oracle tables, pacing controls, and random generators for dungeons, cities, and hexcrawls that connect directly to your threads.
Loose Weave gets you running in session one with an index card and a d6. Standard Mode adds everything else one session at a time. Some groups never leave Loose Weave. That's fine.
Full guidance for dungeon crawls, investigations, social sessions, megadungeons, and hexcrawls. Solo play supported.
WORKS WITH
D&D, Pathfinder, OSR games, PbtA, Fate, Ironsworn, and anything else with adventures in it.
If it has sessions, The Loom can connect them.
Development log
- Generator Consolidation10 days ago
- The Loom: Full Version is ready for playtest14 days ago
- The Loom - Why I Built a System-Agnostic Narrative Framework46 days ago
Comments
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Thinking about a few more things that might be good to have- Have you considered making a printer friendly version of this? Its not necessarily immediately important because this is still in the Playtest phase, but I'd love to be able to print it out in black and white without worrying about the entire page color turning gray.
I'm also still a little bit stuck on players tracking their own threads thing too, though. If we're all sitting in different positions around a table, it would be pretty difficult for everyone to be able to see the index cards regardless of position. I feel like it might be helpful to have a master thread list for the GM, and then the players can do the actual tracking on their own index cards? Just pondering.
Yes! Printer-friendly version is on the list. Not the priority right now while it's still in playtest, but it is coming before any kind of release. Nobody should have to burn a full ink cartridge to run a game.
Thread tracking issue, you're right that index cards at odd table angles are a real problem. The intended setup is one shared tracker that everyone can see (the GM included), not players managing private cards. The tracker is meant to be public, like a scoreboard. I might not have been explicit in the rules, so I'm going to make it explicit in the GM-Led section next pass: the tracker lives at the center of the table, players own their threads but the list itself isn't hidden from anyone.
The master GM list idea you're describing could be good if your group prefers the GM holding the full picture and players maintaining their own shorthand on cards, that works fine. The Loom doesn't break if information is redundant. Just make sure the GM version stays visible when a clock fires, because that's the moment you need to see what's been ignored i think.
I'm very interested in this system, but I have a question- How do you decide what thread comes into play as a GM when a clock triggers, if your players are the one managing their threads? I feel like I'd need to be seeing everything that's going on to be able to make that judgement.
Also just a quick note- It would be very nice to have the random generators all in one location in the appendix for easy access.
Thanks for the close read an the interest. The thread tracker is meant to be public at the table. Players own their threads but the tracker sits where everyone can see it. The visibility rule in Section 13 actually uses the thread tracker as the example for how World Forces should be posted ("like the thread tracker"). So when a clock fires you can see which threads are live, what's pressured, who's been ignored, and pick from there.
That said, you're not the only person to read past it. I'll add a clearer line in the GM-Led section next pass.
And yeah, the generators are spread across a few spots right now. Pulling them into one appendix is on the list for next pass. Let me know how you make out.
It looks both simple and elegant; I'm eager to try it with Sundered Isles soon! Though I do wonder how much or little it would interfere with other pacing / prioritizing mechanics from the TTRPG system, such as Legends in the Mist (Abandon), or contending Challenge Pools (Cortex Prime).
The short version:
The Loom doesn't compete with either of those mechanics because it's not working in the same layer. Abandon and Challenge Pools are live pressure. They fire during scenes, during rolls, while the fiction is moving. The Loom only activates between scenes at Story Beats. It never touches what those systems are doing.
If anything they feed into each other. Abandon forcing a hard choice? That's a Transformation Question waiting at the next Beat. A Challenge Pool completing because you ignored it? That's already a Consequence with timing built in. The Loom catches what those systems leave behind and makes sure it sticks.
Also, I'm dropping an update soon that clarifies how Thread Snap works when the fiction isn't already pointing that direction. I
t doesn't rewrite your current scene. It means the world has been moving without you and it's going to catch up at the next moment that can hold it. Felt like that needed to be said out loud. Have fun, and let me know how it goes.