RUN A SESSION - Wrinkled & Ready

Game Master Territory

This content is for the game master only. May include spoilers!

TONE

This is a comedy game about people who are underestimated, undermined, and slightly past caring what anyone thinks. The residents are the heroes and the troublemakers. These are the same thing.

Play it warm rather than cruel. The humour comes from the gap between how the characters see themselves — competent, dignified, entirely reasonable — and how the situation unfolds around them. Failed rolls should make things funnier, not more miserable. Nobody dies. The worst outcome is embarrassment, which is temporary and often useful.

LENGTH

Wrinkled & Ready is designed for short play. The natural unit of the game is a day in the home — breakfast to lights out — and most groups will find one session is exactly enough. Give the characters a goal to achieve in that time and see what happens.

For longer play, give the group multiple goals across several days. There is no levelling system, but if you want to raise the stakes over multiple sessions the optional Ageing mechanic in Character Creation is there for exactly that purpose.

THE HOME & ITS PEOPLE

The home is a small world with its own rules and power structures. The residents have been studying it for years from their chairs.

The building has a rhythm. Medication rounds at eight and two. Lunch at noon. Bingo on Tuesdays. Knowing the schedule is the group's greatest advantage. Disrupting it is their greatest weapon.

Information is currency. A well-placed rumor can move a member of staff from one end of the building to the other without anyone laying a finger on them.

Everything takes longer than expected. The lift is slow. Grudges last years. Someone's back goes out at a critical moment.

The home is full of people. Staff, residents, and visitors move through it all day, each with their own agenda, their own blind spots, and their own price. Some are obstacles. Some are assets. Some are both depending on the hour.

MISSIONS

Every session needs something worth doing. A mission is the scheme the group has decided to pull off — audacious enough to be interesting, local enough to feel achievable, and specific enough that everyone knows what success looks like. It does not have to be complicated. The complications will arrive on their own.

Establish the mission before the session begins. Everything else — the encounters, the NPCs, the things that go wrong — hangs off it. A clear goal keeps the story moving even when the plan falls apart, which it will.

Choose from ideas below or make up your own.

Mission	Description	Steps
Special Brownies	A resident's drug dealing teenage grandchild accidently left behind a bag of pot. Tomorrow is brownies day. The kitchen is unattended at night.	Retrieve the ingredient · Access the kitchen · Enjoy the ride
Schedule Hack	The home runs on a shared digital calendar controlling everything. You all hate chair yoga classes more than technology. It can't be that hard.	Steal keys to the office · Hack into the computer system · Edit the calendar
Unstoppable Force	Sandra's grandson Dennis is coming to a visit again. He is seven. He has the energy of something that should not exist indoors. By the time he leaves he has hidden three remotes, has told everyone exactly how old they looked, and has reorganized your medication by color. Sandra thinks he is delightful.	Gain Dennis's trust · Identify Dennis's actual skills and redirect them usefully · Deploy him against own target
Wheelchair Grand Prix	The Tuesday corridor is freshly waxed. Would be a shame if the opportunity for an impromptu race came and gone.	Acquire the vehicles · Clear the corridor · Run the race
Karaoke Escape	The White Horse pub two streets away has karaoke competition every Thursday. Tonight is Thursday. The side door is alarmed but Tomáš always props it open for the bins.	Slip out undetected · Crush the competition · Return before the night check

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ENCOUNTERS

These are individual problems, complications, and situations that can arise at any point during a session. Use them to fill gaps between scenes, escalate a situation, or derail things at exactly the right moment. Roll a d20 or pick what fits.

d20	Encounter	Ability
1	The Medication Round — the nurse is doing rounds and one character is exactly where they should not be, holding something they cannot explain	Charm
2	The Waxed Floor — the main corridor has just been mopped and is still wet. The cleaner is watching. The sign says Do Not Enter. The destination is on the other side	Agility
3	The Nap Ambush — one character must make a Mind roll or fall asleep mid-scene in a location that will raise questions when they are found	Mind
4	The Wrong Glasses — a character has someone else's glasses and cannot read, recognise faces, or identify which door is which until they are retrieved	Mind
5	The Chair Dispute — the route through the common room is completely blocked by two residents engaged in a territorial dispute that has been escalating since breakfast	Charm
6	The Eager Volunteer — a cheerful young volunteer has decided to help one of the characters with whatever they appear to be doing. They will not be discouraged. They ask a lot of questions	Charm
7	The Inspection Round — the duty manager is doing rounds twenty minutes early. Everyone must look innocent, seated, and medically compliant within the next thirty seconds	Charm
8	The Visiting Priest — a priest is doing his weekly round of visits and has decided that one of the characters looks like they need a long conversation about their soul	Guts
9	The Fire Drill — the alarm goes off. Mandatory evacuation. The characters are in the middle of something that cannot be paused, abandoned, or explained to a fire warden	Agility
10	The Stuck Lift — out of order, indefinitely. Three flights of stairs. One character's knee has already lodged a formal complaint	Agility / Guts
11	The Therapy Cat — has escaped its room and is now in possession of something belonging to one of the characters. It is under the cabinet. It looks comfortable	Agility
12	The Overheard Conversation — a character catches a fragment of a staff conversation through a door that was not quite closed. Getting closer to hear the rest requires commitment and a convincing reason to be standing there	Mind / Agility
13	The Visiting Family — an unexpected family member has arrived for one of the characters. Their timing is catastrophic. They have brought grapes, opinions, and a list of questions for the staff	Charm
14	The Power Cut — fifteen minutes of total darkness. The emergency lighting covers the reception and nowhere else. Everything that happens in those fifteen minutes is officially unverifiable	Mind
15	The Activities Session — chair yoga is starting in the common room and attendance has been marked as strongly encouraged by management. The common room is exactly where the characters need to be	Charm / Guts
16	The Spilled Trolley — the lunch trolley has shed its contents across the main corridor. It is slippery, it smells, and something that should not have been on that trolley is now visible to everyone in the vicinity	Agility / Charm
17	The New Enthusiastic Staff Member — just started, following every rule with genuine personal conviction, and has noticed something slightly unusual about what the characters appear to be doing	Charm
18	The Queue — an immovable queue has formed for the one working telephone, the one working computer, or the toilet nearest to where the characters need to be. Nobody in the queue has anywhere else to be	Guts
19	The Grandchild — Dennis is here. He has already hidden something, told someone something they did not want to know, and is currently heading in the direction of the characters with obvious intent	Charm / Mind
20	The Announcement — all residents summoned to the common room for an immediate announcement. Attendance is being checked by name. The characters cannot be here and where they need to be at the same time

Encounter	Description	Primary Ability	Special Check / Cost
The Polished Gauntlet	The night shift has over-waxed the linoleum. It’s a mirror-finish death trap between you and the exit.	Agility	Failure triggers Back Goes Out or costs 1 Energy to stay upright.
The Interrogator	Nurse Brenda is convinced you haven't taken your fiber supplements and won't let you pass until you "prove" it.	Charm (Deception)	Fail: She follows you, giving Wilt to all stealth-based actions.
The Memory Maze	The layout of the new dementia wing is intentionally confusing. The signs are missing or misleading.	Mind	Fail: A Senior Moment occurs; you end up in the laundry room instead.
The Heavy Fire Door	A massive, weighted door stands between the party and the garden. It’s built to keep people in.	Guts (Brute force)	Strenuous Action: Costs 1 Energy regardless of success.
The "Quiet" Resident	Arthur is asleep in his armchair right in the middle of the hall. He’s a light sleeper and a loud shouter.	Agility (Stealth)	Fail: Trigger The Stare from nearby staff as Arthur starts a shouting match.
The Medication Fog	It's just after 4 PM—the "med-cocktail" is kicking in. Your legs feel like lead and your head like cotton.	Guts	Success avoids the Confused condition; Failure adds a Wilt to the next 2 rolls.
The Family Visit	A party member's adult child has arrived for a surprise visit, blocking the path and demanding "quality time."	Charm	Success: You trick them into "waiting" elsewhere. Fail: You're stuck in a scene for 10 mins (loss of time).
The Contraband Check	The Facility Manager is doing a random "Safety Sweep" of the area you are currently sneaking through.	Mind (Hiding)	Fail: You lose one piece of Stuff as it's confiscated for being a "hazard."

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