Fun with time paradoxes! What could possibly go wrong? No seriously, I need a list.

[Odessa333]

Hi all!

So this is a bit off an odd request, but I'm looking for strange/odd ideas of things to happen with time. In short, I need to make a wild magic table that specifically centered around time, from aging people, to making people younger, seeing visions from past/future, alternate timeline mischief, paradoxes.... anything that could possibly relate to 'time' in some way. I have a good list (I think anyway) yet there's only so many times I can use 'you age d10 years' before it gets old. I'm looking for inspiration and hoping someone here has some good ideas. Thank you for your time!

[OldTrees1]

It would help if we knew which way time worked in your setting.

For example temporal paradoxs might just include travel from one universe to another. So sudden visitors, sudden jumps forward/backward, or history changing 1 detail would be common.


If time is a single consistent coiled string, then different times could become in close proximity. That would cause:
1) People from one time observing the other time
2) Things from one part of time might fall into the other time

See something in the future
See something in the past
Someone in the past sees you
Someone in the future sees you
You fall into the other time, and hopefully return somehow.

You age X years, you lived in the past/future for those years
You are beside yourself. You get 2 turns for X turns.
Your younger self is thrown forward in time. You get X years younger but your history changes.
You disappear into the future. We will return to you later.

Something falls from one time into another

Funny object X falls nearby.
Object X disappears into a different time.



5 different versions of you collab to make 1 messy post

[rg9000]

A lot of the below can be inverted:

The target's senses are shoved 5 seconds back in time for a short while. (As seen, they see and hear what happened 5 seconds in the past)
The target's body is forced to repeat the actions it just did.
The target is unaffected by further time shenanigans.
Time only passes for the target while they are moving (think Superhot)
The target swaps place/time with an older, wiser version of themself for a while. (this can send people into the future)
The target's body will not age.
The target perceives time as passing twice as fast/slow.

[Darth Credence]

Almost anything could be time related - a gender swap for the affected character could be time related by messing with the character's parents before birth, equipment could be different, shorter/taller or skinnier/fatter due to nutrition in the past, skills or even classes change abruptly from different experiences, stuff like that.. That said, I have a few that might be more clearly time related.

An extremity (finger, limb) is suddenly gone, as though amputated and healed long ago.
Hair length changes abruptly, or style of clothing
A fellow traveler could completely disappear, or
New companions could appear that everyone else has known for a long time
Enemies could be seen as friends, because they are in a different timeline
Anachronistic items could appear, like a gun
Start moving backwards through time
An evil twin could show up, and no one knows who is who
Effect begins to precede cause (slightly different than moving backwards through time)
Deju vu events keep happening until it overwhelms
Sudden changes in level, temporarily granting abilities far beyond the player or far below what they are used to

Some that have just a cosmetic effect, and some that could really mess people up.

[Pex]

This takes work.

Starting from Session 1, play the game describing things as you normally do. For world flavor you can describe things the players see that has nothing to do with the adventure. It's background. They may or may not interact as they please. As DM keep notes on these, not necessarily all of them. Either they're something you made up to prepare for the session or it was a spontaneous idea. Then when a temporal surge happens and someone briefly goes to the past they end up in one of those background flavor text situations. It was that person all along. The idea is those background situations the players witnessed were temporal surges from their future traveling to the past, their present at the time. The players are now in their future, current present, having the surge going back in time to those background flavor text descriptions.

Sometimes have surges go to the future. The future is a particular encounter the party will have you plan for some time later. When you finally run that encounter the players see the past self of someone arrive and do what he did at the time.

[Hal]

In my game, I've used the short/long term madness tables for this purpose. You can reflavor some of those items as necessary, but they fit reasonably well.

[Hellpyre]

A big question for me is: how many of the people at the table are going to be rolling on the table? If it's one person in a party of 4, you don't want effects extreme enough to take the spotlight continually, but if it's a solo player or a party of Wild Mage sorcs, then you can afford splashier effects, since they come equally from the members of the party.

[Darth Credence]

This takes work.

Starting from Session 1, play the game describing things as you normally do. For world flavor you can describe things the players see that has nothing to do with the adventure. It's background. They may or may not interact as they please. As DM keep notes on these, not necessarily all of them. Either they're something you made up to prepare for the session or it was a spontaneous idea. Then when a temporal surge happens and someone briefly goes to the past they end up in one of those background flavor text situations. It was that person all along. The idea is those background situations the players witnessed were temporal surges from their future traveling to the past, their present at the time. The players are now in their future, current present, having the surge going back in time to those background flavor text descriptions.

Sometimes have surges go to the future. The future is a particular encounter the party will have you plan for some time later. When you finally run that encounter the players see the past self of someone arrive and do what he did at the time.

I really like this. If I were to ever run a campaign that I expect to include any type of time travel, I am absolutely going to go for a long term build like this.

[Millstone85]

It is a small table but it could already give a sense of temporal chaos.

Wild Chronurgy


d6
Effect


1-2
You call forth another you, as if using the Manifest Echo feature
of an Echo Knight fighter (EGtW p183).


3-4
You crystallize your spell, as if using the Arcane Abeyance feature
of a Chronurgy wizard (EGtW p185).


5-6
The first creature that you see cast a spell, before the beginning
of your next turn, must roll a d4 on this table.

[IsaacsAlterEgo]

Your future self appears and hands you an item rolled from the trinket table.

Your past self appears, and you are compelled to hand them an item from your current inventory.

If you get both and make it the same item, congratulations, you've created something from nothing and made a stable time loop!

[Martin Greywolf]

If you really push your time effects to the brink, you can get some... odd effects. An area of space where time is so slow light is now solid, and the area appears black on account of no light leaving it. Arrow being mulched in flight because as it flies into slowed time, it gets ripped apart against itself. An area that ages bodyparts you stick inot it, forwards or backwards, and saps your stamina at a prodigious rate.

Then, you add areas where time flows backwards, and things get really weird. An arrow flies out of point A between you and enemy and hits enemy for damage - if you don't fire an arrow at point A the next round, the damage on your enemy suddenly disappears. Area that deals necrotic (radiation) damage if you shine too much light into it, because light gets time-reversed into itself.

And then you combine the two. Nasty plot of land that tears you apart because it slows one part of you and accelerates other. Places that slow time for your soul/mind, but accelerate it for your body. Areas that are under localized timeloop, and unless you leave before it resets, you are trapped and have to be rescued by ouside force.

Lastly, remember all those physics equations that have t as a component? Now, you can pass through fire because your time is slower than flame time, or, in reverse, a cold area deals damage to you a lot more because you're spending longer there.

If you go with timespace, then you can make even stranger effects, like adding gravitational lensing to fireballs and such.

[cutlery]

Read Recursion by Blake Crouch.

Pretty much the entire novel is time paradoxa.

[Chugger]

The character confuses time with thyme and feels compelled to break off combat, light a fire, and cook gourmet French food, all the time trying to talk just like Julia Child.

[NecessaryWeevil]

You begin to age in reverse. Treat it like very slow level drain. You also begin to lose your short term memory, and depending on your age, your stats may change if you don't fix it fairly soon. (See the novel Hyperion for an example).

[Sigreid]

There's the classic move of doing a cut scene where the player suddenly remembers that he is, in fact, his own grandpa.