How it works

Most AI stories are one chatbot doing everything, and forgetting as it goes. Ellor is an AI game master on top of a game engine. The engine keeps the rules and the record; Ellor moves the world and tells you about it, and cannot change the facts.

The game engine

Three parts work every turn, and each has its own job.

The rules enginedecidesRolls the dice for every risk, runs every fight, keeps hit points, the clock, levels and what you carry. It is code, not a guess.
The keeperremembersAn AI that writes down what each turn made true: money, property, debts, who is where. History is never rewritten.
Ellormoves the world and tells itThe AI game master. It runs the town and the land around it, its events, quests, threats and people, whether or not you are there, and turns the facts into the scene you read. It speaks inside the facts and cannot change them.

What Ellor does

World eventsFairs, storms, sickness, a lord's visit: news that reaches the town and changes it for days.
QuestsWhat the town needs becomes work people offer you, with pay that matches the job and the danger.
ChallengesHidden goals set for your story. Meet one, and you earn experience for it.
Threats and foesWolves in the old barrow, bandits on the north road. They are somewhere, and they are dangerous.
Story threadsDealt from a deck and built into the world, so no two campaigns open the same way.
People with plansThey want things, feel things about you, and act on it: a promise kept, a knock at your door at night.

What the rules engine keeps honest

ChecksA d20 plus the ability and skill that fit, against a difficulty set by the engine, never by the story.
FightsAttacks against armour class, damage by the weapon you hold, and foes that choose their own moves.
Wounds and deathHit points told as hurt or badly hurt. A death stands.
GrowingExperience for what you overcome, levels that raise your hit points and skills.
Time and restA real clock. A night's sleep heals you; a week at the forge passes in a line.
Money and thingsEvery ducat on a ledger, every item where you left it, prices that hold.

A turn, step by step

Pick an example turn and watch the engine work it: what it read in your words, what the dice said, what it wrote down, and only then the story.

You write
  1. 1
    Your words are readWhat you are trying to do, to whom, where, and whether it is risky.
  2. 2
    Dice decideA real d20, rolled by the engine against a real difficulty or armour class.
  3. 3
    The record is writtenWhat the turn made true, kept for good.
  4. 4
    Ellor tells itThe scene, written from those facts and nothing else.
  5. 5
    The story is read backWho spoke, where you stand, how people now feel.
  6. 6
    The world moves onEllor moves people, events and threats along.
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