Clocks and Countdowns

The dragon arrives in six segments. The vault alarm triggers in four. The mob's patience runs out in three. How many do you have left?

Clocks & Countdowns is a pacing toolkit that gives structure to urgency. Eight templates for the scenarios GMs run most — chases, heists, sieges, rituals, investigations, social standoffs, survival, and ticking bombs — each with setup rules, tick triggers, complication tables, and worked examples.

System-agnostic. No stats. Drop a clock onto any scene in any game.

Who this is for: GMs who want their tense scenes to feel tense — not just be described that way.