by John Scott Tynes

with Tales by Divers Hands

2
THE SKIES ARE DIM ALWAYS SINCE THE MAKER DIED.
Once, the golden lights of Puppettown were the brightest beacons
in all of Puppetland, but now they gutter under blood-red glass.
Once, the sun and the moon moved their normal courses through
the heavens, but now they are fixed in place, the faltering moon
above and the cracked and peeling sun somewhere down below.
The rise of Punch the Maker-Killer has brought all of nature to
a stop, leaving it perpetually winter, perpetually night. Puppets
the length and breadth of Puppetland mourn the loss of the
Maker and curse the name of Punch—but not too loudly, lest the
Nutcrackers hear and come to call with a sharp rap-rap-rapping at
the door.
3
 PUPPETLAND™

a storytelling game with strings in a grim world of make-believe

© 2016 John Scott Tynes except as follows. “The Great Sage OF!, the Mountain!” and “Punch
Dammed It!” by Arnold Cassel, © 2016. “Pretty Polly,” “The Box,” and “The Bottler” by Arinn
Dembo, © 2016. “Puppet Masters” by Matt Forbeck, © 2016. “The Lost Giant” by Gareth Ryder-
Hanrahan, © 2016. “The Missing Peace” by Fred Hicks, © 2016. “Vada Wolley Rex” by Kenneth
Hite, © 2016. “Punch Village” by Jason Morningstar, © 2016. “Overtime in the Factory” and “The
Rhyming Ritual” by Ross Payton, © 2016. “Visions of Sugar Plums” by James Wallis, © 2016.
Illustrations by Samuel Araya (pages 2, 6, 26, 30, 43, 50, 55, 56, 60, 65, 72, 75, 80, 134, 146, and
152), © 2016; by Heather Hudson (pages 9, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 19, 21, 22, 25, 34, 85, 136, 138, 140,
142, and 144), © 2016; by Hollie Mengert (pages 28, 39, 41, 53 top, 62, 63, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 73,
76, 77, 78, 79, 100, and 156), © 2016; and by Raven Mimura (pages 32, 33, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49,
52, 53 bottom, and 71), © 2016. Cover painting by Alejandro Téran, © 2016. All rights reserved
worldwide. Permission is granted to reproduce pages 35–38, 70, and 157 for personal use only.

Puppetland,™ Puppettown,™ and Maker’s Land™ are trademarks of John Scott Tynes.

Graphic design by Jessica Hopkins. Back cover design by Todd Shearer. Edited by Shane Ivey and
Lisa Padol. Published by Arc Dream Publishing, 12215 Highway 11, Chelsea, AL, 35043, USA.
Updated 23 June 2016.

Sold by Studio2 Publishing, 1722 Louisville Drive, Suite A, Knoxville, TN 37921, USA; phone
1-865-212-3797; email jims@studio2publishing.com; Puppetland product stock code APU9000.

ISBN 978-1-940410-22-7

For more games and fiction, or for a free PDF of this book with your print purchase, visit Arc
Dream Publishing at www.arcdream.com or email shane@arcdream.com. Ask your favorite store
to join Bits & Mortar (www.bits-and-mortar.com) to provide PDFs of Arc Dream games to all their
customers, free.

Puppetland needs puppetmasters! Please go to www.arcdream.com to sign up to run Puppetland for

stores, conventions, and game clubs. Punch won’t thank or reward you—but we will!

Printed in China

987654321

4
 Contents
Punch the Maker-Killer.........................................................................7 Tales From Puppetland........................................................................ 81
Puppetland.......................................................................................... 27 Boys at Play by John Scott Tynes..................................................... 82
The Game of Puppetland................................................................ 28 The Great Sage OF, the Mountain! by Arnold Cassel......................... 84
The Types of Puppets.................................................................... 32 The Missing Peace by Fred Hicks.................................................... 86
The Puppet Page........................................................................... 34 Overtime In the Factory by Ross Payton.......................................... 89
Finger Puppet Page....................................................................... 35 Punch and the Beanstalk by John Scott Tynes.................................. 91
Hand Puppet Page........................................................................ 36 Punch Dammed It! by Arnold Cassel............................................... 93
Shadow Puppet Page..................................................................... 37 Punch Village by Jason Morningstar............................................... 95
Marionette Page............................................................................ 38 Puppet Masters by Matt Forbeck..................................................... 96
Creating a Puppet......................................................................... 39 The Rhyming Ritual by Ross Payton............................................... 97
Playing a Puppet.......................................................................... 41 The Terrible Fire by John Scott Tynes............................................. 99
Puzzle Pieces and Doom................................................................ 42 Vada Wolley Rex by Kenneth Hite................................................. 101
Puppetmaster Puppets.................................................................. 44 Visions of Sugar Plums by James Wallis........................................ 104
Maker’s Land................................................................................ 51 The Lost Giant by Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan.................................... 106
The Sky................................................................................. 51 Pretty Polly by Arinn Dembo........................................................ 108
The Landscape....................................................................... 51 The Box by Arinn Dembo.............................................................. 113
Puppettown............................................................................ 52 The Bottler by Arinn Dembo......................................................... 122
Punch’s Castle........................................................................ 53 My Life in Puppetland....................................................................... 135
The Lake of Milk and Cookies................................................. 54 Acknowledgements............................................................................ 147
Respite................................................................................... 54 Index................................................................................................ 153
The Candy Cave..................................................................... 54 Generic Puppet Page......................................................................... 157
Down Below........................................................................... 54 Conclusion........................................................................................ 158
Bedlam Circus........................................................................ 58
The Graveyard........................................................................ 59
Thimble Theatre.................................................................... 61
Puppetmastering.......................................................................... 62
Making Tales................................................................................ 69
Tales Worksheet............................................................................ 70
Your First Tale: The Tale of Three Buttons...................................... 77

5
6
Punch the Maker-Killer

7
 The Maker of all puppets finished his work. His new creations were complete.
The Maker kissed Judy’s forehead.

Judy opened her eyes. She looked at Punch. Her heart got bigger. He was the one
Judy was made to love.

The Maker kissed Punch’s forehead.

Punch opened his eyes. He looked at the Maker. The Maker was tall and ancient
and wise and powerful. Punch’s heart shrank. He was the one Punch was
desperate to become.

8
The Maker reached out his great hands and
lifted Punch and Judy up. He opened a hole in
the sky and reached through it. He set them
down on a grassy field in Puppetland.

“Goodbye!” Judy said.

“Come back!” Punch cried.

The Maker smiled and winked and shook his

head no. He closed the hole in the sky.

9
 A s they walked home, Punch grew angry that the Maker was gone. He kicked a big
rock.

“Ow!” Punch cried. “Ow ow that hurt!”

“Poor Punch,” Judy said. “Please don’t hurt yourself again.”

In their cottage after lunch, Punch grew angry that he was not the Maker. He
banged his fist on the table.

“Ow!” Punch cried again. “Ow ow that hurt!”

“Poor Punch,” Judy said. “I will make you a great hammer you can swing so you
do not hurt yourself again.”

10
When Judy finished the great hammer, Punch
found that it took all his strength to hold it up.
He grew angry that it was so heavy.

“You have made this so big I can barely lift it!”

he shouted.

He swung it at Judy’s head with a mighty crack.

Judy’s eyes rolled back and she fell asleep.

“Ha!” Punch cried. “Ha ha, now I am happy!”

11
 Judy woke up in bed. Punch was talking to himself angrily. She decided to get
him a sewing kit.

She went into Puppettown and said hello to every puppet she met. Overhead, the
sun shone bright. Soon she had everything she needed.

“Here is a sewing kit,” she told Punch when she got home. “Now you can be a
Maker too.”

12
Punch took the sewing kit. He cut and sewed the
fabric to make a puppet baby.

The baby lay on the table and did not move.

“Kiss it,” Judy said. “That’s what the Maker

did.”

Punch kissed the baby on the forehead. The

baby did not move.

“Stupid baby!” Punch cried. He threw the baby

out the window.

13
 Punch was talking to himself angrily again. “A puppet must be more than fabric
and wood,” he said. “There must be a secret thing inside.”

“Here is a beautiful cake I have made for you,” Judy said. “Any puppet would love
to admire this cake all day.”

Punch took the cake and left the cottage to find any puppet. He met Jacob
Starbright on the road.

“Oh! What a beautiful cake!” Jacob said.

“If you want it, come with me,” Punch said.

14
They walked to a lonely place. Jacob admired
the cake.

Punch cut the thread at Jacob’s left shoulder.

Jacob’s left arm fell off.

“My arm!” Jacob said, but he was still admiring

the cake.

Punch cut the thread at Jacob’s right shoulder

and his other arm fell off.

“My arm!” Jacob said again, but he was still

admiring the cake.

15
 Punch removed Jacob’s feet, and then his legs,
and finally his head. Jacob fell asleep.

Punch made a new puppet. He used every bit of

Jacob so he did not leave out whatever the secret
thing was.

Now he had a new puppet. The new puppet did

not look very good.

16
Punch kissed the puppet on the forehead. The puppet did not move.

“Stupid puppet!” Punch cried. He smashed the wooden head into tiny pieces.

Jacob never woke up again.

17
 I t was late at night. Punch stared at the wall for hours. Judy thought and thought.
“Let us go see the Maker,” Judy said. “He will know what to do.”

“Yes!” Punch said. “That is a good idea!”

This was the first kind thing Punch had ever said to Judy. Her heart was so full of
love she thought it might burst.

“I will bring a great picnic,” Judy said.

“I will bring a great hammer,” Punch said.

18
Punch and Judy returned to the field. They cut a
hole in the sky and jumped through.

Beyond the sky, the Maker was seated at his

workbench. They climbed onto it and stood
before him. Judy unpacked the picnic.

“I want to make puppets,” Punch said.

The Maker smiled and winked and shook his head

no.

“I want everyone to do what I say,” Punch said.

The Maker winked and shook his head no.

“I want to be the Maker,” Punch said.

The Maker shook his head no.

19
 “Yes,” Punch said, and he swung his great hammer into the Maker’s nose. The
Maker dropped to his knees. Tears welled up in his eyes.

“No!” cried Judy, and she felt her heart burst open.

“Yes,” Punch said, and he leapt onto the Maker’s head. He raised his great hammer
all the way back and swung it as hard as he could into the Maker’s forehead. It was
like a kiss, only different.

“Stop!” cried Judy, and she felt her love for Punch spill out of her broken heart.

The Maker fell asleep and dropped to the floor. Punch grabbed the Maker’s ear
and hung on. When they hit the floor, he jumped off and kept swinging his great
hammer against the Maker’s head.

The empty space in Judy’s heart hurt so much.

The Maker was dead. Punch danced and laughed.

20
A single silver tear ran down the Maker’s face. Judy grabbed a thimble and caught
the tear. She took it back through the hole in the sky. She went far away from their
little cottage. She cried and cried.

21
 No one knew how long Punch was gone
because the sun did not rise.

Punch marched into Puppettown Square. He

wore a new face made from the Maker’s skin.
Now he was a person of f lesh instead of a puppet
of fabric.

All the puppets stopped and stared. They did

not understand.

Punch swung his great hammer onto the ground.

“I am Punch the Maker-Killer!” he shouted.

The puppets stepped back in fear. Punch waved

his hand and six new puppets entered the town
square. They were also made of f lesh, and they
were horrible.

22
“These are my Boys,” Punch said. “I am the Maker now.”

Some puppets cried. Punch waved his hand again and twenty Nutcrackers entered
the town square.

“These are my Nutcrackers,” Punch said. “Obey me or they will hurt you and kill
you.”

The Nutcrackers marched towards the crowd. The puppets ran away in fear into
the dark night.

Punch felt his heart grow with pride at all he had done.

23
 Judy sat with the thimble in her lap. She rocked the tear back and forth.
Some puppets who ran from the town found her. “Oh Judy!” they cried. “We are so
afraid of Punch!”

“You are right to be afraid. Punch is a very bad puppet. In fact, he is the worst
puppet ever.”

“But what can we do?” they asked her.

24
Judy thought and thought. She looked
into the thimble. The tear sparkled and
she saw the Maker looking back at her.

“We hide,” Judy said. “We hide and we

hope. We hide and we hope, and one
day, the sun will rise again.”

They all held hands. They tried to

hope.

The long night of Puppetland began.

25
26
Puppetland
Many years ago, there was a war in the people world. Many were hurt
and terrible things happened. The Maker saw all that was happening
hammer, he killed him. With the Maker’s death, no humans lived in
Maker’s Land. But the flesh lived on, for Punch took the Maker’s face and
and wept. His creations were the gentlest of creatures, and they too were made a cruel new face for himself. That wasn’t all he made, either: soon he
saddened by these tragedies they witnessed but could not comprehend. had not just a new face but six loyal puppet-servants sewn of the Maker’s
The little basement theater beneath his shop had been a lively place where flesh. These six, whom Punch called his Boys, stood beside Punch as he
the old brought the young to hear the wonderful stories. Gradually, the announced to all the land that he was now the king. He was Punch the
old were fewer and fewer, but the children still came, until they began Maker-Killer, and his word was law.
to disappear too—a little boy this week, a family the next. Then the day
arrived when no one came at all. Punch and Punch’s Boys now rule Maker’s Land with hearts of cruelty
and black souls devoid of mercy. All of the puppets exist to serve them.
The Maker made puppets and soon they were all he had left. So he made All of the puppets toil for hours on end making new clothes, new homes,
a great creation: Maker’s Land, a place where all his puppets could go and new food, new toys—whatever Punch and his Boys want.
be safe until the war was over.
At least, almost all of the puppets do so.
It was in this way that Maker’s Land came to be. One morning the Maker’s
puppet shop was closed and all the puppets were gone: hand puppets, Across the great lake of milk and cookies lies the small village of Respite.
finger puppets, marionettes, and others—just gone. One morning the Judy, who once loved Punch but does so no more, runs the village. She
puppets woke up and they were found: in Maker’s Land, where the cruelty knows better than anyone the cruelties he is capable of. She knows the evil
of humans was just a dim memory. that lies in his twisted heart. In her little village, she runs a freehold of
puppets that have escaped from Punch’s clutches. They have avoided the
In Maker’s Land, all was well. The puppet folk lived without fear and spent terrible Nutcrackers, fled the cruelties of Punch’s Boys, and made their
their days happy and free. No hands controlled them. No strings pulled way to Respite where Judy’s small group of free puppets look towards the
them. They could live as they cared, their every need met. All were safe day when Punch will be brought down and the Maker restored to life.
and sound. The Maker was the only human in the whole land, and he was
good and kind. He mended broken puppets, made new puppets, and told For when Punch killed the Maker, Judy was there and she caught the
them all the stories. Maker’s last tear in a thimble of purest silver. With this tear, the Maker
can be brought back to life, Judy says. This is her fondest dream, and the
Then came Punch, who fancied himself the greatest of all puppets. He Maker’s Tear is her most cherished possession. It is her last and greatest
was jealous of the Maker’s powers of creation and one day, with a great hope.
27
 The Game of Puppetland The First Rule: An hour is golden, but it is not an hour
Puppetland is very specifically a game, and should be thought of as such. A tale of Puppetland can last no more than an hour of time. Puppets
The object of the game is to defeat Punch the Maker-Killer and save are special and magical creatures who only come to life in stories, and
Maker’s Land. To do this, each participant in the game will be an actor, stories must never wear out their welcome. When the hour ends, all of the
and the character each actor portrays will be a puppet. Unlike an actor puppets in Maker’s Land fall asleep; when they awaken, at the start of the
in a play reading from a script, each puppet’s lines and actions are up to next tale, they are all safe back in their beds (or wherever they have been
the actor. Therefore, the actors must be prepared to get into the mindset staying lately). Things outside are still the same as they were at the end of
of their puppet and say and do the sorts of things their puppet would say the previous tale, except that all the puppets (who survived) are back in
and do, much as in improvisational theater. their beds snug and warm. Wounds from one tale are not carried over to
the next tale—injured or maimed puppets awaken whole and well again—
One of the participants does not play just a single puppet. This is the but puppets who die never return. An hour is golden.
puppetmaster. The puppetmaster is responsible for creating and
presenting the stories of the game. He or she serves as referee for the A Puppetland tale may seem to last more than an hour: for instance, the
game’s rules and as an actor who portrays a number of supporting roles puppets might make a long journey that takes many days. But time only
that the other actors’ puppets will meet in the course of the game. passes in the time it takes to talk about what you are doing. A puppet can
say, “I sleep for a week!” and a week has gone by, but only a few seconds
Actors are unlikely to reach the object of defeating Punch right away. have passed on the clock. The clock is the arbiter of time, as it should be,
Each time you play Puppetland, you play a tale. A tale is a single game not the actions of the puppets. The time passed is the time in which the
of Puppetland in which progress is made towards the object of the game. tale is told, not the time in which the events of the tale occur. An hour is
Over the course of a series of tales, the actors will strive to achieve that not an hour.
object and defeat Punch the Maker-Killer. When they do, the game is
over. This may take only a few tales, or it may take many. How long it
takes is up to the number of tales the puppetmaster and the actors wish
to tell. Keep a Timer on the Table

As all games have rules, so does Puppetland. This game has three Everyone in a game of
important rules. Puppetland, including each
puppet, knows the clock is
ticking. Put a timer on the table
where everyone can see it—an
hourglass is perfect. As the
sands drop, the players and
the puppets both will become
more frantic and concerned. The
puppets refer to this deadline as
“story’s end.”

28
The Second Rule: What you say is what you say If the actor or the puppetmaster simply must converse out of character, the
actor must get up and come over to the game master and the two must hold
During a game of Puppetland, it is very important that as long as the actors their discussion in whispers so that no others may hear. If the actor must
are sitting in their chairs, they say only what their puppets say. Every word an then communicate information he or she has just learned to the other actors
actor says while seated comes out of his or her puppet’s mouth exactly as the then he or she should, if at all possible, sit back down and communicate the
actor said it. No actor should say anything while seated that he or she does not information in the voice of his or her puppet. Out-of-character conversation
mean for their puppet to say—not at all—not even if it’s “Pass the chips” or should be avoided at all costs and at any inconvenience.
“I’m going to the bathroom.” If an actor wants to say something their puppet
does not say, he or she must stand up and say it. If an actor wants his or her To help this process work, imagine that somewhere, someone is “reading”
puppet to do something besides speak, this must be stated as something the everything the actors and the puppetmaster say, verbatim. This someone
puppet says. For example, if an actor wants her puppet to climb a ladder to is expecting to read a story, told like a story, with appropriate dialogue
a window, she will declare, “I shall climb the ladder and go in through the and description. As a rule of the game, you must endeavor to make every
window!” If an actor wants his puppet to take a hammer and smash a window spoken word sound like part of a written story rather than an out-of-game
he will exclaim, “With this hammer I now hold, I shall smash the window conversation between a bunch of people at a table. What you say is what
in!” All forms of action that an actor wishes his or her puppet to take must be you say.
expressed as dialogue spoken by the puppet, though the dialogue can be kept
simple: the puppetmaster is expected to infer appropriate action based on the
dialogue and need not have every step spelled out.
Playing in Dialogue
An actor cannot ask a question of the puppetmaster, for in Maker’s Land, This form of roleplaying can be tricky. Remember that
there is no “puppetmaster” and hence no one to whom the actor’s puppet you’re advancing a story, not enacting a tactical game plan.
would address such a question. If an actor does not quite understand Here are a few lines you can turn to when you’re having
something that the puppetmaster has said, or desires more information, trouble:
he or she should simply say something like, “I don’t quite understand
all this” or “I find this all most confusing.” The puppetmaster will then ™™“Oh, if only someone would help us!” The puppetmaster
attempt to explain things better. may respond by having another character show up to assist.
™™“You won’t get away with this!” If you’re stuck for a useful
A puppetmaster who needs to ask an actor a direct question must do so action, you can always stall with banter while your friends
within the narrative by making it a rhetorical device. Such as, “And did figure out their next move.
Splotch Flaggy really mean to eat Punch’s Boy?” The actor can then ™™“I shall . . .” You can always begin a physical action
respond silently by nodding yes or no, or by saying something relevant statement with “I shall” or “Now we must” rather than
like, “I bet he’ll taste nasty!” Then the puppetmaster can continue: “Yes, trying to phrase it in a more creative way.
he did! He gobbled Punch’s Boy right up.” ™™“Give me that!” If you make a demand rather than stating
an intent to act, you give the puppetmaster the creative
freedom to help you succeed. You don’t always have to
solve the problem yourself—you just need to push the story
forward.

29
30
The Third Rule: The tale grows in the telling, Examples, Bad and Good
and is being told to someone not present
A bad example of playing Puppetland:

The puppetmaster must realize that while he or she has a certain tale in PUPPETMASTER: “Okay, the door bursts in and there’s a Nutcracker
mind, that tale may not be the one that ends up being told. The actors standing there. He yells at you to stop.”
must realize that they are a part of the tale they are hearing—they create ACTOR 1: “Let’s get out the back door, and fast!”
the dialogue of the main puppets. They should strive to make their ACTOR 2: “I pick up the rock and throw it at the Nutcracker!”
dialogue sound as colorful and appropriate as possible and should also PUPPETMASTER: “You throw the rock and smash the Nutcracker’s jaw.
strive to make the tale as entertaining and unpredictable as they can. He can’t bite anymore. He sort of grumbles and lurches, dazed.”
Together, the puppetmaster and the actors will create a tale better and ACTOR 1: “We run out the door!”
more exciting than any one of them could have created on their own. PUPPETMASTER: “The door’s locked.”
ACTOR 2: “Let’s grab the Nutcracker and use him as a battering ram
Always imagine, as mentioned a moment ago, that an invisible reader is on the door.”
reading every word that is spoken during a game of Puppetland and they PUPPETMASTER: “Okay, since he’s still dazed you can do so. You guys
will be most disappointed if the words sound bad or don’t flow well or hoist him and charge the door, which pops open.”
don’t make sense. Since this is a tale, it should always be told in the past ACTOR 1: “We run outside and down the alley.”
tense, except for dialogue, which is in the present tense.
A good example of playing Puppetland:
Storybook Storytelling PUPPETMASTER: “And then, the door flew open! A Nutcracker stood
there, still crunching the doorknob in his clacking jaws. ‘Stop, you
Try these simple tricks to evoke the style of an adult
mangy puppets!’ he cried. ‘I’ll have your puppet stuffing for my
reading a storybook aloud to a child:
dinner!’”
™™Use past tense for narration ACTOR 1: “Run! Run out the back door! We must escape the
™™Use present tense for dialogue Nutcracker!”
™™Do not use contractions ACTOR 2: “Where is that rock? Here it is! I shall hurl this rock and
™™Speak slowly and clearly smash your greedy mouth, Nutcracker!”
™™Ask rhetorical questions of the reader: “And what do PUPPETMASTER: “The rock flew across the room and hit the
you think the Nutcracker did?” Nutcracker in the jaw. ‘Rmmf!’ cried the injured Nutcracker. His jaw
was broken in twain and he lurched to and fro, dazed from the force of
This is SO Difficult! the blow.”
ACTOR 1: “Out the door, my friends! Quickly!”
The key to having a good time with Puppetland is
PUPPETMASTER: “Sally Red Buttons hurried to the back door and
keeping the session short and enjoying the form: the
turned the knob. But it was locked! The puppets were trapped!”
humor of stilted, unnatural dialogue; the sinister irony
ACTOR 2: “Sally, grab the Nutcracker’s ankles and I’ll take his arms.
of creepy things happening in a childish context; and
We’ll knock the door in with his hard wooden head!”
the fun of figuring out how to verbally advance the
PUPPETMASTER: “The puppets picked up the stumbling Nutcracker
story within the contraints of the play style. As many
and charged the back door. With a mighty crash and a shower of
players have found over the years, Puppetland is a
splinters, the door burst open. ‘Rmmf!’ the Nutcracker cried again.”
very specific flavor of game, but it’s a pretty tasty one.
ACTOR 1: “To the alley! Run, before more Nutcrackers come!”

31
 The Types of Puppets
Four types of puppets are provided for play in Puppetland. The
puppetmaster and the actors are welcome to create new types, but note
that each type has specific attributes and that new types should conform
to this style by selecting similar attributes, or creating new ones that fit
with the existing ones. These attributes aren’t just general descriptions;
they are exacting statements of what a puppet can and cannot do. These
are strengths and weaknesses but they are also important points of
character definition and expression. All puppets can talk, and move,
and think, and pick things up, and do other basic actions expected of
any character in fiction, unless they specifically cannot as part of their
character concept.

Puppet Attributes
Puppets are described with three sets of attributes: is, can, and cannot.
While these are fairly easy to understand, let us particularly discuss the
“is” attributes, as they have a system to them.

The “is” attributes are intrinsic properties of that puppet type and are As you can see, each quality has three variations. In addition, the first
always defined by a core set of five qualities: and third variation can be prefixed with “quite” as in “quite short,” or
“quite strong,” which indicates the same only a bit moreso. A quite fast
medium puppet can therefore outrun a fast puppet, while a quite weak puppet can
HEIGHT quite short short tall quite tall lift less than a weak puppet.
height
quite medium quite
BUILD slender stocky When comparing two puppets, use the relative positions of their qualities
slender build stocky
to determine the results. Only an equivalently or better positioned quality
WEIGHT medium quite can successfully impact another. For example, a strong puppet can lift a
quite light light heavy
weight heavy heavy puppet, but a weak puppet cannot lift a medium weight puppet.
medium
quite slow slow fast quite fast
SPEED speed Compare these qualities as you like and as you think fit the situation.
medium quite One puppet lifting another could be strength vs. weight, but one puppet
STRENGTH quite weak weak strong shoving another off a cliff could be strength vs. build.
strength strong

This is not a strictly deterministic approach. Many puppets will

effectively be tied in their qualities, which is fine—in such cases, the
puppetmaster should favor the more active or motivated puppet over the
other for the sake of better drama, or can defer to situational specifics
such as two puppets struggling on a frozen pond.

32
A FINGER PUPPET IS: short, slender, light, quite fast, and weak.
A FINGER PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at them even if they only
see them coming at the last moment, move very quietly.
A FINGER PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, or throw things or grab
things because they have no legs or arms.

A HAND PUPPET IS: medium height, medium build, quite heavy,

medium speed, and strong.
A HAND PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at them if they see them
coming as soon as they are thrown, throw things, grab things, hit things,
and move quietly if they are lucky and careful.
A HAND PUPPET CANNOT: kick things (because they have no legs), or
move quieter than a finger puppet.

A SHADOW PUPPET IS: tall, quite slender, quite light, fast, and quite weak.
A SHADOW PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at them by turning
sideways, even at the last moment; kick things, throw things, and grab
things; and become invisible from one other puppet if they are careful
and cautious, by keeping their skinny edge towards the puppet at all
times.
A SHADOW PUPPET CANNOT: kick, throw, or grab things that weigh
more than a piece of paper; be invisible if they aren’t trying; be invisible
to more than one puppet at a time; or get wet, because getting completely
wet kills them.

A MARIONETTE IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy, slow, and quite strong.
A MARIONETTE CAN: kick, throw, or grab things; and hit things very
hard.
A MARIONETTE CANNOT: dodge things thrown at them.

33
 The Puppet Page
The puppet page is the piece of paper on which an actor will describe his
or her puppet and refer to during play. It contains all of the information
about an actor’s puppet that is set for the puppet right from the start and
can’t be changed. Each puppet page has five parts:

NAME: This is the puppet’s name, as chosen by the actor. Names in

Puppetland are usually composed of two pieces. The first is the puppet’s
common name, the name by which other puppets refer to him or her
informally. This name is always a name that would be familiar to most
actors, such as “Sally” or “Jim” or “Nadia.” The second is the puppet’s
unique name, a name by which no other puppet is known. The unique
name is usually descriptive of the puppet, like “Red Buttons” or “Tassel
Hair” or “Purple Hat.” A puppet’s full (or formal) name consists of both
names strung together, like “Sally Red Buttons” or “Jim Tassel Hair”
or “Nadia Purple Hat.” (While this name construction is most typical,
players are welcome to come up with unusual names like “Snarf” or “Elmer
Worthington Boxtopolous the Third.”)

PICTURE: This is where the actor draws his or her puppet, to the best
of his or her ability. Even if this is just a stick figure, it’s fine. The
important thing to remember is that this drawing must be done to scale.
Use the jigsaw puzzle lines as a guide. Finger puppets are two puzzle pieces
tall, hand puppets are three pieces tall, and marionettes and shadow puppets
are four puzzle pieces tall.

THIS PUPPET IS, THIS PUPPET CAN, THIS PUPPET CANNOT: In these
three sections, the actor starts by copying down the information given
under the appropriate “Puppets Are” heading discussed previously. He
or she also adds other information as desired; this is discussed in the next
section, “Creating a Puppet”.

34
Finger Puppet
NAME:

THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light, quite fast, and weak.

THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at them even if they only

see them coming at the last moment, move very quietly.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, or throw things or grab things

because they have no legs or arms.

NOTES:

35
 Hand Puppet
NAME:

THIS PUPPET IS: of medium height and medium build, quite heavy,

medium speed, and strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at them if they see them

coming as soon as they are thrown, throw things, grab things, hit

things, and move quietly if they are lucky and careful.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things (because they have no legs), or

move quieter than a finger puppet.

NOTES:

36
Shadow Puppet
NAME:

THIS PUPPET IS: tall, quite slender, quite light, fast, and quite weak.

THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at them by turning

sideways, even at the last moment; kick things, throw things, and

grab things; and become invisible from one other puppet if they

are careful and cautious, by keeping their skinny edge towards

the puppet at all times.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick, throw, or grab things that weigh

more than a piece of paper; be invisible if they aren’t trying; be

invisible to more than one puppet at a time; or get wet, because

getting completely wet kills them.

NOTES:

37
Marionette
NAME:

THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy, slow, and quite strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab things; and hit things very hard.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things thrown at them.

NOTES:
Quick Puppet Names Creating a Puppet
If you need a puppet name in a hurry, string one Each actor chooses one of the four puppet types described earlier.
together by picking a word from each column. This should be done as a group; each puppet type has advantages and
FIRST NAME ADJECTIVE NOUN disadvantages. Two actors should avoid playing the same puppet type
unless they either have a good reason for it (e.g., the puppets are part
Nicholas (Any Color) Ringlets of the same family) or because there are already actors playing all four
Alexandra Double Eyes puppet types.
Jack Silly Pants
Molly Enormous Ears After each actor has chosen his or her puppet type, the actor needs to
give the puppet a name and draw a picture of the puppet on the puppet
Frederick Grabby Coat page in the jigsaw puzzle space. It is important for the actor to visualize
Lydia Jingly Berry the puppet and try to express that visualization on paper, no matter the
Billy Smelly Hands drawing ability of the actor.
Esmerelda Sweetie Heart
How big do you draw your puppet within the jigsaw puzzle? It depends on
Hadi Hungry Tongue what kind of puppet you are:
Leotta Smashy Boots
››FINGER PUPPETS: Two puzzle pieces tall.
››HAND PUPPETS: Three puzzle pieces tall.
››MARIONETTES & SHADOW PUPPETS: Four puzzle pieces tall.

Drawings of puppets should make a point to show what limbs are or are
not present; marionettes and shadow puppets have arms and legs, hand
puppets have arms but no legs, and finger puppets have neither arms nor
legs. (Well, finger puppets do have arms, but they’re just for show; they
can’t move them.)

Once each actor has chosen a name and drawn a picture, the actor should
then write the following information: what the puppet is, what the puppet
can do, and what the puppet can’t do. This information should be copied
from the list given in the previous section, but the actor must choose
three additional items to add to each list. These additions must be
approved by the puppetmaster. For example, take a look at the following
puppet. Items in italics are additions made by the actor.

39
 ™™ How do I speak to other puppets? (Funny, Forgetful, Boastful,
Obnoxious, Lost in Thought)
A SAMPLE PUPPET
™™ What am I passionate about? (Fond of Candy, Always
NAME: Sally Red Buttons Daydreaming, Helpful)

PUPPET TYPE: Hand Puppet You aren’t limited to just these three questions, but they are good
examples of how to choose your “is”.
THIS PUPPET IS: medium height, medium build, quite heavy,
medium speed, strong, very clever, quite pretty, and a show-off. THIS PUPPET CAN . . . : “This puppet can” is where the actor chooses
the puppet’s strengths. The actor should think of things that are both
THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at her if she sees them distinctive to this puppet and likely to be useful in a dramatic adventure
coming as soon as they are thrown, throw things, grab things, hit story. Please don’t use your Can to override some other attribute of your
things, move quietly if they are lucky and careful, do magic tricks puppet, such as adding “can pick things up” to a finger puppet.
by sleight of hand, charm a puppet into doing her a favor, and sing
very well. Try these questions to inspire your “can” statements:

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, move quieter than a finger ™™ What unusual physical things can I do? (Ride Horses, Perform
puppet, tell a lie, swim very well, or hurt another puppet who hasn’t Acrobatics, Hear Far-Away Things)
or isn’t about to hurt her or someone she cares for.
™™ What talents do I have? (Solve Any Riddle, Pick Locks, Disguise
Myself)

™™ What can I do to other puppets? (Charm Anyone, Sing

More About Is, Can, and Cannot Distractingly, Wrestle)

These three categories are crucial to both defining the puppet and to the THIS PUPPET CANNOT . . . : “This puppet cannot” is where the actor
playing of the game itself. decides what the puppet is bad at. What are the actual weaknesses and
vulnerabilities of the puppet?
THIS PUPPET IS . . . : “This puppet is” is where the actor gives the puppet
colorful and distinctive personality and visual traits. These are meant to These questions may help you create your “cannot” statements:
be constant attributes, not specific actions. “This puppet is often lonely”
is great. “This puppet is able to bend steel bars with her felt hands” is not ™™ What are your personality flaws? (Cry, Care About Strangers, Be
right at all—that’s a “can” not an “is”. Above all, actors should use this Happy, Share)
category to ensure that their puppet is very clearly different from other
puppets of the same type. ™™ What unusual physical limitations do you have? (Swim, Dance,
Climb Ladders, Carry Two Things)
To come up with your three “is” statements, try asking yourself these questions:
™™ What moral restrictions do you place on yourself? (Hurt
™™ What do other puppets notice about me? (Brooding, Loved by Anyone, Steal, Lie)
Everyone, Lonely, Always Eating, Imaginative)

40
Playing a Puppet During play, the actors need to listen to the story as it is told, but they
should keep reviewing their Is, Can, and Cannot statements. Those sections
The examples of play given earlier should make it clear how a game of the puppet sheet offer opportunities to get involved in a scene, solve a
of Puppetland is played. Interactions are adjudicated entirely by the problem, make things worse (but more interesting), and have fun. If the
puppetmaster, using the attributes of the puppets involved as guidance. actor thinks of them like a deck of cards and endeavors to “play” several of
For example, if a Nutcracker hurled a rock at Sally Red Buttons those elements during the tale, everyone will have a better time.
(described just above) she could avoid it (as described in her “This
Puppet Can” attributes) if she sees it coming in time. Players should also keep an eye on the timer counting down to the end of
the present tale. The puppets have an intrinsic sense of how much longer
Again, all such actions are at the puppetmaster’s discretion, and they the tale has to be told and they should get more frantic and desperate
should serve the interests of the story (as the third rule said) while still as the minutes tick away. If they cannot resolve the problem of the tale
rewarding the creative improvisation of the actors. before the end of it, the tale will end in failure and the problem will
resolve in a way they do not want.

41
 Puzzle Pieces However, filled-in puzzle pieces are never erased. They always remain
filled in. In the Sally example, she would awaken at the start of the next
The jigsaw-puzzle portion of the puppet page needs explanation. That tale with her arm healed back to normal, but the puzzle piece would still
portion of the puppet page is simply a large box with the outlines of a be darkened.
jigsaw puzzle within it, into which you draw the picture of your puppet.
This particular jigsaw puzzle (for every page is the same) has sixteen
pieces. Doom
During play, the actor will fill in a piece of the jigsaw puzzle with a pencil Once all sixteen puzzle pieces are filled in, the puppet dies at the end of
or pen when certain things happen. These things are: the current tale.

™™ When the puppet does something it shouldn’t be able to do (if Sally The puppet knows this as soon as the last puzzle piece is filled in—or
Red Buttons told a lie, her actor would fill in a piece of the jigsaw at least, the puppet has a strong premonition of death. This shouldn’t
puzzle). be expressed directly, such as “I’m gonna die!” Instead, it should be
described as a form of unease and sadness related to not seeing friends
™™ When something especially bad happens (if the Nutcrackers took again, not being able to help more, and so on. For example:
Sally Red Buttons prisoner and crunched off one of her arms, her
actor would fill in a piece of the jigsaw puzzle). ™™ “I don’t think I’m going to be in any more stories.”

The player usually does the first case voluntarily. For dramatic reasons, ™™ “I don’t feel very good. I think when I go to sleep, I may just never
the puppet may violate a core character concept and suffer a puzzle-piece wake up.”
loss as a result.
™™ “I really wish I could keep helping my friends and going on
The puppetmaster usually enforces the second case. Asking the player adventures. But I think my story is almost over.”
to fill in a puzzle piece due to something awful happening is a dramatic
reinforcement of the awful event. Because the puppet knows its fate, the actor should attempt to choose the
time, place, and manner of death as best serves the story. Depending on
The actor may choose which puzzle piece to fill in; this has no practical the puppet, this could be a heroic sacrifice or a cowardly betrayal, either
effect on the puppet. In other words, if the piece that contains the puppet’s with fatal consequences. At the climax, the doomed puppet could hurl
face is filled in, the puppet is in no way disfigured or blinded. Likewise, itself at the Nutcrackers and tell her friends to flee, or run to Punch and
damage taken by the puppet does not require that the actor fill in a betray Judy, only to be devoured.
correspondingly located puzzle piece. In the Sally Red Buttons example
where the Nutcrackers crunched off one of her arms, the actor doesn’t Death is inexorable in Puppetland. These wounds are existential and
have to fill in a puzzle piece containing an arm. cannot be healed. In the end, the puppets are only puppets and they are
not built to last.
When a puppet suffers physical damage—like the chomping of Sally’s
arm—that damage remains for the rest of the tale. But when the next tale
begins, and Sally wakes up safe and snug in her bed, her arm is fine. All
puppets are restored to full bodily health at the start of each tale.

42
43
 Puppetmaster Puppets
Besides the four puppet types available for actors, the puppetmaster has
nine additional puppet types available for his or her use. These puppet
types—most of whom are unique individuals, rather than general kinds—
are described here.

P U N C H T H E M A K E R- K I L L E R
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette)

THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy, slow, quite strong, cunning, impatient, and cruel.

THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab things; hit things very hard; command the Nutcrackers and
Boys; order any puppet to do anything and kill them if they don’t; and work magic.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things thrown at him; be happy, survive without his mask of flesh,
allow disobedience.

NOTES: Punch is a megalomaniac. A twisted and vicious puppet, he has been corrupted by the
ways of humans, and was so before Maker’s Land ever came to be. That he kept this corruption
hidden deep within his bitter heart—so that even the Maker couldn’t see it—is tribute to his high
intelligence and cleverness. Punch is a wily, cruel puppet who lives only to exert power over others
and gain more power for himself. He is selfish and bestial, freely abusing those near him when
it suits him to do so. Punch is vindictive and takes even the smallest slight as a personal affront
worthy of being burned alive at the stake—his standard punishment for any disobedient puppet.

Punch wears a red cloak and hobbles about under the weight of the great deformity on his hunched
back. At all times, he wears a mask over his face made of the dead flesh of the Maker. He has cut
eye and mouth holes in this fleshy mask so he can see and eat, and wears atop the mask a red cap
that he dipped in the Maker’s blood. Punch the Maker-Killer carries with him a great mallet. When
angry, he usually chooses an innocent puppet nearby and beats him to death with the mallet in an
explosion of fury.

Punch’s Boys are six in number, and if anything the puppetfolk are more afraid of them than they
are of Punch—for it is the Boys who go out and enforce Punch’s insane edicts. They glide through
the streets of Puppettown and the roads of Puppetland each night, their feetless forms moving
swiftly through the air like vengeful spirits. The Boys are hollow cloaks of human flesh, cut from
the dead skin of the Maker. Their names are Spite, Haunt, Grief, Vengeance, Mayhem, and Silence.

44
SPITE
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Flesh)

THIS PUPPET IS: short, quite stocky, heavy, slow, and strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: throw or grab things; tear off a puppet’s limb; yell loudly all the time;
order and puppets to do anything and maim them if they don’t.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: allow disobedience, or betray Punch.

NOTES: Largest of the Boys, Spite is a bully with a loud voice and a face contorted in anger
and jealousy. He wanders the streets and the roads and rips an arm off of any puppet who he
feels is trying to look better than he does. Spite paints his face to look more normal, but only
succeeds in increasing his gruesomeness. He has maimed dozens of puppets in his time and
has no intention of stopping.

HAUNT
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Flesh)

THIS PUPPET IS: short, medium build, light, fast, and weak.

THIS PUPPET CAN: sense a puppet’s disobedience, circle a disobedient puppet closer and closer.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: allow disobedience, speak, betray Punch, or hurt anyone.

NOTES: Haunt is greatly feared by those puppets who plot against Punch, for Haunt can feel the
wispy emotions of betrayal. Haunt never attacks or hurts any puppet. Instead, he is drawn towards
feelings of betrayal and vengeance. Haunt floats grimly around and around in an ever-tightening
circle. Whenever the other Boys happen to run across the voiceless Haunt circling ceaselessly,
they begin searching house-to-house within Haunt’s circle, looking for traitors. Anyone they even
suspect of harboring disloyalty to Punch is sentenced to the flames.

45
 GRIEF
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Flesh)

THIS PUPPET IS: tall, stocky, heavy, medium speed, and quite strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: throw or grab things; notice a puppet’s obvious sadness; and kill any puppet
who is sad.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: allow disobedience or betray Punch.

NOTES: Grief is a tool of Punch’s justice. One of Punch’s first edicts was “Everyone must always be
happy!” and it is this edict that Grief has special responsibility to enforce. Grief wanders aimlessly,
seeking those who are not trying to be happy. Those he finds who are obviously sad, for any reason,
he rips limb from limb. (Punch does not allow Grief to be near him, for Punch cannot be happy.
Although Grief would not attack Punch, he would get very agitated and confused in Punch’s
presence and might lash out at random or even turn inside-out and be destroyed.)

VENGEANCE
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Flesh)

THIS PUPPET IS: short, stocky, heavy, slow, and quite strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: throw or grab things as heavy as he is; torture puppets; and find new ways to
torture puppets.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: allow disobedience ,or betray Punch.

NOTES: Vengeance is another tool of Punch’s justice. When Haunt or another Boy finds a traitor
and they aren’t in a hurry, they summon Vengeance to the scene. Vengeance’s specialty is hurting
puppets—or at least hurting traitors. He knows many ways to make a puppet scream and delights
in finding new ways he hasn’t thought of before.

46
M AY H E M
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Flesh)

THIS PUPPET IS: medium height, medium build, light, fast, and strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: throw or grab things; kill a puppet in seconds.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: speak, allow disobedience, or betray Punch.

NOTES: Many, many puppets fear Mayhem, for he is Punch’s implement of random destruction.
Mayhem is seen very rarely, but when he is seen, it is because he is coming to kill. Mayhem arrives
at a house suddenly and begins killing puppets seemingly at random. He never speaks, never
explains. He just rends puppets part from part, dragging screaming marionettes through the snowy
streets or setting fire to a wailing finger puppet just to watch it go bouncing and sparking down the
road.

SILENCE
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Flesh)

THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light, fast, and weak.

THIS PUPPET CAN: throw or grab things; take off his cloak of flesh and become invisible and
silent.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: allow disobedience, betray Punch, communicate without his cloak of
flesh.

NOTES: This Boy is seen even less often than Mayhem because he can pull off his cloak of skin and
reveal nothing underneath. Silence’s specialty is spying. Since he can become invisible, he tries
to follow suspected traitors and find out what they’re up to. Twice, some brave puppet has found
Silence’s discarded cloak of flesh and tried to destroy it, but failed both times. Silence cannot
speak or communicate in any way without his cloak and for this reason can be considered somewhat
vulnerable—at least until he gets his cloak back on.
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 NUTCRACKER
PUPPET TYPE: Nutcracker

THIS PUPPET IS: tall, stocky, heavy, medium speed, and strong.

THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab things; order puppets to do anything and kill them if they
don’t; crunch parts of puppets or other things with his teeth; and hit things very hard.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things thrown at him, feel emotions, allow disobedience, or betray
Punch.

NOTES: In addition to his Boys, Punch has a small army of Nutcrackers—they rarely have individual
names or identities—which maintain order and enforce the laws. These red-suited soldiers stomp
endlessly through the streets of Puppettown and the land beyond. They are not very bright, but their
great fierce mouths are sized just right for shattering the joints of marionettes or crushing the parts
of any puppet. Punch’s Boys are more feared than seen. The Nutcrackers, on the other hand, are seen
daily and remind all the puppets of the land just who is boss.

JU DY
PUPPET TYPE: Marionette

THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy, slow, quite strong, hopeful, strong-willed, and kindly

THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab things as heavy as she is; hit things very hard; make handy
things; figure out tough dilemmas; and revive the Maker.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things thrown at her, tell a lie, allow a puppet to suffer, or hurt
Punch directly.

NOTES: Judy used to love Punch, back when they were younger. But since he slew the Maker and
seized control of Puppetland, she loathes him. Judy has founded a small village called Respite,
across the lake of milk and cookies, where rebellious puppets can come and hide. She hopes to
overthrow Punch and restore the Maker to life with the tear she keeps in her thimble. Thus far,
Punch has been unable to find Respite. Judy isn’t entirely sure just how to restore the Maker, but
for now, she’s focused on helping puppets who are in danger and building a group strong enough to
take on Punch’s crew.
48
Creating New Puppetmaster Puppets
The puppetmaster will create new puppets all the time. Most don’t need a complete set of Is/Can/
Cannot statements—just knowing their puppet type and one or two personality traits is often
enough. But if you’re going to build a recurring puppet, and especially one who will serve as an
enemy of the actors’ puppets, you’ll need to put some more thought into it. In particular, think of
how the puppet’s Can/Cannot statements could result in interesting or challenging play. A puppet
who can fly, or who is so big they can eat other puppets, presents very specific difficulties for the
players to overcome. Of course, these difficulties could be verbal or moral as well. A puppet who
lies all the time, who is too scared to talk to strangers, or who can only speak in riddles will present
their own kinds of challenges.

49
50
 The Sky
Maker’s Land
Maker’s Land is bordered by the sky on five sides, comprising a ceiling
Although “Puppetland” is used generically to refer to the area in which and four walls, so that the entirety of the place is roughly shoebox-shaped.
the game is set, “Maker’s Land” is the proper title. When the puppets use The sky is made of some sort of thick canvas on which is painted the night
“Puppetland,” they mean the area ruled by Punch, which includes the sky of stars and moon. Those latter features are painted with luminescent
main locale of Puppettown and Punch’s castle. “Maker’s Land” refers to paint, and it is their pale radiance that lights the land—that and the
both Puppetland and the lands beyond, where Punch’s influence is only lights of Puppettown, of course.
lightly felt; this includes Judy’s freehold of Respite. The blurring of the
terms is due to Punch, who forbids anyone to mention the Maker except The sky overhead is a few yards high. To a little puppet, it’s unreachable.
himself.
Before the Maker died, the sky changed regularly. The five panels of
How big is Maker’s Land? It’s big, but not too big. It is not an entire canvas are on large rollers and each morning the Maker would turn the
planet. Maker’s Land is a rectangular stretch of ground big enough to cranks and scroll the canvas one way or the other, providing the transition
hold Puppettown (where a couple hundred puppets live), the lake of milk from day to night and back again. The day stretch of canvas is entirely,
and cookies (which is long enough that you can’t see across it and just warmly luminescent, and the sun is fat and gleaming. But since the
deep enough that you can drown), Respite (where Judy and perhaps a Maker’s death, there hasn’t been anyone outside the land to turn the
dozen puppets hide out), and whatever unknown territory you wish to cranks—not even Punch understands how day and night used to work.
border these places. It’s probably the size of a handful of football fields— All the puppets know is that since the Maker died, it has always been
even one football field is pretty big to a little puppet—though whether night.
those fields are stretched end-to-end or have a few abutting at the sides
is up to you. The total population of Maker’s Land is probably about five If you go far enough in any direction, you’ll eventually reach the night sky,
hundred puppets, almost all of whom live in Puppettown. painted on the canvas. You can touch it and feel the coarseness of the fabric
and even cover up the glow of a star with your little puppet hand. This is
Hypothetically, the entirety of Maker’s Land is constructed on a massive a secret few puppets know, and any who find out firsthand are likely to
table, rather like a model-railroad diorama. If a puppet could cut through be terrified that they might fall through the sky into some nether realm.
the ground far enough to get through the tabletop, she would fall to the In truth, it’s just canvas. But because of the Maker’s magic, this canvas is
floor below and be outside Maker’s Land altogether, back in the real world impervious to harm. Punch has secretly tried to cut through it, burn it, and
where you and I live. But much like digging to China, no one has tried so forth, and has always failed. If he hears of any puppets who have gone to
this—and probably, no one could do it. It’s best to set aside existential touch the sky, he’ll be furious.
considerations such as these. (“What is outside Maker’s Land?” “Hush,
child.”)
The Landscape
Maker’s Land features a variety of topography. Puppettown is flat,
overlooked by a hillock on which Punch’s castle stands. The uninhabited
areas are rolling hills that eventually rise to mountains, which stand
flush against the sky-canvas. Across the lake of milk and cookies, where
Respite is, the terrain is wild and steep, with lots of little canyons and
caves.

51
 The land is artificial. It’s constructed of some sort of hobby building
material. It might be putty or pressed wood, as you prefer. It’s stable
enough that you can dig holes, or even mine a tunnel through a hill.

The ground is flocked with a green granular substance that looks a bit
like grass, except that it’s not blades of plant growth—it’s just a dried
gunk spread evenly over the countryside. Trees and other growth are
made of carved wood with fabric leaves or flowers. It’s mildly flammable,
but the grass does little more than scorch at the source of the fire.

Buildings are made of wood and stones. Some are covered with plaster
and whitewash, and most are cheerily painted. The architecture tends
towards medieval European, but it’s a mishmash of cultures and styles.
Roofs are constructed with fabric shingles or straw thatch.

Puppettown
Puppettown is the main living area of the puppets. It contains hundreds
of buildings, most no more than two (puppet) floors high. Most of the
usual amenities of a medieval town are present, including plazas, still-
functioning clock towers, fountains, gardens, and so forth. There are no
churches, though there is a gothic meeting-hall and art gallery tended by
“monks”.

Puppets live and work normal lives. It’s always night, so a morning bell
tells puppets when to rise and work. They shop, although there is no
money and the puppets have no concept of such—you “buy” something
simply by taking it and thanking the shopkeeper, who cheerily makes
more. Often, puppets bring their purchases back after they tire of them
and take something else instead.

Puppets do not eat, but they fumblingly pretend to. They have meals at
which they sit around a table and converse and admire the foods they’ve
brought home—almost all of it pretty candies. They’ll comment on how
delicious everything is and eventually say they’re full, but they don’t
really eat anything or cut up the food. If they don’t “eat” for a while, they
get hungry and fretful. Starving puppets are appropriately miserable.

Puppet jobs tend towards making pretty or useful things. Items do wear
out through normal use, and much-handled food begins to lose its glossy
varnish sheen or begin to crumble.
52
 Puppets get around town on foot. There are several wagons drawn by
puppet horses, which belong to no one in particular; puppets just go and
get them from whoever was last using them. There are no bicycles or
other forms of transport. Some puppets can ride horses, but the concept is
strange to most. Few are ever in that much of a hurry.

Punch’s Castle
The castle stands on a hillock overlooking Puppettown. It is made of
stones, with wood used for support beams, doors, and the like. When the
Maker lived, this was his castle. There’s a large open courtyard with a
human-sized trapdoor in the floor. The Maker would scuttle underneath
the table, raise the trapdoor, and stand up through the open courtyard to
look down on Puppettown and greet his friends.

Since Punch took control, he has turned the castle into his own. Puppet
laborers cut doors in its base and filled the shell with rooms and halls
appointed with fine furnishings. The castle is the size of an entire
Puppettown block and is three times the height a normal puppet house.
There are puppet animals, but only a token few varieties: cats, dogs, Punch lives there, guarded by Nutcrackers and some of the Boys, and
birds, cows, pigs, and the like. They behave like their analogues, within addresses the town by standing on the parapets and speaking into an
the confines of puppet behavior and abilities. Farmer puppets tend to
their flocks, but the animals are never killed and the concept of hurting
an animal puppet and eating it would horrify anyone—food consists of
candy, though the vile Nutcrackers are fond of puppet stuffing, which
they gobble and chew until it’s all spilled messily from their jaws.

Light is provided by torches and candles, which burn forever and never
wear down. There are no matches or other sources of creating fire; puppets
just use already-burning torches to light other things as needed.

Water is ample in Puppettown. It runs through fountains and elevated

aqueducts, and into houses through little copper pipes. Puppets use it to
keep clean, to play in, and to put out fires.

The streets are laid with cobblestones. Beneath them is a layer of dirt—
real, honest-to-goodness dirt, found nowhere else in Maker’s Land—and
beneath that is the same substance from which the Maker made the hills
and ground.

53
 enormous trumpet. Inside the castle is the Nutcracker factory, where Punch emerge in secret locations. The puppets live on water and on stolen food—
once forced puppets to make his guards. It stands idle now, active only when which of course they never use up, but that they are quite tired of. (“Can’t
an injured Nutcracker must be repaired or replaced. He has plenty. we have something different for a change?”) Occasionally they venture
out for milk and cookies at the lake.

The Lake of Milk and Cookies

The Candy Cave
This large lake lives up to its name: the water is milk, which remains
ever-fresh, and large, crisp, chocolate-chip cookies bob on the surface like Somewhere in Maker’s Land are a series of caves and tunnels. In the heart
ice floes. There are enough cookies in the lake that it’s possible to cross of this maze is a cavern where the walls grow cheerful candy. It’s a legend
it by jumping from cookie to cookie, but this is not easy and not always among puppets, who like to ponder where it might be and just what sort of
possible—if the cookies aren’t floating close enough at a given moment, delicious new candies it might contain.
too bad. Cookies capsize easily, and the bottom of the lake is littered with
unlucky Nutcrackers. Few puppets can swim or float, not even the wooden The Maker built it as a sort of treat for his puppet friends. If they’d ever
ones. found it, he would have been delighted—and probably gone on to build
some new secret treat for them to find. But Punch’s rise cut such plans short.
The lake has no fish—“Fish? What’s a fish?” the puppet said—but some
puppets believe there is a monster in the lake, thanks to a rumor started by The cave still exists, unseen by puppet eyes. The central cavern is now
Punch. He’s contemplating building some sort of monster puppet to live in quite full of candy and it’s beginning to spread up the tunnels. Eventually,
the lake and keep puppets away, but he’d have to sacrifice one of his Boys to this unchecked growth could cover the entirety of Maker’s Land in candy.
get the flesh he’d need to build such a thing since he can’t reach the Maker
anymore. For now, the rumor will suffice. Punch wants to find the cave for several reasons. First, he suspects that
Judy is hiding there. (“She needs food, right?”) He also believes that if
As noted earlier, the lake is deep enough to drown in. Assume it’s about the cave is real, it may contain more Maker-magic which he could twist to
two puppet-stories deep. sinister ends. And finally, he hopes that the cave might contain an exit
leading from Maker’s Land to the world the Maker came from—a world
that Punch glimpsed only briefly, the night he slew the Maker. Punch
Respite nurtures grim ambitions, thinking that if he could just get out of Maker’s
Land with his forces, he could conquer the world outside.
Judy’s little freehold is home to a dozen or so valiant and rebellious
puppets. Some are here because they chose to defy Punch. Others are the
unlucky victims of happenstance whom Judy rescued from the jaws of the Down Below
Nutcrackers and brought here. Not all are happy with their lot. Some wish
they could just go back to Puppettown and have some fine candies and One of Punch’s legendary adversaries is the Devil, who has always
make shoes again, but they’ve realized that this is not an option. threatened to drag Punch “down below” to the fires of eternal torment.
In Puppetland, Down Below is a real place. Hidden beneath a box canyon
Respite isn’t much to look at. It’s hidden in a secret box canyon and in the wilderness, Down Below can be reached through a narrow tunnel
shielded from view by numerous trees. The village consists of a few tents lined entirely with shards of obsidian. From the darkness within can be
and a little pool of water. Judy has led her charges in the construction heard a faint singing.
of two escape tunnels that burrow deep into the surrounding land and

54
55
56
 Good and bad
Mom and Dad
The tunnel winds down and around in a spiral. As you descend, the singing grows louder, as does the We’ve been had
steady beat of a drum. The singing is revealed as chanting, a repeating bit of doggerel that goes: Come my lad
And this repeats. When the bottom of the tunnel is finally reached, it opens into Down Below: a large D o w n B e lo w
cavern lit by crimson lights projected through colored crepe paper flames. It’s a puppet vision of I n t h e g lo w
Hell itself, and the proper abode of the Devil. Numerous puppets are here, some of whom the actor- S tart th e sh o w
puppets may recognize from previous tales: all are puppets who have died the final death and ended up To a n d fro
here, including any actor-puppets who lost all their puzzle pieces. These dead puppets do not respond to
questions or interruptions and instead just endlessly beat on the rocks with their fists, which are slowly
Angels sing
wearing down to nubs, producing the drumming sound and chanting out their lines.
Deep the king
Wedding ring
Presiding over this grim spectacle is the Devil, who looks much as you’d imagine: a glistening red
Lo v e r s c l i n g
body like a skinned corpse, massive horns, and a fine robe of embroidered silk. The Devil spends Get th e ro pe
much of his time enjoying the eternal concert, but really perks up when new arrivals enter Down End all hope
Below, either through final death or just curiosity. Beat the dope
Death will cope
His second-greatest joy is trapping naïve visitors who have not actually died. It’s rare that anyone
stumbles into Down Below, but it happens. He tries to persuade such puppets to join the chorus and sing
along. “It’s fun!” he pleads, “Give it a go! Just a
line or two! Here, bang this rock!” If the Devil
persuades a visiting puppet to pick up the tune, DOWN BELOW: THE DEVIL
that puppet is trapped in Down Below until
someone drags him or her back to the surface to PUPPET TYPE: Marionette
resume a normal life.
THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy, slow, and quite strong, cruel, treacherous, and smart.
While visiting puppets who have been trapped
can be freed, the same is not true of the dead. THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab things; hit things very hard; trick a puppet to chant
They cannot escape and if dragged to the forever; fight Punch better than anyone else; resent all happy puppets.
surface, will flail wildly before dissolving into
stuffing and splinters. There is no hope for them. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things thrown at him; defeat Punch; set a damned puppet free; eat
candy.
What is the Devil’s greatest joy? Besting Punch,
of course, a joy he has never truly known. He NOTES: The Devil may be Punch’s greatest adversary, but he is no friend to anyone else. To him,
has connived to finish Punch off and drag him Punch is an annoyance whose very existence prevents him from doing what he really wants to do:
Down Below many times, but always Punch preside over Down Below forever and enjoy the terrible music made by the damned puppets. But
has won. While the Devil sits and listens to the as Punch’s enemy, the Devil may nonetheless be helpful in schemes hatched by the actor-puppets,
choir of the damned, in his mind he only thinks assuming they can find Down Below and avoid becoming trapped there.
of one thing: his foot on Punch’s face, forever. It
is his fondest dream. Always remember that the Devil cares only for himself and that he is very impulsive. Even if
recruited in a scheme against Punch, the Devil will abandon and betray the scheme at the first
opportunity if he sees a chance to trap an unwitting puppet Down Below. He’ll take a damned
puppet now over Punch later.
57
 B E D L A M C I RC U S : P U L C I N E L L A Bedlam Circus The six Pulincellas here do not speak on their
own and only repeat what Punch says, in the same
PUPPET TYPE: Marionette In a grassy field outside of Puppettown stands a high and warbling swazzle-voice that Punch uses.
large canvas tent painted with brightly colored Their white clothes are quite dirty and torn, the
THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, stripes. Strings tether the edges of the tent to result of numerous beatings by Punch. He uses
heavy, slow, and quite strong, playful, the ground. A large, sagging banner over the them as a sort of chorus, and sometimes they even
loyal to Punch, and acrobatic. entrance reads BEDLAM CIRCUS. sing together. But he also becomes infuriated by
them and their limitations, and may variously lock
THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or This circus was under construction by the them into cage wagons, hang them from the top
grab things; hit things very hard; clown Maker when he died and was never finished. It of the tent, or just beat them as they crumple on
around; mimic everything Punch says; do is a particular haunt of Punch, who has made the ground and mimic his every grunt and hateful
whatever Punch says. his own efforts at finishing what the Maker shriek.
started, to demonstrate his power, but it is
THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things also where Punch goes to wallow in his own They are utterly loyal to him but also too
thrown at him; leave Bedlam Circus; self-loathing. It’s a good place for a set piece, cowardly to leave the circus. When Punch is
move when Punch isn’t around; speak his particularly one in which the actor-puppets are not here they are listless and do not interfere,
own ideas while in the Circus. trying to steal something from Punch as he can but when he arrives they spring into clownish
be rather distracted here. mayhem: tumbling, tripping, doing minor
NOTES: There are six identical acrobatics, and invariably getting into slap-
Pulcinella puppets living in Bedlam The interior of the circus is that of a traditional fights with each other until Punch summons
Circus who only come to life when European traveling show, with a single ring them into a semblance of order.
Punch is around. The Maker never quite around which are arrayed cascading rows of
finished them, and they have no lives benches. Several circus wagons are positioned out When visiting Bedlam, Punch generally does one
of their own. When Punch is present, front, ready for puppet animals that were never of two things. Either he’s trying to build a puppet
however, they spring into clownish made. One of them is Punch’s favorite, a cage lion or he’s moaning and sobbing in the cage
action and perform silly stunts. They wagon with a frightening painting of a roaring wagon because of his failure to build a puppet
also deliver beatings to each other in lion in the scrollwork above the bars. Punch lion. This is because the lion is Punch’s great
comical but violent fits of rage. They likes to climb inside, shut the door, and then test: he has used all of the Maker’s skin to build
repeat much of what Punch says when he roar like a lion, rattling the bars and bellowing his own face and his Boys, and now he is trying
is present, but can say nothing of their over and over, until he collapses into sobs and to make a puppet the Maker’s way, with fabric
own. hides his leathery face from the world. and needle and thread. So far, he has failed. His
sad attempts at a lion are incomplete and ghastly
If somehow removed from Bedlam While Bedlam Circus has no animals, it is and possess no life whatsoever. When deprived of
Circus and away from Punch, Pulcinella inhabited. A crew of six clowns live here, all the Maker’s skin, Punch cannot bring anything
seems to wake up. He gains his own of them marionettes in the style of the Italian more to life.
voice and weepingly pleads with the clown Pulcinella: a white tunic, white pants,
actor-puppets to never take him back a white conical hat, and a black mask with a Nonetheless, he keeps trying. If he can
to the circus again. If he returns to the long, beak-like nose. Pulcinella is the historical accomplish this great work, he truly will be the
Circus he resumes his normal existence, precursor to Punch himself, a vicious and stupid equal of the Maker and then not a single puppet
but while free of the Circus he is his own clown who lashes out at authority but claims will be able to stand against him. Until then,
puppet entirely. ignorance when confronted. he frequently consigns himself to the cage at
Bedlam, there to wail and suffer.
58
The Graveyard Should anyone approach the Graveyard, the
Sexton turns edge-on to become invisible. A
In a remote part of the wilderness, atop a craggy concerted search will inevitably find him since
mountain, there lies the Graveyard. No living he can’t be invisible in multiple directions or to G RAV E YAR D: TH E S EXTO N
puppet has ever discovered it, but perhaps more than one puppet at once, but he’ll do his
someone will. best. If questioned, the Sexton is revealed as a PUPPET TYPE: Shadow Puppet
simpleton: he only knows his duties and his life
The Graveyard is just what it says on the tin: it’s here in the Graveyard. He never was anywhere THIS PUPPET IS: tall, quite slender, quite
a graveyard. Every puppet in Puppetland who else and he never goes anywhere else. Between light, fast, and quite weak, shy, dedicated
has ever died—in game terms, whose puzzle burials, he tends the grounds and sits in his to his job, and simple-minded.
pieces have all been filled in—is buried here, little workshop shack, preparing for his next
in a proper coffin lined with satin, beneath a coffin. THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown
wooden tombstone with their name painted onto at them by turning sideways, even at the
a faux stone surface. If you dig up the ground Punch ensures the Sexton always needs more last moment; kick things, throw things,
and pull the coffin to the surface, you’ll find the coffins. and grab things; and become invisible
dead puppet inside, just as they last looked in from one other puppet if they are careful
life. This means they could be anything from a The dead puppets within the coffins are truly and cautious by keeping their skinny edge
complete but lifeless puppet to a pile of ashes, or dead. Removing them from their coffins, or towards the puppet at all times; dig with
anything in between. indeed from the Graveyard, does not restore a paper shovel; build practical things out of
them to life. One day, the Sexton says, the wood; write poetry.
How dead puppets reach the Graveyard is a Maker will return, and then all the dead
mystery, but what happens to them once they puppets will live again. Until then, they must be THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick, throw, or
arrive is not. They are attended to by the preserved and protected, safe in the ground, far grab things that weigh more than a piece
Sexton. from the violence and misery of the world. of paper; be invisible if they aren’t trying;
be invisible to more than one puppet at a
The Sexton is a shadow puppet. When engaged The Sexton composes poetry in his free time. time; or get wet because getting completely
in his trade, he vigorously mimes digging The actor-puppets may overhear him muttering wet kills them; hurt anyone; bury a living
with his flimsy paper silhouette of a shovel, lines and rhymes to himself, but but he never puppet; raise the dead.
the ground flying up in chunks and debris in writes it down and will speak it to no one.
inexplicable response. He makes the coffins NOTES: The Sexton tends to the Cemetary
and tombstones in his workshop located nearby, and ensures all dead puppets are properly
places the dead puppet inside, and buries them buried in a nice plush coffin. He knows
safely in the earth-like substance that is the nothing of how dead puppets come to be in
ground in Puppetland. the Cemetary; he just finds them, sprawled
outside the gates, soon after their death.
He makes his coffins in his workshop and
buries each puppet in turn, quietly and
respectfully.

59
60
Thimble Theatre
On the outskirts on Puppettown stands a small The plays are typical Guignol: humorous, THI MB LE TH E AT RE: G U IGN O L
theater, sized for finger puppets. It is made of knockabout affairs involving drunken
cardboard, but beautifully decorated to mimic bumblers who always end up coming out PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet
a gilded proscenium. Atop the arch is a blue on top. The villains are frequently larger
oval bordered by baroque gold decorations puppets, portrayed here by finger puppets in THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light,
within which is the legend GUIGNOL. The elaborate costumes to exaggerate their size. quite fast, and weak, very funny, lively
theater is a freestanding structure similar and talkative, knowledgeable about
to a child’s puppet theater, before which are Thimble Theatre is little-known outside of current events.
a set of seats also sized for finger puppets. the finger-puppet community. It’s a sanctuary
Surrounding this is a low wall with no ceiling, of sorts for a group of puppets relieved to THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things
only small doors just big enough for finger be someplace where they are unlikely to be thrown at him even if he only sees
puppets to pass through. stepped upon, ignored, or otherwise mistreated. them coming at the last moment, move
very quietly, perform funny voices, win
This is Thimble Theatre, home to the If larger puppets try to visit the theater, anyone’s trust, put anyone at ease.
legendary French puppet Guignol and his a cheerful doorman will greet them and
friends. Here they perform tiny plays for apologize for the lack of accommodation. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things,
tiny audiences. Other puppets are cheerfully “Sorry, we haven’t got a door big enough throw things, or grab things because he
unwelcome here because they cannot fit for you. We should really get that fixed has no legs or arms; resist the promise of
through the doors nor see over the walls. A sometime.” Requests to sit in Punch’s chair gossip; knowingly hurt someone; stay quiet
sign outside the door reads NO BIGGEES produce shock and dismay. No one may sit in for very long.
PERMITTED. There is, however, a large and Punch’s chair but Punch, and if someone does,
rather imperial high chair outside the wall word is likely to reach the demented monarch NOTES: Guignol is the life of any
that allows a larger puppet to take a seat. This who may finally pay a visit to the humble party and a tremendous gossip. Finger
chair is reserved for Punch, so that he is always theater if only to bask in his own outrage. puppets tend to overhear a lot of things
welcome. He has never attended. because larger puppets don’t notice
Guignol’s agenda is very simple: make finger they’re nearby, and then they come to
Guignol and his company are finger-puppet puppets laugh, forget their troubles, and the next show at Thimble Theatre and
zealots. Tired of being overlooked, ignored, be happy. Like any theater, his is home to spread the word. That makes Guignol
and often if accidentally kicked, finger puppets a variety of fools, geniuses, ne’er-do-wells, unusually well-informed about all of
go to the theater to be among their own kind. troublemakers, and jovial drunks. A sinister Puppetland. While he’s far too good-
Buffet tables along the wall are stocked tale may well lead to his door, but only finger hearted to be a spymaster, he’s not
with finger-puppet sized foods and drinks. puppets will get to go inside. above sharing information to help
Decorative mirrors are hung at finger-puppet someone in trouble.
heights. And at the conclusion of each show,
the chairs are shoved aside and a merry finger-
puppet dance is held to the tunes of a finger-
puppet band.

61
 The first tool is CREATIVITY: an actor who comes up with creative ideas
to advance the story, change the plot, or solve a problem is likely to
see their ideas embraced and accepted by the puppetmaster. Instead of
contradicting or overruling the actor, the puppetmaster will run with
their creative ideas and build on them.

The second tool is DRAMA: an actor who creates or heightens drama will
also find their ideas embraced and accepted by the puppetmaster. This
can come through performance, if the actor can amusingly or movingly
portray their puppet. But it can also come through actions and reactions
that are true to the puppet’s nature—even if they contradict it. If a
puppet never lies, but in a moment of duress, the actor has the puppet tell
a lie and promptly marks off a puzzle piece, the actor has just heightened
the drama by showing that the puppet has been forced to behave against
her own nature. Moments like that are what make great Puppetland
sessions, and puppetmasters should reward them narratively by accepting
the results of the player’s action even if it changes the story, having
Puppetmastering puppetmaster puppets react with surprise, and using it to drive the story
forward.
Puppetland places some unusual demands on the puppetmaster
compared to other story games. Besides getting familiar with the rules By employing the tools of creativity and drama, actors can achieve a true
and the world and making up the tales and the new puppets those tales balance of power with the puppetmaster and drive the tale in unexpected
require, the puppetmaster must also manage the play of the game and directions. This is the secret of the third rule: the tale grows in the
provide the ongoing improvised narration. The game’s freeform nature telling. It means the puppetmaster is not the only one telling the tale.
makes it difficult to make concrete statements of how to perform the
puppetmaster’s duties, but here are some of the trickier parts and some
suggestions for how to deal with them. Narration
Coming up with narration that simultaneously explains the tale’s action
The Balance of Power and maintains an appropriate storybook tone isn’t easy. In general,
puppetmasters should be people who are comfortable with storytelling.
Puppetland is a game that invests enormous power and responsibility in “Storytelling” doesn’t have to mean sitting around a campfire and
the puppetmaster. There are no dice and no formal system for combat or reciting that old chestnut “Wait ’Til Martin Comes” for the umpteenth
conflict. The puppetmaster gets the last word. time. If you have a reservoir of anecdotes that you share with friends and
acquaintances—funny stories, dramatic encounters, that sort of thing—
But this is not a competitive game. The puppetmaster does not win by then you’re probably in good shape. If in the midst of some daily event
defeating the actors’ puppets. Instead, the puppetmaster wins by ensuring gone mildly awry, you find yourself putting it into a narrative and coming
that the actors have a good time—one with excitement, surprise, a dash of up with colorful phrases you’ll use the next time you’re at a bar with
horror, and a liberal sprinkling of black humor. friends, you’ve got the makings of a puppetmaster.

The actors have two important tools that help to balance their power The difference between that sort of storytelling and the narration of the
relative to that of the puppetmaster. puppetmaster is that the narration is improvised; you can’t rehearse it
62
beforehand, and you certainly shouldn’t pause, compose your next bit of Preparation
narration in your head, and then speak it as if you were addressing the
United Nations. You’ve got to just go with the flow. Proper puppetmaster Good preparation can make a huge difference in relieving the stress of
narration is a state of mind, not a prepped performance. being a puppetmaster. Before you start a tale, review the actors’ puppet
sheets and pay particular attention to their attributes. Are any in conflict?
So, how do you achieve that state of mind? Your first attempts will For example, is one puppet very talkative and one puppet very quiet?
probably be a bit stumbling, and that’s okay. Every line does not have to Look for those kinds of extremes, make a few notes about them, and then
be spun of the finest gold; coarse threads of burlap will suffice at times. play off them in the game by putting the puppets in situations they can’t
To get a handle on it, you might try improvising some narration in your easily handle to create drama.
head during daily life. Let’s say you’re walking down the street to rent
a movie. Start narrating silently to yourself. (You can do it out loud, in Got a talkative puppet? Have a bunch of Nutcrackers come marching
which case sympathetic passers-by might try to give you money.) You don’t by, forcing everyone to be quiet. Then narrate the puppet’s dilemma:
have to account for every moment or every detail. Just narrate in broad “Yakkety Sax desperately wanted to say something. Anything! The
strokes, picking out only the relevant or colorful bits of business from silence was unbearable! Finally he opened his mouth and the other
what’s going on. “She walked happily towards the store, stepping around a puppets wondered if he would speak!” Then look meaningfully at the
fellow walking his friendly dog, and reached the door.” You might also try player for a moment and see what he or she does.
this while watching television commercials. “The man smiled as he placed
the fruits into the machine, then thumbed the switch and boggled at the By using the puppets’ attributes, you can spark memorable moments and
magical mixture that poured from the spout.” challenge the players. But to do that, you need to prepare first.

Try this a few times and hopefully, you’ll get the hang of it. Then when Another helpful thing to prepare is the voices of the major characters.
you’re ready to play Puppetland, you’ll be able to get into the swing and go You don’t need to give everyone a distinctive voice —that can be really
with it. tiresome and hard to maintain—but at least consider how they talk.
Nutcrackers bark orders; an actor puppet is very loud and dramatic; a
dancer puppet might speak in an elegant, flowing way. Getting your
characters into your head can help bring them to life.

Finally, consider your set pieces: the big scenes in a tale where dramatic
moments happen. Review your actors’ puppet sheets with those in mind.
Are there opportunities for trouble or unexpected heroism? Consider what
a finger puppet can do, and what a shadow puppet can do, that might be a
surprising twist.

The more preparation you do, the more confident you’ll be. And
remember: it’s only an hour!

63
 Adjudicating Actions Sweating the Details
In the course of each tale, the actors will be doing their best to react to Don’t sweat the details. If the Sally Red Buttons’s actor says she picks
the situations you throw at them and find a way of turning each situation up a rock and throws it at the Nutcracker, don’t worry too much about
to their advantage. You’ll have to adjudicate what happens when puppets whether a rock would really be there, close at hand. Of course, if an actor
come into conflict, whether that conflict is physical, verbal, or emotional. tries to do something ridiculous (“It’s a good thing this house is built on
top of an enormous firecracker! I’ll light it!”) then you should disallow
To determine whether an actor-puppet succeeds in doing something it: “Sally looked to and fro, but there was no sign of the firecracker. That
difficult, think about the concepts expressed in the Balance of Power must have been some other house.”
between the puppetmaster and the actors: creativity and drama. If the
actor’s request or action is creative, or if it is not creative but is expressed Combat is especially tricky. In general, side with the actors, and avoid
in an enjoyably dramatic fashion, the actor should succeed unless their getting bogged down in blow-by-blow combat. A rock here, a punch
success would ruin everyone’s fun. (Or unless the puppetmaster has a there, and the combat can be over—at least long enough for the puppets
delightful complication to introduce instead of a straight-up victory.) to run away or tie up their foe or what have you. Combat should serve
the story. Enemy puppets can fall down wailing at the first blow, yelling
If the actor is both creative for reinforcements. An injured actor-puppet can be dragged away by the
and dramatic, this is the others as they flee.
Puppetland equivalent of a
critical success die roll. The Keep in mind the nature of storybook tales. The good guys will almost
actor should succeed and do always win, though their victory may not be as complete or as specific
so with extra benefits chosen as they would hope, and there may be losses along the way. If an actor-
by you. puppet dies, it should usually be the result of a dramatic situation rather
than the happenstance of combat. A raging fire might claim a puppet, but
Of course, having set their a lucky blow by a Nutcracker probably shouldn’t. When possible, injured
personal bar for creative puppets should be captured rather than killed. Captured puppets may
and/or dramatic actions, the be subjected to Punch’s diabolical torture or questioned, but of course
actor should equal or exceed they’ll wake up at home when the next tale starts.
that bar next time. A funny
character accent is great once,
but reusing the same accent Waking Up
over and over again does
not continually qualify as a The transition from the end of one tale to the start of the next can be
dramatic action. tricky, but you should have plenty of time between tales to figure this
out. The puppets should not be too aware of how this works. If a puppet
In short, successful play is ends one tale captured and then wakes up at home at the start of the next,
based on creative and dramatic Punch will probably be baffled. “How did he escape? You fools! Can’t you
actions. Reward them. guard one silly puppet?” You could have the next tale be about the rescue
of the puppet, but unless you’re ready for the actor-puppets to take on
Punch and infiltrate his castle, that’s probably not a good idea.

Of course, once Punch learns the identities of the actor-puppets, their

homes are no longer safe to wake up in. Some tales may well begin
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 with the puppets waking up and having only a few minutes before the Magic
Nutcrackers show up to escape and find their friends. But once the
puppets have relocated—perhaps to a campsite in the hills, or with Judy Puppetland presents an obviously magical world. So what kind of magic is
in Respite—then that’s where they should start waking up. available? The short answer is: whatever kind of magic you need. Punch
can work magic and he used it to make the Boys, who can do things no
other puppet can do. That doesn’t mean Punch should be able to throw
balls of fire, though. Magic should be more about clever processes than
brute combat. A puppet who can do magic might be able to make a house
invisible, if he concentrates the whole time. Perhaps he can make a tunnel
appear in a hillside just in time to escape the Nutcrackers, but it fills in
again as soon as he looks away.

You’ll have to be careful with this stuff. Ideally, genuine magic that’s not
just trickery should be restricted to puppetmaster puppets. That way you
can use it for purposes of your tales without having to allow or disallow
whatever magical effect an actor comes up with on the fly. But if you
allow an actor to create a puppet who can perform magic, you should talk
with the actor and work out what sorts of things the puppet can do. The
puppet might be able to do just one kind of magic, such as invisibility,
levitation, or things involving water. And there should be some sort of
cost involved. The puppet might have to concentrate while the magic is
working—and if the puppet gets interrupted or has to do something else,
then the magic ends. Or perhaps using the magic fills in a puzzle piece on
the puppet sheet each time, or afterwards the puppet falls asleep and has
to be carried for a while by her friends. Working this out with the actor
in advance is critical. Should the actor abuse this power or use it in a way
Cutaway Scenes you don’t think is appropriate, you may need to take a break and have
a whispered conference with the actor. Of course, you can always take
For purposes of your tale, you may wish to narrate scenes that the care of it through narration: “Sally concentrated and the house turned
actor-puppets are not present for. You might do a short scene of Punch invisible! But then—oh, no! The puppets inside the house could still be
stomping about, yelling at his Nutcrackers to go find those mangy seen, walking around in the air!”
puppets. Or if the puppets are about to be captured, you could do a
cutaway scene with Judy and some of her friends arriving outside:
“Quickly now, we must save them!” Then go back to the actor-puppets Puzzle Pieces
and play on. Preface such cut scenes with a key word like “Meanwhile…”
so your actors clue in right away that this is happening someplace The slow filling-in of each puppet’s jigsaw puzzle should be a dramatic
where they are not. You can make sophisticated use of cutaway scenes, process. A puppet with many filled pieces might be subject to some sort
using them to reveal some plot twist or to introduce a character whom of strange experience; perhaps she wakes up to find her legs missing, only
the puppets should already know, but haven’t actually met within the to have them re-appear after a few horrifying moments. As more pieces
confines of the tale. get filled up, you may want to shift the tone of the tales to something
darker and more frightening, with the stakes and the risks getting higher.

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When the last piece is filled in, the puppet will die at the end of the tale. We puppetmasters hope that the actors will maintain the innocent nature
You should tell the actor this in a whispered conference, in case he or she of the puppets as long as possible, even if this means their reactions
doesn’t know. Hopefully, the actor will make the most of this situation. are incongruent. If Punch smashes in the head of a puppet and the
Nutcrackers begin greedily devouring the puppet’s cotton stuffing, the
actor-puppets shouldn’t say things like, “Oh my GOD! They’re eating
Tone her brains!” A more appropriate response would be, “Sally! No! Oh, you
wicked, wicked Punch!”
Puppetland is a mixture of children’s storybooks and visceral horror. The
Nutcrackers, while threatening, are meant to be somewhat comical with Puppetland’s tone comes from the intersection of innocence and horror,
their stiff legs and frequent shouting—but there’s really nothing funny and if the actor-puppets turn into stony-faced guerrilla warriors inured
to the horrors of Punch, that intersection turns into a one-way street
leading nowhere. The actors’ goal should be to maintain their puppets’
sense of innocence and wonder, even in the face of terrible evil, simply
because that’s the way puppets are supposed to be. Recall the rule about
the tale being told to an audience; the juxtaposition of the actor-puppets,
performing their naïve roles, should strike sparks against the unseen
audience’s realization that Punch has turned this innocent world into a
particularly sadistic abattoir. It is precisely this inversion of innocence
that makes Punch so unusual and so powerful—but it’s also why the
actor-puppets and their allies are so determined to make things right and
restore the natural order. Other creative works may explore the grey area
of human behavior and ask whether good can fight evil even while using
the tools of evil in that fight; in Puppetland, the answer to that question
is a resounding no. There is good, and there is evil, and there is nothing
in between save a crisply etched line in the sand. (It’s for this reason that
puppets who act against their natures are punished with a filled-in puzzle
piece.)

As puppetmaster, you need to work towards maintaining this tone. You

can do a lot to help the actors stick to that sense of innocence and wonder
in the way you portray other innocent puppets. When a Nutcracker
about Punch’s Boys, who are intended to be genuinely disturbing and burns a screaming puppet at the stake and you’re doing the voices of the
awful. They represent the incursion of Punch’s madness into the benign gathered crowd, have them say things that maintain the tone: “Curse you,
reality of Puppetland, and they do not have to obey the same tonalities Nutcracker!” rather than “All hope is lost! The cosmos cares not for we
that their victims do. poor puppets! Let’s jump off a bridge before our souls are crushed!” This
is explicit storybook melodrama; the existential despair is merely implied.
The intention is to portray a childlike world of wonder that has verged
into an unpleasant world of adulthood. The actors take the roles of Hopefully it’s obvious that you should avoid profanity, though some
innocent puppets as might be found in any storybook. But their foes, and clever puppet-curses are fine as long as they’re not just profanity one
the situation their world has entered, are something very different. These step removed: “Eat my stuffing!” would be right out but “Ooh, you ugly
create a symbolic tension, drawn from the juxtaposition of innocent main clacky-jaws!” is fine.
characters and corrupt foes.
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 About Tales
Each tale will consist of the puppets doing their best to stop Punch, find
the Maker’s body (which not even Punch can reach via the castle trapdoor,
but which might be discovered through the Candy Cave), and bringing
the Maker back to life with the Maker’s Tear that Judy saved. In addition,
they must protect Judy and her freehold of Respite and do what they can
to save innocent puppets from the ravages of Punch and his Boys.

Tales may come from the mind of the puppetmaster or may be instigated
by actors who have a particular goal in mind and seek to go about it.

Typical tales might include:

™™ In classical Punch & Judy shows, Judy has a baby and Punch throws
it out the window when it cries too much. A worthy subplot would
be to have Judy pregnant by Punch (from before the fall of the
Maker) and for the arrival of the baby to be at hand. Is it a child of
evil, like Punch? The inhabitants of Respite may well be divided
over this pivotal event. Perhaps it represents a chance for Punch
to be rehabilitated; perhaps it is the dawning of a greater evil.
Significantly, this is the first new puppet not created by the Maker or
by Punch—who could only make the Nutcrackers and his Boys—and
its arrival would be a major tale.

™ ™ Each of Punch’s Boys can suggest a tale all by himself, or in

tandem with other Boys. Innocent puppets who happened to be
within one of Haunt’s slow circles would need rescuing, as would
hapless passers-by assaulted by Mayhem. Defeating one of the
Boys would be a major event and should not be easy.

™™ The Nutcrackers are catchall generic villains, capable of anything.

Perhaps a squad of Nutcrackers has become lost and is nearing
Respite—Punch doesn’t know where Respite is, you’ll recall—so the
puppets have to band together and find a way to lead them astray or
stop them cold.

™™ In happier times, the puppets would hold joyful parades, making

floats and playing music while the Maker looked on, pleased. Since
Punch came to power, he’s changed the parades. Now the puppets
stomp listlessly through the streets, blowing music out of tune,
while the Nutcrackers march in lockstep. The floats are constructed
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 under Punch’s direction and feature themes such as: BE HAPPY
OR ELSE, written on a banner hung over a dead puppet with a smile
painted on her still face; JUDY IS BAD, where a puppet dressed as
Judy flogs puppet-cats; and EVERYONE LOVES PUNCH, where
Punch rides on a throne, scowling and watching for anyone acting
out of line. Finding a dramatic way to disrupt Punch’s regular parade
could help convince more puppets to join Judy’s rebellion.

™™ The goal of the game is clear: find the Maker and restore him to life
so Punch may be stopped. But where is the Maker? He’s a human,
so he’s far larger than any puppet. He couldn’t possibly be within
Punch’s palace, could he? There’d be no room! Figuring out where
the Maker is would be a worthy goal even before helping Judy bring
him back to life.

LARPing
Live Action Roleplaying typically requires participants to wear costumes Making Tales
and physically embody the role of their characters. Playing Puppetland as
a LARP may seem strange, but it really just means that every actor has an Puppetland is a strange and fantastical place. It’s natural that
actual finger, hand, marionette, or shadow puppet to operate during play. puppetmasters may have a hard time inventing tales to tell about it. Here are
the components of Puppetland tales to help you create your own.
Several puppetmasters have reported phenomenal, even magical results
when players have actual puppets. The puppets allow the players to mime
silent actions, such as sneaking around or jumping out from behind Ante
something, without having to do the usual narration. They can also more
clearly express when their puppet is speaking, making out-of-character Remember that Puppetland is a game. As in poker, a tale of Puppetland
conversation more reasonable and differentiated despite the stated rule begins with the ante. This is the main goal of the story, the problem the
against it. LARPing in this way also lets the actor get more into character actors are trying to solve. It’s called the ante because if they don’t solve it
by using puppet body language to express emotion. in one hour, they lose the ante and those consequences are real.

While the author has not tried this approach, those who have swear by The ante needs to be very clear and direct: “X is going to happen if the
it. Check your local toy store for some cheap puppets and see what you players don’t do Y.” There should be no ambiguity about the ante.
discover.
For example, let’s say the the Nutcrackers have kidnapped a sock puppet
farmer named Dweezil Stinky Lips because he helped the actors’ puppets
in the last tale. If the puppets don’t rescue him from Punch’s castle in
time, the Nutcrackers will unravel him thread by thread. That’s the
ante. Failure means the tale ends with a cutaway scene in which Dweezil
is unraveled by Vengeance in the dungeon and he dies forever. The
puppets have failed and they cry themselves to sleep. The tale is over.
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Tales Worksheet
ANTE: What’s changed? What’s the imperative? What happens if that fails?

LITTLE VILLAINS: What do they want?

BIG VILLAIN: What does he or she want?

INNOCENTS: What do they want?

MACGUFFIN: Why is everyone after it?

What happens if they get it?

Make the ante explicit. This can happen right up front, if you wish,
perhaps with your opening narration:

Dweezil Stinky Lips was roused from sleep by an angry group

of Nutcrackers. “You’re coming with us!” they clacked loudly.
“What did I do?” whimpered Dweezil. “You were seen helping that
troublemaking group of puppets last week and we’re going to pull you
into tiny pieces!” “Oh no!” Dweezil cried, as the Nutcrackers hauled
him off to Punch’s castle. “Who can help me? Who?”

Or you can wait a few minutes to introduce the ante by first giving the
actors some brief unifying goal, such as playing a prank on a Nutcracker
who then angrily reveals Dweezil’s kidnapping.

Once the ante is known, however, all efforts of both the actors and the
puppetmaster should be aimed towards it. You’ve only got an hour and
nobody wants to lose the ante. Some examples of antes:

™™ A NUTCRACKER LOST in the mountains discovers Judy’s hidden

village. Stop him before he reports back to Punch!

™™ PUNCH HOLDS A PARADE to celebrate his victory over the Maker.

When the parade reaches his castle, he’s going to light six captured
puppets on fire as a warning to the crowd. Save them!

™™ SOMEONE IN THE VILLAGE IS A TRAITOR! Judy is planning to

kidnap a Nutcracker, but if the actors’ puppets can’t find the traitor
in time, the whole plan could turn into a trap. Find the traitor!

™™ PUNCH IS BUILDING A DRAGON to terrorize the land, but he

needs a heart to make it come alive. Replace the stone heart he’s
carving with a candy heart so the dragon is sweet. Otherwise, the
dragon becomes a big villain in the next tale!

™™ JENNY SWEETIE MERMAID WAS CAPTURED BY PUNCH who

removed her tail and replaced it with legs. Now she is miserable,
hobbling around and unable to swim. Get her tail back before she’s
stuck with legs forever!

™™ THERE’S A HOLE IN THE SKY—the canvas of night is unraveling

and will soon fall forever upon the land. Sew it up before it covers
Puppettown!
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Big and Little Villains the actor-puppets
can play them off
Choose your big and little villains. The little villains are often against each other
Nutcrackers, but they can also be ordinary puppets who get in the way and escape.
of the actor-puppets. They might be trying to help the big villain, but
they might also just be confused or misled. The actor-puppets should ™™ NUTCRACKERS
be confronted by the little villains early in the tale. Either they should (LITTLE VILLAINS).
resolve the problem of the little villains in a big early showdown or the The Nutcrackers
little villains can keep turning up to harass the actor-puppets throughout are always great
the tale. as small villains.
They are loud,
The big villain is the one most related to the ante. The actors might or menacing,
might not know who the big villain is up front. The big villain might incompetent,
show up early on to taunt them and then not be seen again until the end. and surprisingly
Or the big villain might be a surprise the actors only learn about in the stealthy since they
final minutes of the tale. tend to just barge
into scenes out of
Some examples of big and little villains: nowhere to make
things exciting and
™™ THE SENILE HUNTERS (LITTLE VILLAINS). Three old hunters with kick off a chase or
pop-cork rifles keep mistaking the actors’ puppets for Nutcrackers a fight.
whom they shout at and shoot (harmlessly) with corks. Whenever the
actor-puppets are out in the woods someplace doing sneaky things, ™™ PUNCH’S BOYS
the senile hunters keep showing up and raising a ruckus. (BIG VILLAINS).
Any one of the
™™ THE TRAITOR (LITTLE VILLAIN). Any puppet can be revealed as a Boys on their own
traitor. Punch is particularly good at forcing puppets to betray their makes a great big villain. Pick a Boy and imagine what kind of tale
friends, perhaps by holding a loved one hostage or threatening harm would best show off his unique attributes. Haunt, for example, is
against an innocent. Puppets tend to forgive coerced traitors because already a tale unto himself: he begins circling a neighborhood in
they know Punch is the real villain, but while a traitor is active it Puppettown where one of the actor’s puppets live, or maybe even
greatly complicates the tale. the countryside where Respite is hidden, and the actor-puppets have
to defeat him or drag him away before the Nutcrackers or Mayhem
™™ PUNCH’S STAFF (LITTLE VILLAIN). Punch keeps a sizable notice his attentions.
bureaucracy in his castle with a variety of ministers, officers, sham
wizards, and most any other role you can come up with. These staff ™™ PUNCH’S DRAGON (BIG VILLAIN). If constructed with a stone
are generally ineffectual, even incompetent, and terrified of Punch, heart, Punch’s Dragon is a fearsome creature who flies and has fierce
the Nutcrackers, and the Boys. They want to be seen doing smart, claws and teeth. But the stone-hearted dragon is also sad and lonely.
helpful things for Punch, which means if they encounter the actors’ If properly approached and befriended, his heart may crack open
puppets in a tale, they’re likely to raise a big ruckus so someone will and be revealed as a geode containing beautiful crystals, infusing the
come see them sternly admonish the puppets for whatever they’re dragon with hope and love.
doing. They’re also very competitive, so if two staff come together

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 ™™ DEREK PURPLE GALOSHES. Derek is missing a leg—the Maker
didn’t get to fix him before Punch arose—but still hops pretty fast.
Tales Based on Cans and Cannots He runs a cobbler shop where he cleans the shoes of puppets. He’s
always willing to hide a puppet on the run from the Nutcrackers and
When you’re creating a new tale, consider the Cans and will stand up to them if they come, but he cannot fight at all.
Cannots of your actors’ puppets. Adding villains or set pieces
that exploit Cannots is a great start, as is conceiving of ™™ JENNY SWEETIE MERMAID. Jenny lives in the lake of milk and
challenges that specific Cans can solve. Tailoring the tale to cookies and rarely gets news from the land puppets. During any
your actors is a powerful way to improve Puppetland. As an chase scene across the lake, Jenny thinks they’re just playing and she
example, pick one Cannot from one of the actor-puppets and cavorts happily nearby as the actors’ puppets desperately flee from
come up with a situation that relates to it. Then do it again villains. She provides contrast to the grim events.
for another puppet. String those two situations together and
you’ve got the beginnings of a tale already! ™™ FANNY SMIRKY CHEEKS. Never a bright spark to begin with, Fanny
lost quite a bit of stuffing to the Nutcrackers and has never been right
Let’s say your actors have four puppets, two of whom are since. Something of a holy fool, Fanny misunderstands everything,
finger puppets. That suggests a tale in which the actors have mixes up any message given, fails to recognize danger, and wants to
to transport three important things to triumph. They can’t help everyone. He’s so bumbling he almost becomes a little villain
carry all three at once because finger puppets don’t have because of the chaos he causes, but his basic decency means everyone
functional arms, so what do they do? Maybe the two finger forgives him. In a set piece, Fanny should screw everything up until
puppets decide to walk together and squeeze the third item he accidentally does just the right thing to save the day.
in between them, so they can carry it that way! Of course, if
someone then starts to chase them it could really complicate ™™ DANDELION. This floral finger puppet exists by the dozens across
this plan. And so on…. Puppetland, rooted in the soil. Dandelion cannot talk but hums
cheery tunes when happy and spooky tunes when sad. Dandelion
serves as comic relief with his/their incessant humming, but can
also serve as an alarm when danger is near by changing his tune to
Innocents something ominous.

Puppetland is about innocence, and innocent characters should have ™™ ALI SALI. A shadow puppet from a distant land, Ali is a pilgrim in
important roles. You need someone to react to the events and spur the search of magical places. She’s searching for the Candy Cave in the
actors on. The innocents might be in danger, but might be ordinary belief that inside it can be found the Infinite Confection which will
puppets who witness the action and talk about what they’ve seen. Their bestow sweetness on everyone who has a bite of it. Ali is relentlessly
perspective is valuable in either case. As victims, they represent Punch’s optimistic and comically unfamiliar with Puppetland and its culture.
attempts to destroy innocence; as bystanders, they keep the tale grounded
and react with surprise, sadness, and outrage, giving an emotional
foundation to the fast action of the game. Some innocents might include: MacGuffins
™™ POLLY SQUEAKY DIMPLES. A simple village puppet who is present A MacGuffin is some kind of object or information that the characters are
during a fight between the actors’ puppets and some Nutcrackers. struggling over. In an action movie, the MacGuffin might be a briefcase full
Her reactions to the fight amplify the drama but may also suggest of money or a folder of secret military blueprints. Ultimately, it doesn’t
tactics to the actors. “Oh me, oh my! I hope no one is set on fire by really matter just what the MacGuffin is—what matters is that everyone
that burning lantern!” wants it, to keep it or destroy it or sell it or whatever.
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75
 Puppetland can have MacGuffins too. Judy’s thimble containing the Set Pieces
Maker’s last tear is a MacGuffin. Other MacGuffins might include:
In a movie, a set piece is some big piece of action or story that takes
™™ SILENCE’S SKIN. He took it off, someone stole it, and now all the place in a distinctive location. Any number of action movies have had set
villains want it back. pieces where bad guys and good guys fight in a warehouse, for example.
In Puppetland, a set piece is probably where your climax happens, but you
™™ DIAGRAM OF PUNCH’S CASTLE. It shows all the secret entrances may have multiple set pieces if you think you can squeeze more into an
and tunnels. hour. Spend a little time thinking about the location of your set piece and
maybe sketch a diagram of it. Are there useful items there? Traps? Risky
™™ TALKING GOOSE. The puppet goose can say things that come true, places? Is it dark or light?
and Punch wants its power for himself.
Then sort out what happens there. If the set piece is the climax, then it’s
™™ RECIPE FOR STICKY DOTS. This recipe creates candy sticky dots where the actors can win the ante by getting the MacGuffin and defeating
that can trap Nutcrackers who step on them. the big villain. If it’s a stop along the way, it should be a crucial scene
where a little villain is defeated, or an innocent is rescued, or some key
™™ SWAZZLE. The swazzle is a small oval loop of metal strips around a part of the story is explained so the actors can advance the action. Some
wooden reed, and is held in the mouth of a Punch puppet performer example set pieces:
to create the distinctive
reedy, warbling voice of ™™ PUNCH’S CASTLE DUNGEONS. Below Punch’s castle are his
Punch. A puppet constructs dungeons where he imprisons rebellious puppets. Sketch our four
a swazzle, and with it, prison cells and a torture chamber. Make up a few colorful puppets to
anyone can mimic the voice be locked in the cells who aren’t part of the ante. Some of them could
of Punch, to the confusion be innocents, and some could be small villains. Decide where your
of the Nutcrackers. MacGuffin is hidden. The key action idea is that the Nutcrackers are
bringing a newly captured puppet into the dungeon and their presence
™™ THE BABY. Judy gives can complicate the climax of the tale.
birth to a baby, the child of
Punch, from a pregnancy ™™ THE OLD FARM. A family of puppets was captured by Punch and
that began before the Maker taken away the first week after he killed the Maker. Some people
died. If Punch knew the say it was his own family. In pursuit of the MacGuffin, the actors’
baby existed, he would want puppets reach the old farm and are very surprised to discover Punch
it above all else; once he got there. He will surely kill them all if they try to fight him, but if
it, he would inevitably end they are very sneaky they can hear him talking to himself and learn
up killing it, just like in the important secrets.
puppet shows.
™™ THE LAKE OF MILK AND COOKIES. This is where you should have a
chase scene in which the actors’ puppets jump from floating cookie to
floating cookie, pursued by the Nutcrackers. Jenny Sweetie Mermaid
might help them once she realizes what is happening. Too many
puppets on one cookie might make it tip over.

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™™ THE PARADE. Every year on Punch’s Own Day, there is a mighty Putting it All Together
parade of Nutcrackers who tromp through Puppettown in a big circle
that begins and ends at Punch’s castle. Punch watches from the front To assemble a Puppetland tale, just mix and match the preceding sections.
gate, loudly applauding and commenting on how strong and powerful Start with a MacGuffin, pick a Big Villain, choose a Set Piece, grab a
the Nutcrackers are. Clever puppets might mislead the Nutcrackers couple of Innocents, fill in some Little Villains, and finally establish your
into taking a wrong turn into a trap, or pour sticky glue all over the Ante given everything you now know. Or start with the Villains and the
road to slow them down. And of course, while the Nutcrackers are Innocents, choose the Ante, build the Set Piece, add some Innocents, and
busy parading might be the right time to get up to mischief. pick a MacGuffin. You can put these things together in any order. Just
start with what inspires you and it should lead you to fill in the rest.
™™ THE BOIL. A large family of small beetles have burrowed into the
very firmament of Maker’s Land. They have produced countless eggs
and are busily gathering food to feed their young. The ground over
their burrow is just a thin membrane of painted grass which pulses Your First Tale: The Tale of Three Buttons
and roils as the scurrying beetles press up against it from below.
While their actual entrance is hidden nearby among some rocks, the You can create your first tale from scratch, of course, but if you’d rather
boil is ripe to be pierced, sliced, or broken open by curious puppets. not, then feel free to use this one. It’s called “The Tale of Three Buttons”.
If this happens, hordes of small beetles pour out, desperately
carrying their eggs, to relocate to some safer location.
Opening Set Piece
™™ THE NIGHT SKY. Puppets armed with scissors, knives, nails, or other
pokey objects could use them to climb the very sky itself. At the far The actor-puppets, all friends, woke in their beds in Puppettown. From
boundaries of Maker’s Land, the sky is a flat painted canvas of dark outside, they heard a small puppet calling desperately for help. As the
blue sky and blotchy stars. By jabbing their primitive sharps into the puppets came outside, they found a sorry scene: Farmer Red Hat, a hand
canvas, puppets can climb the sky up, down, and sideways, making puppet, was sitting in his wagon in the town square, riding fast in circles.
for quite a chase scene. A puppet who is jarred too suddenly may even His horse, Nester Hayseed, a marionette, was racing as quick as he could
cause a rip in the canvas big enough for a hapless Nutcracker to fall round and round the square. And trapped in one of the wagon wheels,
through, banishing them from Maker’s Land forever, never to be seen spinning in circles and half-covered in mud, was little Henrietta Penny, a
again. finger puppet milkmaid, who shrieked for help.

Farmer Red Hat was bewildered and hapless. Nester was panicked and
could not stop racing. Henrietta was spitting mud from her mouth and
yelling. They all had one thing in common: each had only one eye. Farmer
Red Hat was missing his left eye, Nester his right eye, and Henrietta
her right eye. Each had a dangling, bright red thread emerging from the
cloth where their eyes used to be. No wonder they were all tangled up and
confused!

Saving Henrietta
The actor-puppets need to save Henrietta and stop the wagon. How
they do this is up to them, and it’s their first challenge. Whatever
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 harebrained scheme they attempt should work as long as they do it using any puppet intent on pursuing them. “Oh my goodness, I certainly hope
teamwork; any single puppet who tries to save Henrietta alone should fail. they don’t crush your knees in their terrible clacking jaws! For then you
Puppetland is a place where good puppets cooperate. might never dance again!” He tags along on any expedition, the better to
whine and quaver with fear at the risk of the enterprise in hopes that the
Once the wagon is stopped and Henrietta saved, the hapless puppets group will choose to abandon their quest. He never betrays the puppets
explain that they ran afoul of a troop of Nutcrackers marching through directly, but he’s not above a bit of dissension-sowing and misdirection.
town after morning bell and had their eyes ripped out. They say this However, if Henrietta is directly threatened, Foppity shows real courage
matter-of-factly, not like they’re suffering from post-traumatic stress and may even sacrifice himself for her sake.
disorder. But in describing their wounds, linger on the uncomfortable
imagery of the red threads
dangling where their eyes Big Villain
used to be, like clusters of
nerves in an empty socket. Spite is our big villain, and he is a very big villain indeed. He’s one of
Henrietta even ties her Punch’s Boys, a hand puppet sewn from the flesh of the Maker, and his
dangling crimson thread particular joy is in maiming innocent puppets. He’s a bully: pushy and
into a pretty bow. Your loud.
tone should be calm and
reasonable, but the imagery Defeating Spite forever is more than the actors can hope for—although if
evoked should be disturbing. they are all repeatedly clever and dramatic, you can always decide they’ve
earned such a significant victory—but luring him away and dealing with
the isolated Nutcrackers to recover the buttons is entirely reasonable.
The Ante
This brings us to our ante: Innocents
tonight is the Puppettown
Dance, and all three puppets Our innocents are of course Farmer Red Hat, Henrietta Penny, and
are keen to attend. In fact, Nester Hayseed. They should come with the players throughout the
there’s a bit of love in the adventure and cause problems along the way. Farmer Red Hat will act
air between Henrietta and increasingly competitive with Foppity Fredworth. Henrietta will keep
Farmer Red Hat. But with making the best of things regarding her eye. (“Well, it was a bit less blue
one eye short each, it’s sure than the other one anyway!”) Use Nester Hayseed, the horse, as your big
to be a disaster—their lack of a second eye means all three are clumsy and surprise. He’s a large horse marionette, which means he’s strong, but you
keep misjudging distances. The actor-puppets have one hour to find the should keep playing him as a slow, hay-chewing country bumpkin always
puppets’ eyes and save the dance from calamity. a step behind everyone until he suddenly uses his enormous strength to
save the day. Nester should be a bit of a pain until suddenly he’s not.

Little Villain
MacGuffins
Our little villain is Foppity Fredworth, a somewhat oily hand puppet who
has romantic designs of his own on Henrietta. Foppity is no true villain, Our MacGuffins are the three buttons. Spite and his Nutcracker squad
but he does hope to dance with Henrietta tonight. He urges caution have taken them away. If the actor-puppets get them back, our innocents
regarding the Nutcrackers and worries quite pointedly about the fate of attend the Puppettown Dance tonight, and Farmer Red Hat and Henrietta
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Penny fall in love. If the actor-puppets fail, Foppity Fredworth triumphs ™™ THE NUTCRACKER CAMP: Pursuing the Nutcrackers who took the
and dances the night away with Henrietta in his arms. Farmer Red Hat eyes, the actor-puppets find them camping in the wilderness. Their
and Nester Hayseed sadly mope away to return to toiling the ungrateful camp is in a rocky area near a cave. The cave is empty, but very
earth. resonant—any sounds made in the cave boom out across the nearby
land. The Nutcrackers have not entered the cave because they’re
scared, a fact the actor-puppets might learn if they eavesdrop. Spite
Set Pieces is with them, juggling the buttons, but he leaves as soon as anything
starts to happen. (“Deal with these puppets! I’m off to Punch’s castle
We have three set pieces for this tale, although the second might be to give him these delicious buttons for his dinner.”)
skipped if the actor-puppets pursue Spite instead of dealing with the
Nutcrackers. ™™ THE SHOWDOWN: Spite makes his way through the wilderness
to Punch’s castle, and the final set piece can happen wherever the
™™ PUPPETTOWN SQUARE: Described earlier, this is just a piece of players choose to make a stand. The lake of milk and cookies would
action to unify the actors, put them under pressure, and demand be a good location for this, if you can emphasize that it lies between
that they solve a problem. Try to conjure up an out-of-control feeling the Nutcracker camp and Punch’s castle, since Spite might be tipped
reminiscent of early 1920s cartoons and ensure the three innocents into the milk and the buttons retrieved when they float to the surface.
and the little villain get to express themselves to establish their If the actors need help, Spite may get distracted by wanting to eat a
importance in the tale. giant cookie.

79
Tales From Puppetland
The single greatest thing about roleplaying Oath, or Delta Green, or Unknown Armies it was If all goes well, you’ll find tales to love and tales
games as an art form is that they are inherently, solely my work, my words, my ideas. It has to hate. None, I think, are boring, the worst of
inescapably, a participatory and collaborative been special to me for that reason. But alone, all sins particularly among revelers at a party.
art form. In the same way that a screenplay unplayed, it’s just another tombstone. I have always believed in erring on the side of
is not a movie, a roleplaying game rulebook passion rather than ambition and these writers
is not a roleplaying game. The game is what This edition offered a new opportunity: to throw have brought plenty of it.
happens at the table, among friends, who come open the doors of my precious, private tomb and
together to birth something new every night. throw a party with some of the most talented But all these accolades are meaningless if you
Game designers can sweat and strain over game designers and writers in the world. do not make the game yourself, at your table,
their beautiful rulebooks with the striking art And like all the best parties, the host swiftly with your friends. Fracture this tombstone,
and the bold advances in ludology but if the becomes irrelevant—the party-goers are the unearth this corpse, and put it on shocking
rulebook goes on a gamer’s shelf and sits there, party, and they find their own rhythm. display. Games are not for reading. They are for
it is not a roleplaying game. It is a tombstone. playing. Please play ours, join our party, don
Only when the spine is cracked open and the What follows are a set of Puppetland tales by the purple lampshade and dance immodestly.
pages are grubby with pizza sauce and the hours many authors. Some hew very close to my
burn away in the fires of creation—only then conception of What Tales Should Be. Others The puppets are waiting.
does it transmute into a game. toss that over the side and blaze their own trails.
I’m good with that, all of that. I get to feel like
Puppetland has always been my most personal I’m running the best game of Puppetland ever
and solitary work. Unlike The Unspeakable for this assembly of amazing talents. ™™ John Scott Tynes

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 There was a flurry of chatter. Suddenly one of The puppets in the square fled in terror. Spite
Boys at Play our puppets was shoved out of the way by an continued to sing. The babies did not stop eating:
invisible force. It shoved another puppet, then candies, wagons, stones, anything. It was all
a little farther off it tipped over a wagon full of sliced to tiny pieces, and they hungered still.
™™ By John Scott Tynes candies. A stack of barrels came tumbling down
and more puppets were shoved aside. Sally cried, “You see? They cannot stop eating!
They will eat everything!”
Opening Set Piece The puppets were surrounded by confusion.
And then Spite appeared. Spite had painted his
Just after morning bell the puppets were face with the biggest smile he could. He had The Ante
gathered in the Puppettown Square, which was lush, ruby red lips and blushing cheeks. He was
all a-bustle. Many puppets were there, singing a mother and he wanted the world to know. If Spite and his babies are not stopped, the
morning songs like “Good morning! Good babies will eat all of Puppetland and everyone
morning! Good morning! And good morning More importantly, he was not alone. Tagging and everything in it. If the actor-puppets fail,
to you!” While they sang they looked for lovely along behind were nine little babies, each then the game ends for this group, forever.
new candies to take home and admire. smaller than a finger puppet. Like Spite and Their copies of the game should be burned,
Punch’s other Boys, they were made of flesh. sold, recycled, or buried in oilcloth for
And what were our favorite puppets doing? Each baby was little more than a flap of skin discovery by a hypothetical future generation.
Perhaps they were getting supplies for a party, folded over and crudely sewn up one side, with a They may not play Puppetland together again.
or perhaps they came to join a choir. They slit for a mouth and a face drawn on with paints.
carried out the business of a normal morning They had neither legs nor arms nor eyes and just
before strange things began to happen. hopped along after their mother. Little Villain
Sally Red Buttons bursts into the square. Spite began to sing. “Good morning! Good The little villain is the invisible force that pushed
“Everyone!” she cried. “Everyone, please! Spite morning! Good morning! And good morning to through the square before Spite arrived—this
is coming!” you!” One of the babies bumped into a shadow is, of course, SILENCE, another of Punch’s Boys,
puppet, Yoon Stormrose, and promptly bit her who has the ability to take off his skin and roam
The singing ended. Every puppet stopped what with its mouth-slit. A cleanly sliced half-moon of the land invisible and silent.
they were doing and trembled in fear. “And it’s paper fell from Yoon’s arm into the baby’s greedy
the worst thing ever!” Sally said. “He is happy! mouth and then continued right through to the Spite has taken Silence’s skin and sliced it
So incredibly happy!” ground, because Spite did not sew up the bottom up to make his babies. Because more than
edge of the babies. anything Spite wants to be beautiful, and he
No one had ever seen Spite happy. The thought knows that all mothers are beautiful. He is
had never before even occurred to anyone. Yoon cried out in surprise. The baby was not not able to comprehend that his babies have
sated. The baby bit Yoon again. The other bottomless gullets and will devour all of
“But why?” Tim Thimbletoe squeaked from atop babies joined in. They nibbled Yoon to confetti existence.
a barrel. in moments, the pieces falling into their mouths
and then onto the ground through their unsewn Silence is desperate to get his skin back, and to
“Because he is now a mother,” Sally said. “And bottoms. They could not contain the food they tell Punch what Spite has done. But without his
he is bringing his babies, his hungry babies! swallowed. Their hunger had no end. skin, Silence cannot speak and is little more than
They are so hungry they will eat the world!” a panicked zephyr, pushing through crowds and
trying to interfere with Spite.
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Silence will bedevil the actor-puppets. He There are numerous ways to solve the problem Innocents
correctly deduces that they might try to solve Spite poses:
this problem, and so he will shove them about The BABIES are wholly innocent. They are
at odd moments, or attract their attention by ™™ If alerted, Punch will be very cross with simply hungry. If their bottoms are sewn up
toppling furniture or other objects. He tries to Spite for stealing Silence’s skin. Punch will they will simply be ordinary babies, of no
lead them to Spite. have the other Boys seize Spite, while Punch particular danger to anyone. Good actors will
and the Nutcrackers capture each baby and rip find a way to save the babies, even though it
But his interference can also ruin their plans, out its stitches. Once the baby unfolds, it stops means Silence will forever roam Puppetland as
by accidentally revealing them to Spite or being a baby and is once again just a flap of a ghost.
complicating their actions. The players cannot skin. Punch will recruit the players to help
simply defeat Silence, but if they can figure out catch the babies as the Nutcracker are fairly Should the actors find a way to save the babies,
who he is and tell him they understand, Silence hapless and several are devoured when they you should expect that Punch will eventually
will calm down and be more helpful than first meet the babies. learn of all this and seek to ensure the babies
interfering. are ripped apart and sewn back together into a
™™ The only real problem with the babies is that new skin for Silence. Silence is worth far more
they cannot fill their tummies. If the actor- to Punch than a brood of babies, after all. But
Big Villain puppets can catch the babies and sew them let the players have their victory, if they pursue
up, they will stop eating everything and this approach, and save the innocents. Spite and
SPITE is our big villain. He is an enormous, cruel behave like normal babies. Spite will take Silence can return in a later tale, with all the
lout crippled by insecurity and self-loathing. He his brood to go live in peace somewhere else, horror that entails.
is painfully aware of how much everyone hates at least until Punch finds him and pulls out
and fears him, but he thinks it is because he is their stitching.
grotesque and ugly, when it’s actually because MacGuffins
he’s horribly violent and vindictive. ™™ Destroying or trapping the babies is not
difficult and any semi-plausible scheme The BABIES are also our MacGuffins. They are
Spite had the idea to make his own babies from can succeed. The babies can be burned not at all smart and will eat anything—indeed,
Silence’s skin, and it is the best thing he has ever or crushed beneath rocks or captured in they will even eat Spite himself if shoved
done. His babies adore him, he is now a beautiful boxes. Just ensure that you always refer to firmly against his flesh. So while the babies
mother in the rosy glow of health, and now he them as “the babies” so the players have to are Innocents who could be saved, they are also
has nothing better to do than traipse through the say things like, “Let’s burn the babies! Yes! MacGuffins who can be used as tools.
countryside with his brood, showing them off Burn the babies to ash!”
and reveling in their antics. The only thing the babies cannot eat is Punch.
™™ Silence cannot do much, but will show up His magic is too great. Which means, sadly,
It is important to understand that Spite is so and assist wherever it helps the tale. He can that the worst-case scenario is all of existence is
happy he is not directly hurting anyone. He has topple each baby so they can be grabbed, devoured except for Punch.
not lain a finger on anyone since making his for example, or trip up Spite or bash open
babies from Silence’s flesh. At this point, Spite the door to Punch’s castle.
himself is completely harmless—but his babies Set Pieces
are endless devourers who will consume the
world. Besides the opening, there are a couple of likely
set pieces to consider:

83
 ARRIVAL OF THE NUTCRACKERS: Whether muddy wet with their tears, so they can’t be
brought by the actor-puppets or bumbling The Great Sage happy, that’s for sure.
in as their own mobile set piece, a squad of
Nutcrackers encounter Spite and the babies. OF, the Mountain! “Oh, Judy wants you to go find the Great Sage?
They are very deferential to Spite at first, unless Wow! You must be very brave!”
they already know better, and when the babies
begin to devour them to Spite’s beaming delight, ™™ By Arnold Cassel
the Nutcrackers will at first attempt to make the Ante
best of it. “Oh, I needed to lose a bit of weight!”
the first one to be nibbled cries. But when it Opening Set Piece The Great Sage has just enough magic left in
becomes clear that the babies spell certain death her for one last Wish. Judy thinks that she
for the Nutcrackers, they finally change their “Surely you have heard of the Greatest of the might help, but she’s been afraid to ask. Now
tune and fight back. They are not very effective Great Sages, the Wisest of the puppets? Why I Judy has learned that Grief is living near The
at fighting the babies unless directed by the hear she’s smarter than Judy! And—and older Great Sage, and she fears that Grief will force
actor-puppets. Haunt turns up to lend a hand, than the Maker, and tougher than old Punch, and The Great Sage to make Punch immortal!
but only succeeds in frightening and confusing bigger than all the Boys put together.
the Nutcrackers even further. The Great Sage could do it, for sure, but maybe
“Judy said that when the Great Sage of the the clever puppets can beat Grief to the top and
PLEADING WITH PUNCH: The actors may decide Mountain spoke, nobody didn’t hear her. Or is it wish to know where the Maker is instead.
that Punch needs to intervene to rein in his that everybody heard her?
wayward Boy. If so, their attempt to enter Punch’s
castle should be a big set piece. The Nutcrackers “You know what I mean. She was loud! A big Big and Little Villains
who guard the gate will not let them in no voice for such an old woman. And magical too!
matter what they say, unless Spite and the babies Puppets from everywhere would come to her, This adventure is rife with peril! Villains lurk
show up and start chowing down. But Haunt and their problems would be solved right away! around every corner! It will take some careful
can help the actor-puppets here, knocking the planning, or great luck!
Nutcrackers out of the way and bashing the gate “But she disappeared, I think. I asked Judy
open. Somewhere inside, the actor-puppets should where the Great Sage went, and all she did was GRIEF lives in a cave at the foot of the
encounter Mayhem, who is an unstoppable force of wave her hands at the mountains over there. mountain. The cave has big iron bars and a good
destruction. This is Haunt’s cue to attack, keeping But nobody goes that way, for sure. I hear Grief lock that only someone as strong as Punch could
Mayhem busy so the actors can slip by and reach lives out there. He’s not allowed in Puppettown break open. But Punch isn’t likely to be found
Punch’s throne room to plead their case. The fight anymore, so he has a cave near the Mountain here, as Punch likes to keep Grief far away from
between Haunt and Mayhem, who cannot figure that he stays in. himself.
out what is going on, should be both comical and
very destructive. “But even the cave is on the other side of those SHACKLEBONES the marionette lives in the
spooky woods! Some puppets tell tales of a woods at the foot of the mountain. Shacklebones
marionette named old Shacklebones! He moves is always moving, and talks in a sing-song voice.
through that forest with a clicker-clack and Shacklebones can leap up into trees or down
grabs up puppets too! from them in an instant, no matter how tall, and
can bind up a puppet in strings and drag them
“He strings them up in the trees with smiles up, up, up! Shacklebones cannot move without
stitched in to their faces. But the ground is
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rattling like old hollow bones, and can’t stand if she concentrates on nothing but that for a it’s not likely. Grief can sense their sadness and
the mention of Punch’s name, no not one bit! solid minute, and she can grant one and only plucks them down for his own fun.
one wish before the rest of her magic runs out.
Some NUTCRACKERS are on the trail leading She cannot speak in anything but a booming The woods are haunted by the click-clack-echo
up the mountain too, but they are easily lost and rumble (so anyone who wants to listen can hear of Shacklebones himself, and puppets will have
confused. Grief will be drawn to help them, what she’s saying, no matter how far away they to move through quietly, keep an open ear to
naturally. But maybe the puppets can keep them are, even if they are all the way in Punch’s listen for the rattling, and both eyes open for the
from finding one another. castle), she cannot move about without hurting many nets and snares that Shacklebones has set.
any puppet smaller than a marionette, and
she cannot decide what to spend her last True He wants only to make puppets happy—as
Innocents Wish on, because she thinks too hard about the happy as Grief’s perfectly smiling face.
consequences.
A few other puppets are on the mountain. GRIEF’S CAVE is a terrible, dark place, darker
still than the woods around it, and darker than
SILLY BILLY GRUFF, WILLY CHILLY TUFF, MOLLY MacGuffins the night sky above. Instead of twinkling stars,
WOOLY STUFF, ROXXY FLOCKSIE BUFF, AND the only light is from a candle deep inside, and
JOLLY OLLIE PUFF are finger puppets. Wouldn’t THE ONE REMAINING TRUE WISH OF THE scattered reflections from shards of broken
you guess it? They are all sheep! They’ve been GREAT SAGE OF is what this is all about. OF eyes and shoes and puppets lining the floor.
in these woods and near this mountain for as just can’t make the wish on her own, because It’s nearly impossible to walk around without
long as anyone can remember, but the rest of she’s just too wise! She needs someone a little making a crunching noise. If any puppet gets in
Puppetland seems to have forgotten about them. foolish, but very determined and very sincere, Grief’s way, he might take them back here before
to decide what that wish should be. he gets to work on them, leaving just enough
They are stubborn and territorial. They can time for a bold rescue.
block a path if they all work together, and they But OF is very old and very tired of worrying
can each call out to one another in their secret about this Wish. She might just settle for There aren’t any traps, and the iron gate won’t
language of bleats. They can’t stomach the idea someone petty and angry, who is also equally be locked if Grief is in a hurry. The cave
of puppets wandering over their turf without determined and sincere.
trading them something of value first, and they
can’t say anything about the Great Sage, even Either way, that True Wish is real, as real as
when asked directly, except to stare wistfully at all of the magic of Puppetland put together. It
the mountain and say “I know I’ve seen her…” could reshape all the actor-puppets’ stories to
before being lost in thought and forgetting the come.
question.

THE GREAT SAGE OF (A.K.A. THE Set Pieces

MOUNTAIN): OF (pronounced like ‘ofv’) is a
unique and special puppet. She is huge, taking THE SHACKLEBONES TRAILS are like any
up an entire set (location) all by herself! She other night-time wood in Puppetland, except
is awe-inspiring, terrifically big, and made twice as tall! High up in the trees, there are
entirely of stone! She can fool anyone into countless threads going too and fro among
thinking she is a mountain if she doesn’t move, the branches. There may even be some poor
she can enchant a puppet to forget about her puppets up there, still wriggling about, but
85
 certainly has plenty of sharp tools and terrible The Ante
hitting objects, but no good puppet could ever The Missing Peace
use those—even in self-defense. Pecan Sandy hails from Wedding Cake Castle,
along with several other confectionery puppets.
THE WINDY PASS is a trail leaving the forest ™™ By Fred Hicks Their leader, if they have one, is Pie-Maker
and approaching the mountain. It starts with Penny, the finest baker in all of Maker’s Land.
a little bridge, under which the five ewes and Her prize project is her Ten-Year Pie, a one-of-
rams live. The bridge is strong and old, mossy Opening Set Piece a-kind pastry treat that takes ten years to make.
and cold, and the sheep keep a close eye on it It was to be completed just a few days ago, when
at all times. Not even a Nutcracker could get The puppets woke in their beds, safe and snug Penny discovered that a thief had stolen a piece
by without trouble from these five, but they and whole like always, in Puppettown. (Or did of the Ten-Year Pie! In a rage, she has begun
certainly couldn’t hold off Punch’s troops they make their homes in Respite? If so, they an inquisition and no one in Wedding Cake
forever. snuck back to Puppettown for a visit.) As they Castle is safe. Pecan Sandy insists that she is
began to go about their business, they heard the innocent, as have been the others who have been
Beyond the bridge, the trail loops back and rattle of the wheels of a giant cart, and the clack- accused before her. The actor-puppets have one
forth, side-to-side, zig-zagging as it slowly goes clack-stomp-stomp marching of the Nutcrackers. hour to solve the mystery of the missing piece
up and up. The view of all of Puppetland in its and restore peace to Wedding Cake Castle. If
wintery, starlit beauty is really wonderful, and The Nutcrackers were guarding a delivery cart they fail, innocent puppets may be punished
it’s not soon forgotten. that carried a gigantic pie, bigger than any horribly.
puppet, with faint cries for help coming from
THE GREAT SAGE is a set all to herself. She’s inside. (“Help, oh help! I have been baked!”)
big, and tricky, tough to climb, and has covered Little Villains
herself in trees and trails and grasses. Her smile
is broad and radiant, and she’s sitting cross- Stopping the Wagon Aside from the Nutcrackers in the opening, our
legged. It might take an entire crew of people little villains for this tale are the members of
to operate all of her pieces, but since the Maker The actor-puppets need to stop the wagon, Pie-Maker Penny’s Inquisition. They’re eager to
died, she’s constantly crumbling around the overcome the Nutcrackers, and open up the find the thief and have already outed a number of
edges and falling in to disrepair. She’s lucky to pie. As actors are a creative bunch, and these culprits—only to later declare that new evidence
move her eyes at the same time she speaks. Nutcrackers are not as strongly committed has pointed them to another one. If they keep at it,
to their job as they should be—they’ve been all the confections of Wedding Cake Castle will end
Very rarely will she move her arms, and she’s marching with this delicious-smelling pie for a up in one of Penny’s pies and shipped off to Punch
long since given up moving the rest of her huge long time, without a bite to eat themselves—this and his Boys for dessert!
body. Even just moving her arms is a good way to should be no real trouble.
accidentally crush smaller puppets. ™™ FLOUR (HAND PUPPET): Slow and heavy,
If the actor-puppets don’t move to stop the Flour is a burlap sack with two button eyes
wagon and claim the pie, the pie will be and a mouth, filled with flour. Prisoners of
delivered to Punch’s castle, and whoever is the Inquisition are tossed in the sack and
inside will certainly be served up for dinner. coated with flour, ensuring they’ll leave a
trail if they manage to escape.
Inside the pie, they find Pecan Sandy, who tells
a tale of woe, nervously leaking sand from her ™™ BUTTER (MARIONETTE): Butter is the
sand-stuffed body as she does. smooth-talker of the group, happy to play
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 friends if it’ll get her the answer she wants. sure to tie the knot. But then Punch murdered The MacGuffin
But Butter is no friend. She’s a slippery the Maker, and Judy refused ever to marry him,
one, impossible to hold onto for long and and that left Punch barred from ever entering The MacGuffin here is, clearly, THE MISSING
sure to make other puppets lose their Wedding Cake Castle, and standing by her side PIECE OF THE TEN-YEAR PIE . Who stole it?
grip in her role as the Inquisition’s chief at the top, where it is said you can touch the Why did they steal it? A few potentials exist. It’s
interrogator. sky above—and, with the right pair of scissors, up to the puppetmaster to decide which one fits
maybe even snip open the seams that hold it the story as it unfolds—it’s rarely the first one
™™ EGG (FINGER PUPPET): Egg once spent shut. Punch would dearly love to gain admission the actor-puppets go after.
all his time on top of the walls of Wedding to the Castle so he can do just that, and he’s
Cake Castle, surveying the countryside, willing to find a new wife to make that a reality. ™™ ONE OF PUNCH’S BOYS COULD BE
watching out for Nutcrackers, and planning BEHIND IT. Sneaky and part-time invisible
where Penny might send her treats next. As such Punch has been courting Penny, or Silence might have been sent by Punch to
But Penny has him all scrambled up now, he would be if she didn’t keep sending him steal the piece and put Penny off her game,
and he’s scouring the castle as head of delicious pies. Pies which keep him fat and gaining Punch an opening for stepping up
investigations, looking for the thief. lazy and unwilling to make the trek out to the his courtship game. Penny’s pies might be
countryside for a wedding. He’s delighted, keeping Punch lazy, but that doesn’t mean
™™ MILK (SHADOW PUPPET): The theft of course, that lately Penny’s pies have been he won’t get his Boys to do the work for
of the piece of Ten-Year Pie has turned arriving stuffed with traitors, and sees it as a him.
tall-and-slender Milk sour. She’s the sign that she’s getting sweet on him.
Inquisition’s top accuser, quick to take any ™™ ONE OF THE INNOCENTS MIGHT BE
sign of potentially suspicious behavior as NOT-SO-INNOCENT. All of them have
evidence of the darkest treachery. She’s also Innocents a good reason for wanting a taste of the
very jumpy, sure that at any moment the Ten-Year Pie, but they know that sharing is
criminal element of the castle will tip her The innocents are PECAN SANDY AND HER important, and how important the Pie is to
over and take her out. FRIENDS, the other remaining confections Penny, so of course none of them touched
of Wedding Cake Castle—Spongecake Bob, it. You have to be invited first! And yet,
Chocolate É. Claire, Cookie Muenster, and the confections are very childlike, and that
The Big Villains Freddie Salted Caramel. If the actor-puppets means there are times their impulses get
don’t solve the crime soon, the confections will the better of them. If it turns out one of
The big villain of this tale is PIE-MAKER each get picked up by the Inquisition, one by them did sneak off with that missing piece,
PENNY. Once she made baked treats for all of one, leaving behind only a few crumbs and a the culprit wouldn’t have realized how bad
Maker’s Land, and her helpers (who became dusting of flour. it made things until it was too late, and
the Inquisition) made sure that nobody went now they’re too scared of how everyone will
without cake and pie and cookies for long. But Deep down, the confections want to help the react if they’re found out.
the theft has undone her; she’s driven strongly actor-puppets, but are too scared to speak up or
by her Cannots now (particularly cannot forgive act out. It will take some convincing if they’re ™™ MAYBE IT’S AN INSIDE JOB. Penny has
and forget) and her ire grows with every new to be enlisted. Moving them outside of the castle ruled the kitchen at Wedding Cake Castle
accusation. to potential safety is out of the question as well, for years (at least ten, in fact), and that
as they’ve never truly known life outside of its doesn’t always sit well with the others who
But the threat of PUNCH lingers over all of frosting-covered walls and find the idea of it do their business there—her helpers, who
Wedding Cake Castle, too. The Maker built the slightly terrifying. currently make up the Inquisition. Maybe
castle when it looked like Punch and Judy were one of them has turned, and is trying
87
 to undermine Penny by ruining her pet Altercations with the Inquisition are likely
project and destroying the life she’s built up here as well—it’s both Egg’s familiar
around herself. Joining the Inquisition home turf, and a good place for them to
turns out to be a very effective smoke- dangle someone they’re interrogating, to
screen for covering up their own wrong- scare them into talking.
doings.
™™ THE KITCHEN: The seat of Penny’s power,
the Kitchen is found towards the top of
Set Pieces the castle. It’s full of all manner of kitchen
implements and is where what’s left of
All the primary action of the tale is set around the Ten-Year Pie can be found. The actor-
Wedding Cake Castle. Wedding Cake Castle is a puppets can get a look at the Pie, but only if
tall, frosting-covered grand palace found out in Penny is distracted or somehow convinced
the countryside, outside of Punch’s easy reach. to let them look. On one side is a big oven:
Its walls are delicious, but difficult to scale, it doesn’t give off any real heat (though red
and entry through the gates is permitted only lights do shine from inside when it’s in use),
by invitation of one of the native inhabitants. but puppets that get stuffed inside tend
Thanks to the rescue of Pecan Sandy, the actor- to come out baked into a pie. A delicious,
puppets will already have an invite to enter. inescapable pie. Any confrontations with
Penny are sure to end up here, and any
™™ THE CART: Described up top, the only set captured puppets are very likely to be
piece we have outside of Wedding Cake introduced to the oven.
Castle; its main purpose is to point the
actor-puppets towards the Castle and get ™™ THE TOP: Only a married couple may stand
them their “in” by way of Pecan Sandy. atop the pedestal at the top of Wedding
Cake Castle; the Maker’s magic has made
™™ THE LOWER LAYERS: This is the easiest it so. There’s some room for other puppets
place to hide and stay hidden, floor after to walk around the edge, but it’s not a lot.
spongy floor of cakey architecture, where If the events of the tale give Punch his
most of the Castle’s residents live. The opportunity for a wedding-day, he’s sure to
Inquisition comes down here, but typically head here with his new bride—whoever that
only to accuse someone and drag them off, turns out to be—and use it to rip the sky
so it’s a good place for the actor-puppets open and learn what lies beyond.
to make their plans and continue the
investigation.

™™ THE WALLS: The Walls of the Castle give

a view of the countryside, and present one
possible (but unlikely) entry-point for any
possible thieves from outside the Castle.
Have Punch’s agents figured out how to
climb the typically-unclimbable walls?
88
 only opened when a Nutcracker is damaged or entirely forgotten about Judy and the Maker and
Overtime In destroyed. It could build wondrous things or has no sympathy for rebels and exiles.
it could be destroyed to prevent Punch from
the Factory ever building another Nutcracker again. But Bran convinced Melvin that the actor-puppets
the puppets have only a single night to work, are here to tour the factory in order to possibly
because Bran tricked the caretaker, Melvin Grey expand it. Melvin would like the factory to
™™ By Ross Payton Chisel, into looking the other way by saying that be reopened very much. However, he is very
they only wanted to have a tour of the factory. protective of the factory.

Opening Set Piece If the actor-puppets wish to actually do

Little Villains anything, they must distract or trick Melvin.
The puppets awoke in their beds and saw that They could lock him in a closet if they are mean
someone had slipped an identical note under NUTCRACKERS endlessly patrol the castle, and puppets or try to persuade him that Punch
each of their doors. The note instructed them to one will surely notice lights on in the factory is a bad puppet. Melvin is a very proud and
go to an alley between Pennywhistle Lane and at night. If the Nutcracker finds out that rebel old puppet, so he has rejected the idea that he
Blackbriar Road in Puppettown and hide there puppets are in the factory, he will surely raise is a victim of Punch. It will be very hard to
until dark. A puppet named Bran Quick Gloves the alarm. convince him otherwise.
would greet them by saying, “Overtime is hard
work, but it pays well enough.” And they should A single Nutcracker could be stopped if the
respond, “Hard work is reward enough for a actor-puppets team up on him and ambush Innocents
brave worker.” him quickly. It would be easy to set a trap. For
example, they could string some thread low BRAN QUICK GLOVES is a well meaning and
When they went to the alley and said the words, across a corridor to trip him, and then stuff a clever puppet, but he is also naïve. He is very
Bran opened a hidden door in the alley that led rag in his mouth so he could not bite or scream. eager to impress Judy and will volunteer for
down. The puppets soon found themselves in The same tools used to make Nutcrackers could the riskiest jobs in Respite. If a Nutcracker
the factory in Punch’s castle. It was a marvelous be used to dismantle one very quickly. But there discovers the actor-puppets, Bran will try
place, filled with large and strange machines. are many Nutcrackers, and while one that goes to lure him away, although that will almost
Giant gears and cogs hung above them, and missing may be unnoticed, if two or more are certainly lead to his doom.
workbenches with gleaming tools lined the walls. ambushed, the rest will surely notice and start
Pieces of Nutcrackers were stacked up against looking for their errant brothers. The actor- Bran does not realize that others may find the
the corner, replacement parts. Bran explained puppets cannot hope to dismantle the entire tunnel. Another innocent puppet like SUSAN
that the puppets would have the run of the army this way. FUCHSIA PENNY may stumble across it while
factory for the night. Every machine could be the party is in the factory. Explaining her
used to help Judy or hurt Punch! presence to Melvin and keeping her out of
Big Villain trouble will further complicate matters.

Ante MELVIN GREY CHISEL is a lonely puppet.

He is more a prisoner than a willing servant MacGuffins
Before it was used only to build Nutcrackers of Punch, but he has gone mad from being
for Punch, the factory made many useful tools alone for so long. He thinks he is a trusted and The factory is positively filled with MacGuffins,
and machines. Punch’s army is large enough valued servant and often talks to himself about although some will be easier to use than
for now, so it is not actively used. The doors are imaginary tea parties at Punch’s court. He has others. Melvin is not much of a caretaker, so
89
 some of the machines have rusted or broken or saw off bits of them. Using the tools MELVIN’S TOUR: Melvin believes the actor-
down. Others were salvaged for parts for more requires the actor-puppets get very close, puppets are also ‘loyal’ servants of Punch and
Nutcrackers. A few of the workbenches still though, and that’s never a safe thing to do wants to impress them so they will reopen the
have plans for marvelous items that could help around Nutcrackers. factory. As he guides them around, the actor-
Respite or fight Punch. puppets must either split up so they can work or
™™ SABOTAGE THE FACTORY: Instead of capture Melvin so he won’t get in their way. The
™™ CANDY CONVERTER: A machine that building something, the actor-puppets longer they let Melvin speak about the factory,
transforms candy from one type into could try to break every machine and tool the more they will learn about it but the less
another. The puppets of Respite would very so that no one could ever use the factory time they will have to work.
much enjoy such a machine because they again. That would be hard to do without
are very tired of the candy they have now. It angering Melvin or alerting a nearby NUTCRACKER PATROL: A Nutcracker saw a
would help morale quite a bit. It looks like a Nutcracker, though. stray light in the factory’s windows so he has
grinder and would be very hard to carry. come closer to investigate. The actor-puppets
™™ SOMETHING ELSE: Perhaps the actors must lure him away or ambush him so he won’t
™™ NUTCRACKER DISGUISE: The actor- have another idea in mind. Who knows report back.
puppets could make a very convincing what kind of machinery could be built?
disguise by hollowing out spare parts SUSAN STUMBLES THROUGH THE TUNNEL:
and wearing it like a suit of armor. No An innocent puppet found the tunnel and is
Nutcracker could see through such a clever Set Pieces making a lot of noise. The actor-puppets must
disguise, but Punch and his Boys might, race through the tunnel to catch her before she
especially if the disguised actor-puppet MEETING IN PUPPETTOWN: The actor- falls into a pit or alerts the Nutcrackers.
does not behave like a Nutcracker. Still, it puppets must sneak through the town without
could be very useful, indeed. being seen. Nutcrackers patrol the streets, MELVIN RETURNS: Melvin will either get
perhaps bullying innocent townsfolk. The suspicious no matter how well they trick him, or
™™ CATAPULT: A weapon made to destroy actor-puppets could ask citizens of Puppettown escape if they lock him in a room or tie him up.
buildings and castles, not puppets. A to let them sneak through their houses or He will do his best to cause a ruckus and alert
single shot from the catapult could destroy perhaps they could leap from rooftop to rooftop. the Nutcrackers. The actor-puppets need to
a Nutcracker or possibly one of Punch’s Perhaps one actor-puppet causes a distraction at hurry up or else it will be too late!
Boys. It might even hurt Punch himself. one end of town to lure the patrols away while
Of course, it is very slow and large, the other actor-puppets sneak in. Of course,
and it would require a heavy object as that puppet will have a harder time reaching the Conclusion
ammunition. Clever actor-puppets could rendezvous.
build the parts in the factory that night, Once the actor-puppets flee through the tunnel,
carry them away, and then put them THE TUNNEL: Bran leads the actor-puppets Punch’s forces will discover the factory has
together somewhere else. through a twisty and dark tunnel while he been used. They will seal up the tunnels and
explains his idea. The actor-puppets should double the patrols of Nutcrackers. Hopefully,
™™ TOOLS TO DISMANTLE NUTCRACKERS: think of a plan as they walk, because once they whatever the actor-puppets did will help
The actor-puppets could bundle up all the enter the factory, Melvin will be there. They their struggle against Punch. Poor Melvin is
tools used to build Nutcrackers and with must be careful where they step because deep most likely doomed unless the actor-puppets
a bit of re-engineering, turn them into pits are scattered about. Fall down one and they convince him to join Judy at Respite with them.
weapons. Cruel-minded puppets can easily may never stop falling.
pop off limbs and heads with these tools
90
 “Finally!” he bellowed in his high and The Ante
Punch and reedy, swazzle-inflected voice. “Bring those
troublemakers over here!” The actor-puppets need to return within the hour
the Beanstalk with a golden treasure for Punch or they will be
Punch stood by some sort of small crevice or forever trapped in the land of the giants. The
sinkhole in the ground. It had crumbled and land of the giants is, of course, the world outside
™™ By John Scott Tynes collapsed, or maybe was never finished in the of Puppetland: the home of the Maker, where he
first place. And up from the void is something no built all of Puppetland before the rise of Punch
one has ever seen in Puppetland: an actual, living the Maker-Killer. The Maker’s body is somewhere
Opening Set Piece plant. A vivid green vine with spade-shaped there still, although the actor-puppets will not
leaves twisted its way into Puppetland. The find it in this tale. They’ll find plenty more to
Before morning bell, as the puppets slept snugly leaves were bigger than any finger puppet, much keep them busy.
in their beds, there was a sharp rap-rap-rapping bigger than the sculpted and painted plants that
at the door. Outside were the Nutcrackers, who inhabited Punch’s realm. Asking Punch questions will get them
displayed a written order signed by Punch nowhere—Punch does not actually know
himself, in the form of a smeary X on a piece “It’s a beanstalk,” Punch insisted. “And we all where the vine leads, how it came to be here,
of torn fabric, given that Punch could neither know where that leads: to the land of giants!” whether there are any giants waiting, or if there
read nor write. “It says you’re coming with us!” is actually any golden treasure to be had. But
clacked the Nutcrackers. And indeed they were. The Nutcrackers reared back in fright. Punch has a profound belief in story, and his
confidence in this one is unshakeable.
The Nutcrackers marched the puppets to a “I want you lot of sorry troublemakers to climb
desolate wilderness, and they all clambered over this vine, visit the land of the giants, and steal
the side of a mountain. The puppets found they for me a golden treasure! Any one will do; I’m Little Villain
may ask questions, taunt the Nutcrackers, and not picky.”
generally enjoy themselves as best they could. The little villain is the Nutcracker, who may
The Nutcrackers had no idea what this was Punch did not tolerate defiance, and his eventually reveal that his name is KARL . Karl
about—they were just following orders—but Nutcrackers looked eager to seize and crunch is not directly opposed to the actor-puppets
they guessed that the puppets were probably any puppet who angered Punch. In fact, Punch but he does bark orders at them to spur them
going to be shoved into a bonfire or possibly ordered a Nutcracker to accompany them. The on, object to almost any plan of any complexity
thrown off a cliff, or maybe Mayhem would rip Nutcracker’s jaw popped open and hung there, whatsoever, and frequently lets his jaw clatter in
out their stuffing. In fact, they had a variety terrified. fear that giants will eat them.
of possible fates to discuss, although they
were short on actual knowledge of anything, “Happy now?” Punch sneered at the actor- Karl’s role is to be an obnoxious annoyance, but
including why the puppets were in trouble. puppets. “And if you aren’t back with a golden one who will enforce Punch’s rules: the actor-
“Insubordination!” they cried. “Probably!” treasure for me within the hour, we’ll fill in his puppets need to find a golden treasure and not
hole and bury all of you forever in the land of fool around with anything else.
Arriving finally at the very edge of the world, the giants!”
more Nutcrackers awaited them as did the It’s possible that the actor-puppets may get the
fearsome figure of Punch himself. Punch’s eyes best of Karl, perhaps by shoving him off a table
gleam behind his mask of flesh as he saw the or something. Karl is determined and strong,
puppets approach. and if at all possible he will return to the tale

91
 by any means necessary, and when he is least art by the Maker, and it is an object of instant of drawers is a gleaming golden box, if only
expected. He will be very cross. desire for both Karl and the rat pack, the latter the puppets could reach it. They will have to
of whom assumes it must contain delicious find ways to climb and clamber up and over
However, it is also possible that Karl may morsels of food. these enormous obstacles to reach the golden
sacrifice himself to save the actor-puppets. He’s treasure and get it back down again.
here to ensure Punch’s mission is a success, Karl wants to possess the Clockwork Ballerina.
after all, and if that means he has to die, he’ll The rat pack want to open the box and tear it ™™ ATTACK OF THE RATS: When the puppets
do so. apart to find the food they hope is inside. The surmount the chest of drawers and find the
actor-puppets want to get it back to Punch to golden treasure, opening the box plays the
escape this land of giants. Not all of them can tune. That tune in turn summons the rat
Big Villain end the tale happily. pack, whose glowing eyes first appear in
dim pooling shadows beneath furniture and
The big villain is a PACK OF RATS! These savage, in corners. Then they emerge and charge,
hungry vermin have infested the home of the Set Pieces scampering up the furniture to do battle. At
Maker since his death. They have run out of food the same time, Karl has seen the Clockwork
and are desperate for anything they can chew, ™™ CLIMBING THE VINE: The vine is literally a Ballerina and has fallen instantly in love.
such as puppet stuffing, puppet fabric, puppet beanstalk growing from a pot in the Maker’s As the rats approach, he finds his courage
eyeballs, puppet shoes, and so on. home. It has grown wild over the furniture to defend the ballerina and strides forth
and finally found a crack into Puppetland to do battle with the rats as Tchaikovsky’s
The rats are somewhat organized, but also itself, through which it has grown. The crack theme plays. Of course, he cannot fight
greedy and selfish. They will help each other is large enough for the actor-puppets and them alone—the actor-puppets must engage
only if convenient or beneficial to themselves. Karl the Nutcracker to fit through. Beyond as well, finding ways to shove the rats off
the crack, however, is a great peril: a long the chest, trap them in drawers, run them
drop to the floor that could kill any puppet. through with fountain pens, and generally
Innocents The actor-puppets and Karl must clamber wreak mayhem.
along the beanstalk away from Puppetland
The innocent of this story is the CLOCKWORK to the pot where the plant is rooted. This ™™ HOMECOMING: Returning to the beanstalk
BALLERINA . This tiny golden figure resides is a perilous climb. Finger puppets are with the little golden music box should be a
within a tiny golden music box. When the particularly disadvantages owing to their lack brief but perilous return—especially since
box is opened, the box plays a tinkly tune: the of arms—other puppets will have to carry little finger puppets need to be carried, too.
overture from Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker. As the them somehow while still holding onto the One final rat, the Rat King, can appear to
music plays, the tiny dancer spins round and beanstalk. Karl will offer to carry a finger menace them. As they near the crevice back
round. Karl will immediately and hopelessly fall puppet in his jaws, a frightening prospect, but into Puppetland, they can hear Punch’s shrill
in love with her, even though she is but a small one he makes with all genuine earnestness. voice crying out for their return. “Where is
carven figure of gold. “It’s easy!” he clacks. “Just get in my mouth my golden treasure?” Once they emerge, he is
and my jaws will keep you shut tight!” deliriously happy to have the music box. He
flings the box open and listens to the music,
MacGuffins ™™ THE GIANT FURNITURE: Here in this land genuinely delighted. Only the actor-puppets
of giants, everything is so much bigger notice that the Clockwork Ballerina is
The MUSIC BOX containing the Clockwork than these meager puppets. Recognizable missing, and that Karl is quietly leaving with
Ballerina is our MacGuffin. It is an acceptable furniture such as chairs and tables seem as something precious in his arms.
golden treasure to satisfy Punch, it is a work of tall as Puppettown itself! But atop a chest
92
 Punch Dammed It!
Big and Little Villains
™™ By Arnold Cassel “Creeeeeeeeak,” went the bed upstairs, and loud
yawns sounded as the little puppets stretched SPITE and HAUNT are both on this job, with a
and shuffled off their blankets and raised their squad or three of NUTCRACKERS.
Opening Set Piece heads up.
Spite is overseeing the Nutcrackers as they dam
Judy busied herself by wringing her hands Already it was time for breakfast, and time to the lake and harvest all of the cookies. It’s a
and staring out the window. She tried hard not tell the truth. good thing for the puppets that Spite is just as
to think about the stack of worn out, frazzled happy breaking up Nutcrackers when they are
cookies on the tray in front of her, the same tray clumsy or slow, but it would be terrible if Spite
she had been using all her life at meal time. She Ante were to turn his attentions on anyone else.
tried and tried to think of happy meals from
before, long before in the time when the Maker Judy has promised the puppets in Respite a Haunt has not been seen by Punch or his Boys
was still alive. delicious Midwinter Feast tomorrow, but it for a few days, but all will soon discover that
seems the lake of milk and cookies has all Haunt has been busy in the woods near the
But now she was hiding, always hiding. Hiding dried up! Without this Feast to cheer them shore of the lake of milk and cookies. Spite and
from Punch, or hiding from his terrible Boys. up, many of the puppets will become angry the Nutcrackers will surely be happy to have
Hiding other puppets who had made enemies and return to Puppettown. Punch and his found Haunt, for that can only mean one thing:
out of Punch. Hiding her home of Respite from Nutcrackers will find out where Respite is, it’s time to hurt some disloyal puppets!
any puppets that wandered too close. Hiding one way or the other, and surely Judy will be
her anxieties and fears from the puppets that captured!
depended on her. Innocents
Judy saw some puppets (Swimming Orchid and
And now she realized she was hiding again, and Darwin Happy Beak, described below) around SWIMMING ORCHID and DARWIN HAPPY
this time, she was hiding the truth. The fresh the lake yesterday, but was so flustered that she BEAK are two playful hand puppets that live on
and wonderful cookies she had set out to gather didn’t speak with them. It’s obvious Punch is (and in!) the lake. They’re bound to be found by
yesterday were nowhere to be found, and she behind this, but Judy isn’t sure whose side the Spite soon, as Haunt has been circling them all
couldn’t use these old things for the promised otter and the penguin are on. night.
Midwinter Feast. She knew that the sight of
these ugly things at Feast time would drive Swimming Orchid is a wonderful hand puppet
many of the puppets away from Respite and with fur the pattern of a wild flower. She is
back to Punch. very loyal, and a great swimmer. She can jump
93
 playfully from the water (or milk), and her Darwin Happy Beak knows about a MAGIC BENEATH AND BELOW THE LAKE OF MILK
giggle can make any puppet feel beautiful. She TREE . He’s not so sure what it does, but he AND COOKIES the Nutcrackers are hard at
can’t move faster than a marionette on land, and remembers seeing it when he left Puppettown work. Spite tied rocks to their feet so they would
she can’t even think of staying away from the and came to the lake. It might not be possible not float and marched them in to the lake. Soon
lake of milk and cookies for too long, because to find it just now, though. It looks just exactly indeed, they will draw up the soggy fabric of
she has nightmares about falling asleep and like all the other trees, only when you knock on the lake bed and pull it over the place where
never finding her way back. it, it sounds like a frog. What could it do, and the cookies come from. Soon enough they will
who ever could find such a thing? weigh down their dam with heavy heavy rocks,
Darwin Happy Beak is a penguin with a classy and only a few escaping bubbles will signal the
monocle. He is well spoken, and a pretty good end of the cookies.
swimmer. He can tell a lot about a puppet just Set Pieces
by looking at them, even secrets they didn’t Orchid has seen this, and told Darwin, but they
know they had. He can also speak with authority THE LAKE OF MILK AND COOKIES has many just don’t know what to do! How terribly crafty
and confuse those who just follow orders (like shores of note, but it doesn’t seem to flow is Punch’s plan!
Nutcrackers). Darwin Happy Beak can’t keep from anywhere. The cookies seem to appear
a puppet’s attention too long, as his stories overnight, and drift slowly ashore just in time THE WOODS have many starlit tress, and
mostly go on longer than his audience desires. for careful puppets to pluck them up and carry many branching leafy trails. From here, the
Darwin also can’t put his own feelings in front them home. actor-puppets can see the lights of Puppettown
of Swimming Orchid’s, because he loves her too all the time, and if they listen closely, they can
much to act so selfishly. But under the stars this time, a makeshift also hear the distant sing-songs of all the happy
dock has been made, and out from it floats a puppets in Respite.
makeshift barge, tethered only by a makeshift
MacGuffins rope. The Nutcrackers are out there with But oh! Those trails and trees and songs are
makeshift nets and are harvesting all of the much too close to the lake of milk and cookies!
A few items in the woods might make things cookies! And that makes them much too close to a bored
interesting, although it’s anyone’s guess how and angry Spite, and a curious and wandering
they got there. Spite has found a MIRROR and Darwin and Orchid are always playing along the Haunt!
it’s made him quite upset. His make-up just isn’t shore, and are quite hard to miss. They have
right, again! He hasn’t decided if he will take it been watching from a distance as Punch’s troops
home with him when this job is done, or if he work on and under the lake, but they are just not
should break it up instead, but he is mumbling sure what they can do about it.
a lot about it and isn’t interested in anyone else’s
opinions, no not indeed!

94
 The Ante Innocents
Punch Village
Did Sally Shoelace reveal where Respite can be THE WOMEN OF THE TOWN: These ladies—
found? If she did, the actor-puppets must make Mrs. Coaxer, Sukey Tawdrey, and Molly
™™ By Jason Morningstar sure no one tells Punch. Brazen—round out what remains of the original
finger puppet set. Colorful, worldly, and
teasing, they live to gossip, see, and be seen.
Opening Set Piece Villains
At the foot of Punch’s castle in Puppettown was This tale has only little villains who may be as McGuffins
a charming little neighborhood of happy finger troublesome as any Big Villain.
puppets, part of a matched set. Now missing a SALLY SHOELACE: Sally is dead, ripped apart
few pieces, the poor, dim puppets were happy to go MACHEATH’S GANG: These little fellows— by Nutcrackers who stormed into the meeting
about their cheerful small lives as a model of how to finger puppets Filch, Jemmy Twitcher, Wat she had called in the village square. Everyone
live—in Punch’s eponymous village. Dreary, and Ben Budge—cultivate an air of in Punch Village knows this. They killed Betty
toughness. They try their level best, without Doxy, too. Best not to dwell on these things.
Punch Village was scaled for finger puppets. For much success, to be intimidating. They are fast
others it would feel very crowded. A large platform and sneaky, and while they can’t really protect
opposite the castle wall allowed anyone to look their turf from outsiders, they can raise a hue Set Pieces
down upon the entire neighborhood. (Nutcrackers and cry that will attract more awful puppets:
often watched from the wall.) The tidy little Nutcrackers or Punch’s Boys, who certainly THE VIEWING PLATFORM: A spindly tower
streets were festooned with bunting and large pro- would be Big Villains after all. made out of blackened wood, repurposed after
Punch billboards adorned the walls between some terrible fire, rises over Punch Village. The
buildings: PUNCH IS A-OK! EVERYONE LUCY LOCKIT AND POLLY PEACHUM: These platform is where Sally was killed, and bits of
LOVES PUNCH. THANK YOU PUNCH. WE two finger puppets are locked in a cycle of stuffing and shoelace bear mute witness to the
ARE HAPPY HOW ABOUT YOU? mutual hatred, both married to Macheath. For recent savagery. From the top, a puppet can look
his part, Macheath is long gone—abducted, down on the boundaries of Punch Village—or
The finger puppets in Punch Village went about tortured and devoured by an errant Nutcracker across, at eye level, to the ramparts of Punch’s
their business, oblivious to the Maker’s death ages ago. Lucy and Polly don’t know this and castle.
and the constant darkness. They were happy anxiously await his return, keeping up cheerful
to be observed and took pride in their tiny demeanors in public while slandering one THE VILLAGE SQUARE: Only finger puppets
neighborhood. None of them were eager to leave. another in private. Neither even remembers could hope to fit inside the dainty buildings that
They were dumb as rocks. what Macheath looks like, a point they mention line the pleasant square of Punch’s Village. The
often. Both clearly remember Sally Shoelace’s square itself has a crudely-made grey felt statue
A hand puppet named Sally Shoelace went to instructions on how to get to Respite, something of Punch in the center of a fountain, surrounded
Punch Village, Punch’s little model community, they talk about loudly and often. It’s only a by cobblestones. A large iron lantern at each
in hopes of bringing all the residents to Respite. matter of time before one of Punch’s Boys corner keeps the statue well lit.
It would have been a major coup for Judy and a overhears their gossip. The only one who could
humiliating disaster for Punch. But Sally did not possibly talk sense into them is their shared
return, and Judy was worried. Had Sally Shoelace lover Macheath.
been captured—or worse? And if she revealed the
location of Respite to the finger puppets of Punch
Village, what then?
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 The Ante Master’s control bar, he can do the one thing
Puppet Masters he’s always wanted: make Punch be happy.
Billy has spent the last week under the control
of Mary O’Nette, a marionette who long pined Once Grief manages that, though, he may not
™™ By Matt Forbeck after Billy with unrequited love. He never paid be content with letting Punch remain in charge.
any attention to her—mostly because of her After all, if he gives up control of Punch, then
cruel streak—until she discovered the Maker’s Punch will be sad, so Grief has to retain control
Opening Set Piece control bar, the handheld metal framework of him forever!
the Maker used to control his marionettes. She
The puppets awakened to a horrible noise found it hidden in the bottom of a well—after
coming from the main square. They went out she tossed herself into it to end her grief—and Innocents
to find Grief tearing through the main square. she’s been using it to control Billy ever since.
He had detected someone who was not at all The real innocent here is BILLY SQUAREJAW.
happy—a small marionette by the name of Billy Mary hasn’t made Billy do anything horrible, Mary’s not all bad, but forcing someone to love
Squarejaw—and was tearing Billy to pieces. It just spend lots of lots of time with her. The you is creepy at best. Billy is determined to
was up to the other puppets to make Billy laugh fact that he’s not in control of his own actions, join the actor-puppets for the entire adventure.
before he lost all his limbs! though, has brought him to tears. It’s this He knows the effects of the Maker’s control
that has caught Grief’s attention, and if the bar better than anyone and can maybe help the
actor-puppets can’t find a way to relieve Billy’s actor-puppets figure out how to obey orders
Billy’s Grief sadness permanently, he’s sure to return and while still doing what they need to do, should
destroy Billy entirely. they fall under its control.
If the actor-puppets succeed at this on their
own, all the better, but it’s hard to make
someone laugh when he’s having his legs torn Little Villain MacGuffin
off. By the time the actor-puppets arrive, Billy’s
already lost his right leg, and Grief sets in to Because of how she’s treated Billy, MARY The MAKER’S CONTROL BAR is the
remove the left leg as well. O’NETTE is our little villain. She’s so desperate MacGuffin. Everyone wants it, and for good
to be loved that she doesn’t care how she reason. If Punch gets wind of it, he’s going to
If the actor-puppets move fast, they should manages it. She never thought it would bring want it too. Nothing will stand between him and
have three tries to make Billy laugh. If they Billy physical harm. She tried to make him such power.
fail, Grief yanks off his other leg. At that point, happy but failed at it miserably, as the one thing
another marionette emerges with something he wants is the thing she refuses to give him: The actors should soon realize that the best
glowing in her hands. Grief stops what he’s freedom. solution for the Maker’s control bar is to get rid
doing and lets Billy go. While Billy drags of it. Since it’s metal and magic, it’s not easily
himself away with his arms, the new marionette destroyed. However, there are a couple ways
orders Grief to leave them all alone—and he Big Villain they could do it:
flees!
GRIEF is the big villain of this tale, of course. ››Bury it someplace secret—they hope. (Easy,
When Mary frees him from her control so she but maybe not effective.)
can go back to controlling Billy, Grief realizes ››Find a way to throw it out of Puppetland.
that she has the power to make any puppet do (Hard, but works well if they can pull it off.)
whatever she wants. If he can get hold of the ››Throw it to the bottom of the lake of milk and

96
 cookies. (Not too hard, but then the lake is And that’s it. Once they read the poem, the
not very deep.) The Rhyming Ritual puppets became certain that the scroll was in
the same handwriting as the Maker himself! But
Set Pieces how could that be? Clearly this was an important
™™ By Ross Payton message, but what did it mean?
There are a few set pieces in this tale, although
the second one might not happen: A brave puppet has discovered a scroll left
behind by the Maker that spells out a powerful Opinions
™™ THE TOWN SQUARE: As described in piece of magic. No one is sure what it does,
the opening, Grief tries to tear Billy apart but it involves a group of puppets speaking in If they ask Judy for advice, she tells them
until the actor-puppets make Billy happy. rhyme for an entire day. After the puppets begin that she remembers that the Maker once said
Even if they succeed, Billy’s injuries make the ritual, Punch’s forces find them! Can the something about the magic of rhyming. Perhaps
Mary so distraught that Grief goes after puppets escape while keeping the ritual going? saying things in rhyme creates magic. An old
her, so either, way she winds up using the marionette named Constance Stern Thimble
Maker’s control bar against Grief. who lives in Puppettown knows quite a bit about
Opening Set Piece rhyming. Perhaps they should ask her.
™™ PUNCH’S CASTLE: If Grief gets his hands
on the Maker’s control bar, he goes to use The puppets woke in their beds at home. They Mandy pipes in and says this is probably a trick
it against Punch. With solid teamwork, the all heard a puppet yelling outside. When they from the Devil, who likes to rhyme. Everyone
actor-puppets can exploit the fact that the went to see what the matter is, they found knows that that the Devil wants to drag Punch
control bar can only affect one person at a Mandy Yellow Watch waving a scroll around. to Down Below, so maybe the actor-puppets
time. Once they get ahold of the control bar, Mandy explained that she found the scroll in should trick Punch into reading the scroll.
though, they’ll have to deal with an angry a hole near Respite and raced back to show
Punch and a furious Grief, but with control everyone what she had found. She thought it was Judy suggests the actor-puppets should speak in
of Punch, they can give orders to Grief or a magical scroll, because of course all scrolls are rhyme for the day to see if that makes the magic
anyone else who could hurt them—which magical. It did not even occur to her to open it. work. It might even be fun.
might work long enough for them to flee. She handed the scroll to the puppets because
she was too excited to look at it herself.
™™ LOSING THE MAKER’S CONTROL BAR: Ante
This could happen in a lot of places, The scroll revealed the following poem-
depending on how the actor-puppets try to fragment: The power of an ancient scroll possibly imbued
get rid of the Maker’s control bar, but they with the magic of the Maker is nothing to take
could well wind up hopping across cookies lightly. The actor-puppets may have a powerful
There was an o ld man
until they get deep enough over the lake of weapon against Punch in their hands. They must
Wh o m a de pret ty p u p pet s
milk and cookies that anyone going after find out exactly what it can do.
And wanted them each
the control bar is doomed to drown. If
To speak all in rhyme.
you’d like Mary to redeem herself at this The truth of the scroll is left to the
But one sad day
point, she could take the control bar and puppetmaster. It could be a trick left by Punch’s
He k i cked th e b u cket!
dive into the lake with it. Boys or just a mundane note from the Maker. It
Forever an d ever
could mean something else entirely, like a gift
Is now a bad time.
from outside Puppetland or a clue leading to the
Th eir wish es an d dreams
Candy Cave.
To th e p it sh a ll p lu m met
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 Little Villain MacGuffins ™™ CONFRONTING THEIR FOES: If the
actor-puppets manage to explain the scroll,
NUTCRACKERS may be patrolling near The central MacGuffin of this story is THE Constance should probably be able to
Puppettown, so if the actor-puppets want to SCROLL . If it is real, its effects should be determine who wrote the scroll and what it
speak to Constance, they will need to avoid obvious to anyone who holds it while speaking can do. If it is real, the actor-puppets could
them on their trip from Respite. in rhyme. For example, if an actor-puppet sees use to stop one of Punch’s Boys, perhaps
a Nutcracker charging at her and then says by rhyming him out of existence or luring
Other puppets, like FREDDY GREEN FINGER , something like “I spy a Nutcracker, an evil him Down Below where the Devil can catch
may decide that they want the scroll, because it toy/With this scroll, Evil shall I destroy!” the him. Maybe they even use it against Punch
must be from the Maker, so it is very important. Nutcracker might fall apart or magically catch himself—but will a simple rhyme have
These puppets won’t fight the actor-puppets but fire. power against the magic that Punch stole
they may try to steal the scroll or alert Punch’s from the Maker himself? Either way, all
forces. Of course, magic is seldom safe. A puppet who of the actor-puppets will have to help fight
tries to use it without speaking in rhyme should Spite and his gang of Nutcrackers.
suffer a major setback or perhaps even lose a
Big Villain precious puzzle piece. ™™ SEEING THE DEVIL: If the actor-puppets
talk to the Devil, they find him very
If the scroll is the work of THE DEVIL , he must accommodating. He always wants new
surely be the big villain of the story. Perhaps Set Pieces victims for Down Below. He tells the actor-
the scroll causes other puppets to become puppets that the scroll will magically drag
envious of the actor-puppets or the scroll will ™™ TRAVELING WITH THE SCROLL: Regardless anyone who recites it three times into Down
drag an unfortunate puppet to Down Below if it of whether the actor-puppets decide to visit Below—even Punch! Of course, Punch is
is read three times in the same day. The actor- Constance or the Devil, they will need to very clever and won’t easily be tricked. And
puppets may try to talk the Devil into helping travel. Even a simple walk is no easy task this could be one of the Devil’s tricks. The
them fight Punch, which he will agree to do— with the scroll as they must describe every actor-puppets might want to test the scroll
but he cannot be trusted. action they take, while speaking in rhyme. before they try to get Punch to recite it.
A single Nutcracker chasing after them will
If the scroll is from the Maker, then the big turn their leisurely journey into a difficult
villain could be ONE OF PUNCH’S BOYS, who conflict. Conclusion
wants the scroll for himself.
™™ SPEAKING WITH CONSTANCE: Once they The secret of the scroll will be revealed one way
reach Puppettown, the actor-puppets must or another. Hopefully, the actor-puppets figure
Innocents find and explain the scroll to Constance, out how to use it for the benefit of Respite or at
while speaking in rhyme, of course. Spite least avoid being trapped by the Devil or Spite.
MANDY YELLOW WATCH just wants to help might have heard about the scroll by now Even if they did not gain much, they got to
but she also wants to be important. She brags and could be looking for the actor-puppets. speak in rhymes all day! It’s good to have fun,
about finding the scroll to everyone in Respite One actor-puppet could distract Spite by even in dark times.
and may even talk about it to some folks in taunting him and running away, although
Puppettown. This will probably get her into that is very dangerous. If the actors elude
trouble, especially if Punch’s Boys hear about him, he could grab an innocent puppet and
it. torture them, all the while yelling out for
the actor-puppets to reveal themselves.
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 the puppets argued over what to do. But all too Big Villain
The Terrible Fire soon, the top of the haystack sloughed off to one
side and a wave of putrid smell emerged with The big villain is MAYHEM. Mayhem would
a black layer of mold. The rush of air ignited gladly watch the whole world burn and this
™™ By John Scott Tynes the smoldering hay and the haystack burst into sudden calamity is the greatest thing ever as
flames! far as he is concerned. When the actor-puppets
organize a bucket brigade from the lake of milk
Opening Set Piece Monsieur Babypants caught alight instantly. and cookies or something similar, even if it’s
“Ahh! Ahh!” he cried in his little baby voice, with the help of the Nutcrackers, Mayhem shows
“Come see the dragon!” cried Monsieur as the fire rippled into the meadow grass up, the fire glistening in his button eyes, and
Babypants, the little shadow puppet baby cut and spread rapidly in all directions. Slanted charges in to smash up the whole operation.
from a single library card-catalog entry, a handwriting reading “le Roi en jaune” went up
spidery script in French stretching across his in flames as his arm crumbles into ash. While there could be a variety of ways to defeat
crisp, flat body. Mayhem—including setting him on fire—one
Overhead, the pale moon floated in the way is to recruit Punch himself. Punch is
Nearby puppets on the edge of town were sky, the light of the flames reflecting off its terrified of fire and the potential loss of his
surprised at his news. A dragon? Where? luminescently painted surface. Over the next kingdom. A fast puppet who hurries to the
hill was Puppettown, and the world. castle may provoke Punch to come personally
Monsieur Babypants led the puppets to a nearby and intervene. If so, the Nutcrackers snap to
field where Farmer Rhubarb tended his tidy attention and Mayhem drifts off sulking.
rows. In a grassy meadow was an enormous The Ante
bale of hay, glistening wet. “Aye, been storin’
it up nigh on twelve years,” Farmer Rhubarb Monsieur Babypants’ imminent destruction is Innocents
nodded. “Keep thinking I’ll get me a horse. It only the beginning. This fire is already out of
was looking pretty dry a couple weeks ago, so I control and if not contained and subdued, all of Poor MONSIEUR BABYPANTS is particularly
sloshed some water on it.” Puppetland and everyone in it will burn to ash. flammable, owing to his desiccated source
material. While the actor-puppets likely save
The haystack was the largest one any puppet him in the opening set piece—minus one arm—
had ever seen. It was not even clear how it got so Little Villain his paper is so dry and crisp that he combusts
big, towering over Farmer Rhubarb as it did. anywhere near the fire. The actor-puppets can
The little villain is a NUTCRACKER OFFICER. do their best to keep him away, but he’s so
Tendrils of sweet smoke drifted from its deep Unimaginative even by Nutcracker standards, enthusiastic and wants to help, even one-armed,
interior. “You see!” cried Monsieur Babypants. he resents and resists anything that feels like that he keeps sneaking past them to drag a
“There is a dragon hiding in the haystack!” a breakdown of order. All plans to put out the sloshing bucket to douse a few flames. But water
fire smack of revolution and rabble-rousing is just as dangerous for a shadow puppet as fire.
Skepticism ensued. But clearly something was in to him and he opposes them. It is not until he
the haystack. is personally in danger from the fire that he
changes his tune, at which point he marshals MacGuffins
One way or another, the haystack fell over. the other Nutcrackers to help in whatever fire-
Perhaps Monsieur Babypants asked to be lifted fighting effort the actors come up with. The AQUEDUCT leading towards town is a handy
atop it so he may peer down inside (“I’m the source of water, although it flows in the wrong
only one light enough to get up there!”). Perhaps direction. Big, strong puppets (or Nutcrackers)
99
 could lift part of the aqueduct off its supports
and point it towards the flames.

Mayhem will put all his strength into topping

the aqueduct to prevent it from being used to
quench the fire.

Set Pieces
Besides the opening scene of the smoldering
haystack, there are two big set pieces to bring
focus to the tale:

™™ BATTLE OF THE AQUEDUCT: At some point,

you want to have the Nutcrackers on one side
and Mayhem on the other, struggling over the
fate of the aqueduct. The two sides are mostly
tied and if the actor-puppets can mobilize the
other puppets, they can turn the tide against
Mayhem.

™™ THE PIT: In the center of the spreading

conflagration is the haystack, origin of the
terrible fire. When the actor-puppets are
near victory and have fought the fire back
towards its source, the ground beneath the
haystack gives way and the whole burning
mess drops through the earth. The strata
of Puppetland’s tabletop construction
are laid bare and someone falls into the
hole, hanging on with one hand on the
crumbling, smoldering earth. Below, a dark
chasm looms, at the bottom of which the
final embers of the haystack flicker and
go out. A squad of Nutcrackers bearing
boards, nails, and hammers charge over and
quickly seal up the pit. “Get back!” they
snap. “That’s Hell down there!"

100
 Vada Wolley Rex Perhaps our puppets joined in the cruel
taunting, or perhaps they tried to stop it.
Cassilda’s Song
If an actor sings even a line of the Carcosa Song,
Either way, soon the taunting puppets’ songs then their puppet must sing it whenever Cassilda
™™ By Kenneth Hite died away, leaving only the voice of Cassilda does. That is the magic of the song that the
Corn-Silk. She sang a new old song, the Hyades sing.
This tale draws on a familiar set of symbols. “Carcosa Song”:
Like Punch and Judy, they seem eternal and If asked where she heard the song, Cassilda
archetypal, drenched in meaning even when replies one of three ways:
none is provided…or possible. Along the sh ore the clo ud waves break.
The suns have sun k beneath the lake. ›› “I heard it from the five black stars”
That’s why it might not be a terrible idea to The shadows lengthen and re-Make. and points up at the sky, where indeed some
change them around if you like, especially if What form does it take? Carcosa . of the stars in one patch do look a little
you prefer your tales to be surprising rather dimmer.
than weirdly foredoomed. Make the Lemony [CHORUS] ›› “I read it in a book of tales, a book I
Emblem a Green Eye or a Blue Cross; change couldn’t stop reading.”
I ’ d l i k e t o g et c lo s e t o C a rc o s a
Cassilda to Clarissa; switch the song’s feel from ›› “Have you seen the Lemony Emblem?”
It’ s Costa Carcosa for me
music-hall to nursery rhyme.
I ’ d l i k e t o g et c lo s e t o C a rc o s a
The last question is one she uses to reply
Co m e c lo s er , C a rc o s a , t o m e
Or just leave it like it is, and see what happens. to most conversational gambits, when she
doesn’t start up another rousing chorus of
the Carcosa Song instead. She does make
Strange is the night where black stars rise,
Opening Set Piece sure to invite her interlocutors to a grand
And strange moons circle through the skies ball to be held on the shore of the lake. And
The puppets were in Puppettown Square, drawn But stranger still in Pun ch ’ s eyes she makes sure to tell them dreamily that
to the unusual combination of Spite’s roaring We all become Carcosa . soon all of Puppetland will become Carcosa.
and the shrill laughter of other puppets. Puppets
raced around, poking and teasing Punch’s Boy [REPEAT CHORUS] To end the scene, a band of Nutcrackers
as he lurched ineffectually toward the spot shows up to rescue Spite—even in disgrace,
his tormentor occupied seconds before. Other Songs that the Hyades shall sing one of Punch’s Boys is not to be left for mere
puppets laughed and sang taunting snatches of Re-Make the Wolley Yellow King, common puppets to torment. Most of the
song (“Poor old Spite! Can’t see the light!” or And when the Pallid Mask they bring puppets (including Cassilda) skedaddle, some
“Can’t see to fight!”) at the briefly hapless goon. Make ev’ ry th ing Carcosa . of them still singing. The Nutcrackers grab
one of the singing puppets (not one played by
A laughing puppet explained: “Spite fleered [REPEAT CHORUS] an actor) for good measure, but their captive
when he should have toadied, and so Mister keeps singing even when they crunch him.
Punch put his eyes out and gave him the bucket As she sang, Cassilda came into view, her long Eventually, they cart him off to Punch’s
for so long that he can’t hear us singing at him!” golden hair trailing behind her. Other puppets castle, still singing. As the Nutcrackers
The bucket, all puppets knew, was when Punch joined in the song. She gazed upward in an march off, the puppetmaster should make
lowered a metal bucket over an unfortunate’s unfocused fashion, looking perhaps at the the hrrunch-hrrunch noises of their stomping
head and banged on it with his mallet. stars—or at Punch’s castle. cadence as it matches the rhythm of the Carcosa
Song.
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 The Ante Little Villain The Lemony Emblem works best narratively
when shown to other puppets before the actor-
The players may recognize “Carcosa” and the Our little villain is CASSILDA CORN-SILK, a puppets. Its light plays over their faces, glinting
other symbols in the song from Robert W. hand puppet with long, golden hair that shines off their glass or button eyes. They describe the
Chambers’ weird King in Yellow stories. Their like corn-silk. She is, without doubt, the best steady shift of Maker’s Land into Carcosa. The
puppets don’t, but it ought to be clear that singer in Puppettown. She constantly practices sky turns light and the stars painted on it turn
Cassilda’s creepy song threatens to change the her scales, singing “la-la-la-la-LA-la-la-la-la” dark. The lake of milk and cookies rises and
very nature of Puppettown and of Maker’s Land and suchlike, telling all who will listen about darkens into chocolate milk and then extends to
itself. If the puppets don’t stop the Carcosa Song her exercises and how she keeps her voice so meet the sky. Punch’s castle changes to a sort
and thwart the Torn Puppet in an hour, Maker’s beautiful. She organizes singing contests and of decadent Italian palazzo. There’s no hope
Land changes to become ghostly Carcosa, and wins them. (Fairly.) At puppet parties, she always anywhere anymore.
Mister Punch becomes Wolley Rex, the King in volunteers to sing a song or a medley or a few
Yellow. This is not any kind of improvement. popular selections. Her voice really is beautiful— If the actor-puppets dodge or close their eyes
at least as far as a bunch of puppets know—and or do anything to avoid seeing the Lemony
many puppets enjoy hearing her sing, if not so Emblem, their evasion works. Puppets who see
much hearing her talk about her singing. Now, the Lemony Emblem cannot resist the Torn
Cassilda has discovered the “Carcosa Song”, and Puppet in any way, although they might very
CASSILDA CORN-SILK she loves it. This, she knows, is the song she was loudly wish they could. They also get a puzzle
made to sing. It’s hard enough to get Cassilda to piece filled in.
PUPPET TYPE: Hand Puppet stop singing a normal song; stopping her from
singing this one may prove quite the challenge.
THIS PUPPET IS: medium height, medium Innocents
build, quite heavy, medium speed, strong,
quite pretty, quite proud of her voice, and Big Villain Our innocents are ALL THE OTHER PUPPETS,
loves to sing. EVEN SPITE . If you have an innocent puppet
THE TORN PUPPET is our big villain, sort of. the players have grown fond of, put her into the
THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown His appearance heralds the change in Maker’s chorus of Carcosa. JENNY SWEETIE MERMAID,
at her if she sees them coming as soon as Land, and the coming transformation of Mister in true mermaid fashion, becomes captivated
they are thrown, throw things, grab things, Punch. Cassilda summoned him by singing the by the song in the first or second set piece.
hit things, move quietly if she is lucky and Carcosa Song, and now he must travel his pre- DANDELION hums the Carcosa Song when the
careful, sing very beautifully, dance well, ordained path. actor-puppets encounter him, probably in the
and get other puppets to sing or dance. second set-piece.
He is a tall, black shadow puppet, his paper
THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, move edges torn and tattered into little strips and
quieter than a finger puppet, say a song is barely-hanging tags. His face is a white blank, MacGuffins
good when it isn’t, resist an opportunity to as though someone never bothered to finish
sing for an audience, or fight well. coloring it in. On his chest, where his heart Our MacGuffins are the LEMONY EMBLEM
might be if he had one, is a little taped flap and perhaps the CAPTIVATING BOOK where
of paper. When he lifts it up, underneath is a Cassilda first read the song. The actor-puppets
design in yellow luminous paint, the Lemony almost certainly spend time dodging the former,
Emblem. but may go hunting the latter. If they find it, a

102
perceptive puppet notices its pages glow yellow, from the enforcers until the Torn Puppet Song are not stopped, at the end of the
as if they were written in luminous paint. “I hope appears. The Pulcinellas begin singing the hour the cry goes up to “unmask!” The
that book doesn’t have the Lemony Emblem Carcosa Song, and a lemony glow effulges Torn Puppet tears off his own head and
inside it!” Polly Squeaky Dimples exclaims from from the lion cage. The irresistible nature collapses. Mister Punch, his garb now
outside the window, if the actors don’t make the of the Song and the Lemony Emblem mustard yellow, removes his flesh mask
connection. become apparent, and the painted lion to reveal a featureless oval. Vada Wolley
becomes a painted bull with five black Rex—behold the King in Yellow.
In addition to the effect of the Lemony Emblem, stars between his horns. The stamping of
reading the book makes puppets obsessed his hoofs punctuates the Song (“I’d like to
with sharing the tale it contains (“Here! O my get close to Carcosa,” stamp stamp), and the
friends, read this part! It explains everything!”) surviving Nutcrackers flee to tell Punch
and with asking folks they meet if they have the bad news. The Torn Puppet either turns THE TORN PUPPET
seen the Lemony Emblem. The book can be invisible or exits with the Chorus.
burned or drowned, but the Song is still out PUPPET TYPE: Shadow Puppet
there. ™™ THE BALL UNDER BLACK STARS: This
is the big dance, Cassilda’s grand ball. It THIS PUPPET IS: tall, quite slender,
If an actor says “Yellow Sign” instead of occurs on a sort of deck or platform next quite light, fast, quite weak, silent,
“Lemony Emblem”, the closest Singer or other to the edge of the lake of milk and cookies, single-minded, and enigmatic in
member of the Carcosa Chorus exclaims: “You between the lake and Punch’s castle. As appearance.
have seen the Lemony Emblem! O, you have!” the dance goes on, Cassilda sings her Song
And indeed, that actor’s puppet remembers and the Torn Puppet appears. (If the Torn THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things
having seen it earlier, perhaps while asleep. Puppet had died in a previous scene, he thrown at him by turning sideways,
Apply its effects. has taped himself up; if he somehow got even at the last moment; kick things,
soaked into wet mush, some other puppet throw things, and grab things; become
sports new tears in his fabric or paper, and invisible from one other puppet if he
Set Pieces a flap with the Lemony Emblem behind it is careful and cautious by keeping
where his heart used to be.) The sky turns his skinny edge towards the puppet
We have three set pieces for this tale. pale, and the stars darken to black. The at all times; tape himself back together
lake rises and turns to chocolate milk, given enough time; resist all attempts at
™™ THE FIRST SONG: The opening set piece covering the whole horizon out to the sky; persuasion; and show other puppets the
demonstrates the contagious nature of the the dance floor rises with the lake, always Lemony Emblem.
Carcosa Song. It also provides a possible on its shore. That same rise slowly carries
weapon against the Torn Puppet: Spite, who it up to Punch’s castle, until the ball is THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick, throw,
can’t see the Lemony Emblem or hear the happening right in his courtyard. The or grab things that weigh more than a
Song. painted moon comes unstuck from the sky piece of paper; be invisible if he isn’t
and swings down in front of the Castle’s trying; be invisible to more than one
™™ COUNTER-PUNCH’D: The Nutcrackers and tower, hanging by a white thread. When puppet at a time; or get wet because
perhaps another one of Punch’s Boys track Punch emerges, enraged but seemingly getting completely wet kills him;
Cassilda to the Bedlam Circus. The Chorus powerless, his scarlet cloak and hat begin speak; appear without being summoned;
puppets and Cassilda sing and dance away to turn yellow. If the Torn Puppet and the or unmask.

103
 Visions of and personalities, becoming Punch’s army of
emotionless enforcers.
Ante

Sugar Plums The breach, however, is not as well sealed as

If the actor-puppets can’t get the Nutcracker
fixed and back to his home,either he will
Punch imagines. Whether the walls have been eventually find Punch, who will indeed
™™ By James Wallis deliberately breached, whether the seal has mend him and put him to work as part of his
failed, or whether creeping creatures have eaten forces—or use him as spare parts for damaged
The puppets find a tunnel between their world it away over time, it is open again, and it is only a Nutcrackers in Puppetland.
and another, the realm of the Sugar Plum Fairy, matter of time before someone notices.
where another type of magic holds sway. But is
this place any better than their home, and will Set Pieces
they find friends here? Opening Set Piece
THE MYSTERIOUS TUNNEL: Puppetland exists
“Visions of Sugar Plums” is based loosely on One night the puppets encountered a strange on a table surrounded by a back-cloth. In an
the story of the Nutcracker, which most people Nutcracker moving among them. Unlike the obscure corner, almost invisible unless you
know in its ballet form. The original Hoffman cold, harsh Nutcrackers they were used to, this know to look for it, is a slit in the cloth, and
story, “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King,” is one had a personality—stiff and military, but behind that a brick wall. Enough bricks have
a rather stranger and darker affair. Which one not unfriendly and not unwilling to ask for help. been knocked out to form a low tunnel: all but
you choose to follow to set the tone and style of the shortest puppets must crawl.
this Puppetland tale is up to you. The Nutcracker had a broken jaw and a broken
leg. He explained as best he could that he came The tunnel is completely dark, surprisingly
from the Land of Sweets because he had heard long, and twists. Puppets should be scared. In
Backstory someone here could mend him. Nobody in the the middle is a large chamber, a void between
Land of Sweets could mend him, and his fate the buildings, open to the night sky. There is
Hard by the building where the Maker built was to be discarded. He was looking for Punch. a light carpet of snow on the ground, and fresh
Puppetland stands a bakery and candy store. flakes are falling from heavy clouds above. As
Such places are magical: a different type of they enter this space, there is a scurrying and
magic to Puppetland, to be sure, but magic is Repairing the Nutcracker several mice rush past them, heading into the
magic however it’s made. tunnel towards Puppetland. The puppets may
If the puppets dissuade him from this course or may not have encountered mice before, and
The other building’s links to Puppetland are of action, they can try to mend the Nutcracker, should react accordingly. The mice are not
more than coincidental. This is where Punch and may succeed if they have the right skills or hostile and cannot speak.
recruited his Nutcracker guards, back in the materials. Alternatively, they can take him to
beginning, since Nutcrackers are not native to Judy, who will fix him up herself. THE LAND OF SWEETS: At the end of the
Puppetland. Punch found (or possibly built) tunnel is a new world of bright lights, colors,
a tunnel through the walls between the two The Nutcracker describes the Land of Sweets as towering ornate structures and music. This
worlds, spun a tale of a land of tyranny and a beautiful paradise where everyone is happy, is the realm of the Sugar Plum Fairy, and
its maniacal overlord who had to be defeated, ruled by a benevolent queen fairy with magical the Nutcracker will take them to meet her,
brought the Nutcrackers through, and then powers. (He cannot explain why such a ruler introducing them as friends who helped him.
sealed up the breach. Cut off from their own would refuse to mend his injuries.) He can show The world is filled with fairies, their wings as
land, the Nutcrackers lost their memories them the entrance to the Land of Sweets, but delicate as spun sugar or filo pastry: they are
will not return there until he has been repaired.
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welcoming, but unthinkingly condescending, long after Punch killed the Maker. His wooden ™™ Punch will attempt to seal up the tunnel
like adults welcoming a group of children. hands have been completely worn away from properly.
years of toil. He begs to be taken back to
The Sugar Plum Fairy’s realm is smaller than Puppetland: he insists it is a better place than ™™ If he came with them, the Nutcracker may
Puppetland, though it too is built on a table, here. become a friend, a Nutcracker who does not
or rather a network of tables connected by work for Punch.
marzipan bridges created each night by the SAVING JIPPY: The puppets must ascend back
Sugar Plum Fairy’s magic. Its structures are to the table and re-enter the tunnel leading to ™™ Jippy, once repaired, changes his tune and
large cakes, its decorations and props made their home. They may choose to avoid the Sugar tells tales of the fantastic Land of Sweets.
from candy, sweetmeats, and icing. It is a caste- Plum Fairy and her Nutcrackers, or confront Credulous puppets begin searching for the
based society: at the top are the fairies, the her, and there may be a pursuit. However, way to this supposed paradise.
cake-toppers, the decorations who spend their something is waiting in the central chamber
time dancing and partying. Below them are the between the buildings. Punch has captured the ™ ™ The Sugar Plum Fairy may decide to
Nutcrackers, and below them the servitors. The mice from earlier and used his magic to graft investigate what lies through the tunnel,
cakes and sweets are made by humans, during them together, making a seven-headed Mouse or may bring an army through to extend
the day; by night the fairies use them for their King to guard the tunnel and prevent anyone her realm.
revels. entering or leaving Puppetland while he blocks
up the entrance properly. ™™ Punch may decide his power is enough to
The Sugar Plum Fairy is beautiful and initially conquer the Land of Sweets and make the
welcoming, like a huntsman to a new puppy. Depending on the puppets’ actions and Sugar Plum Fairy his queen.
She carries a magic wand at all times, her interactions so far, any of the following things
rod of office and power. Its magic, if used, is could let them get past the Mouse King: ™™ Punch may want to erase any puppet
based on sugar and sweet things. She welcomes who knows of the other world beyond the
the puppets and invites them to a feast. They ™™ Luring the Mouse King into the Land of backdrop.
watch the fairies perform many dances, until Sweets.
their host claps her hands and demands that ™™ The Mouse King, if it survived, may raise
the puppets should now show everyone their ™™ Sacrificing any treasure, prizes, magic a force of mice that nibble away at the
dance. Refusal is taken as impoliteness, and wands, or candy they were taking back to structures and foundations of Puppetland.
impoliteness is not tolerated in this land of Puppetland. It may take the Sugar Plum Fairy’s magic
frolics and delights. to stop them.
™™ Their friend the Nutcracker sacrificing
THE LAND OF SERVITORS: Whether the itself to let them escape. Do not encourage puppets to climb out of the
puppets dance, trip, and fall off the table, space between the buildings and into the wider
or refuse and are thrown off the table by ™™ Jippy sacrificing himself to let them escape. world. That is not where their story lies.
Nutcrackers (fewer and politer than their
Puppetland brothers, but just as strong), they
find themselves on the floor, in the land of the On Returning
servitors: those who work to serve the Sugar
Plum Fairy and her favourites. Here are lost Back in the land of puppets, the following
dolls, broken Nutcrackers, fairies whose wings things may happen in subsequent sessions:
have snapped or melted, and an old marionette,
Jippy, who disappeared from Puppetland not
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 The Lost Giant case it should fall out and get beaten up again. Big Villains
As they traveled through the woods, the puppets VENGEANCE is the obvious villain in this
heard the howling of wolves. Molly said the story. Punch sent him to capture the Lost Giant
™™ By Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan wolves belong to Vengeance, and they must and bring him back to Puppettown. Vengeance
hurry to avoid being eaten. carries a ball of string for just this purpose; the
The Lost Giant is a human child who fell into Giant is strong enough to fight off the wolves,
Maker’s Land. Before you tell this story, take a The woods were dark and tangled—how did the or even drive Vengeance away for a few minutes,
moment to answer some questions to your own puppets ever get through? but a flesh puppet is terrifying whether you’re a
satisfaction—or discuss them with the group if puppet or a scared lost child.
you prefer.
Ante MOLLY BLUEBELL is the other villain—not
››What’s outside Maker’s Land? Well, we know because she’s evil or in league with Punch,
that it’s in the basement of an abandoned On the other side, the puppets meet the Lost but because she thinks of the Lost Giant as a
theater, but where’s that theater? I can never Giant. He’s much bigger than any of them, bigger weapon, not as a child in need. Use her to cause
choose between some ruined town in eastern even than Punch or Judy! He’s sitting on a rock, arguments among the puppets. If any players
Europe during the Second World War, or a crying because he’s scared and alone. side with Molly, then step back and let the
rainy grey pier in England in the ‘70s, but it players argue among themselves.
could be anywhere. If Vengeance catches the Lost Giant, it’ll
››What’s the Giant’s name? How old is he? In be very bad—he’ll drag the Giant back to
my story, I named him Carlo, and he was Puppettown, where Punch will kill him and Innocent
six years old, and he was running away from skin him. More flesh means more of Punch’s
someone in the world outside. Boys, if you can imagine anything so awful. But THE LOST GIANT is an innocent child. He was
››What do puppets know about people? Are the Giant can’t stay in Puppetland—what’s to be looking for a place to hide, and ended up here.
humans entirely mysterious to them? Do they done?
know the difference between a child and a
grown-up? The Giant may be a giant compared to the little MacGuffin
puppets, but he’s just a child. He needs someone
You may also wish to look at “The Bottler” on to help him make the right decisions. Really, THE LOST GIANT is the MacGuffin of
page 122, which involves similar themes. (If you the whole story. He’s bigger than any puppet bar
also run “The Bottler,” perhaps the Blue Fairy Punch, and as strong as one of Punch’s Boys.
and Nurse Blue are sisters.) Little Villains
THE WOLVES OF THE WOODS aren’t a threat Set Pieces
Opening Set Piece to the Giant, but they’ll chew up Molly or the
players if they’re not careful. The wolves are Once the puppets find the giant, there are two
Molly Bluebell, a hand puppet who usually lived hand puppets. set pieces left in the story, and two possible
in Respite, asked the puppets to come with her. endings after those.
Someone was crying on the other side of the
woods, and it kept her awake. Molly was once a RESCUING THE GIANT: The puppets comfort
kindly puppet, but she had run-ins with Punch’s the Giant, and learn about him before
Boys and now carefully guarded her heart in Vengeance and the wolves show up. Vengeance
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exclaims that he’s going to bring the Giant back becoming a puppet himself is most frightening
to Puppettown, where Punch will kill him and of all.
skin him. He tells his wolves to attack, while he
tries to catch the Giant with a lasso of string! THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SKY: Finding the rip
The puppets must escape and rescue the Giant. in the sky is easy. Getting the Giant up there
Maybe the Giant could use his size and strength is harder, but the puppets can all help push
to throw the wolves to the other side of the him up or make a ladder, or find a convenient
woods. mountain for him to climb on.

WHAT TO DO, WHAT TO DO: Molly suggests Vengeance and the wolves show up (possibly
they bring the Giant to Respite and ask Judy’s thanks to Molly’s betrayal) still trying to catch
advice. Molly’s also very impressed by the the Giant. It would be a fitting punishment if
Giant’s size—if he’d only stop blubbering about Vengeance grabs the Giant just as he’s climbing
how he doesn’t want to hurt people, he’d be able out of Puppetland, and the last anyone sees is
to beat up Vengeance, and all of Punch’s Boys, him clinging to the Giant’s foot, screaming at
and even Punch too! This could be the best the puppets to save him from the outside.
thing that’s every happened in Puppetland.
THE BLUE FAIRY: The Blue Fairy’s cave is on
In Respite, Judy tells the puppets that the Giant the other side of Down Below. Puppets can
shouldn’t be in Maker’s Land (“people aren’t get to the mouth of the cave, and see the blue
allowed behind the curtain”), and that the thing light that shines from within, but they can’t
to do is to find the rip in the sky that the Giant go in. The Giant can enter, but needs to be
fell through and help him climb out. encouraged by the players if they’ve chosen this
course (and maybe Vengeance and his wolves
When told this, the Giant clings to whichever of chase them all the way here). If the Giant does
the puppets was kindest to him. He’s scared and become a puppet of some sort, then make it a
doesn’t want to go back. Reluctantly, Judy adds happy ending by hinting that he’s escaped some
there might be one way that he could stay in unimaginable sadness or danger in the world
Puppetland. She once heard a story about a Blue outside. The new puppet goes to live in Respite,
Fairy who turned a marionette into a “real boy,” never to grow up or be scared again.
and she knows where that fairy now dwells.
Maybe a real boy can, if he’s got nowhere else to
go, become a puppet.

Molly still thinks the Giant should go and smash

Punch’s castle. She might even tell Vengeance
where the Giant is, hoping to force the Giant
into fighting. That won’t end well at all.

What do the players think the Giant should

do? He’ll listen to their advice. But he is
easily frightened, and such a major change as
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 Pretty Polly and began bustling about. In moments, the two
hard-working puppets had raised a huge white
musicians are Rama Ding-Dong on strings!
Simba Skinny-Britches on the clarinet! And
sheet and unfolded one side of their mysterious Sindi Windy-Lips on flute!”
wagon to form a make-shift stage!
™™ By Arinn Dembo When the applause and cheers of the audience died
The hand puppet stage hands worked quickly, down, Semar continued.
hanging exotic silver lamps and bright mirrors
" P o l ly , p ret t y P o l ly , until the stage and its clearing were flooded “Tonight we have a special guest as well. She is
would you think me unkind with a rainbow of cheerful light. And then, the most famous dancer in Maker’s Land, here
P o l ly , p ret t y P o l ly , one by one, four shadow puppets appeared, to entertain you for the first time in many years.
would you think me unkind emerging from the darkness of the caravan to Please welcome…Pretty Polly!”
if I sat down beside you take their places behind the scrim.
an d to ld yo u my min d Immediately, Semar sat down at his drums
Wonderful music filled the glade and spilled out and began to beat out a lively rhythm. As the
My m i n d i s t o m a rry into the forest and the road beyond. Puppets Orchestra swung into a sprightly tune, out
a n d n ev er to p art at the edge of town heard the sound and came from behind the scrim came the most beautiful
My m i n d i s t o m a rry outside at once, trying to find the source. Soon marionette that anyone had ever seen. Pretty
a n d n ev er to p art , there was a parade of puppets hurrying to the Polly danced across the stage and leaped as
The first time I saw yo u edge of town, moving toward the light and the gracefully as a finger puppet down to the
it w o u n ded my h eart " sounds of the drums, strings, horn, and flute… grass, catching the first puppet she found by
the hand and twirling him into a merry dance
™™ Traditional Ballad, "Pretty Polly" Judy and her friends joined the rest of the town, with her. With each circle that they spun, Polly
curious about the foreign puppets and their would reach out to catch the hand or shoulder
traveling show. The forest filled with laughter of another puppet from Respite, and they too
Opening Set Piece and talk as the puppets of Respite enjoyed the would begin dancing with her, laughing with
music of the Shadow Orchestra, and Judy looked delight.
The puppets awoke to the sound of cart wheels around and smiled for the first time in a very
rumbling over the cobbled streets of Respite. long time. She could not remember the last time Every puppet of Respite was overjoyed to see
Looking out their windows, the puppets saw a she had seen so many puppets so happy, since Pretty Polly…except for Judy.
mysterious traveling wagon, drawn by a powerful the Maker died.
marionette horse and driven by two burly hand “No!” she cried. “No, no, don’t! Don’t dance
puppets with bright cheerful faces and colourful By the time the first melody was finished, with that awful woman! She’s evil! She’ll steal
turbans. the forest glade was thronging with so many your hearts and make you wicked…just like she
puppets that it seemed all of Respite had come did to Punch!”
The smallest and quickest puppets were able out to see the show. The largest of the four
to nip out and follow the caravan all the way to shadow puppets stepped forward, and the But no one heard her over the jangling music of
the edge of town, admiring the wooden wagon audience hushed to hear him speak. the Shadow Orchestra, and the whole town was
painted the deep purple of the evening sky dancing along happily now, caught in Pretty
and decorated with moons, stars, and mystical “Greetings, my fine friends, and thank you Polly’s spell. What could Judy do?
symbols. They watched in wonder as the two for coming to our show! We are the Shadow
hand puppets parked it on a hill above a forest Orchestra from a far-away land. I am Semar
clearing, unhitched the horse to let it graze, Big-Booty, your percussionist, and my fellow
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The Ante and the MacGuffins of the earliest signs of his madness was his PRETTY POLLY: Pretty Polly’s tale is a tragic
infidelity to Judy, and his pursuit of a dancing one, and comes from a very ancient folksong.
Punch is certainly heartless now…but was he marionette puppet called Pretty Polly. When she was a young, beautiful, and recklessly
always this way? Whatever did happen to the romantic young puppet, she was lured into a
heart of Punch? Did Pretty Polly steal it? Did It is very difficult for Judy to reconcile the dalliance by Punch, a wealthy married man.
he give it to her willingly? If Polly ever had the puppet Punch once seemed to be—the brave, Drawing her along with trinkets, bon-bons, and
heart, did she lose it, or break it? Could she give fun-loving puppet she once thought she loved— tokens of love, Punch led her off into a lonely
it back? Could it be restored? Could Punch even with the monster he has become. At some place where no one could hear her call for help
become a good puppet again, with Pretty Polly’s level, Judy truly believes that Punch once had and proceeded to open his jacket, promising to
help? a good heart, and that somehow his good heart give her his heart—any puppet’s most precious
was taken from him, possibly even destroyed. possession.
At first the players may believe that they are Secretly, she believes that it was Pretty Polly
searching for a Heart, the Heart of Punch that who stole the heart of Punch, and she suspects When she looked into Punch’s chest, however,
Pretty Polly allegedly stole. In fact, Pretty Polly that the dancing marionette carelessly lost it, Pretty Polly saw that Punch had no heart. There
never stole his heart, and his heart may never like a meaningless bauble. She even worries that was a gaping hole in his chest where a puppet’s
have existed. The most important MacGuffin in Polly broke the heart out of spite. heart should be. All of his charm and jokes, all of
the tale is SPITE’S SOLVENT, which will allow his smiles and promises were just a show—Punch
the player puppets to break the seal on Pretty Without a heart, Punch eventually became mad, had no real feelings at all! And in the empty place
Polly’s lips and reveal the truth. and over time his madness turned to outright inside him, something “gross and icky” had
evil. Judy believes that Pretty Polly is indirectly taken root, either by crawling inside when Punch
If the players fail to steal the solvent and use it responsible for all of the terrible things that was sleeping or possibly stuffed inside by Punch
skillfully to dissolve the glue without damaging Punch has done, and that all of the suffering of himself, so that he might have some kind of heart
Polly’s face, Spite will use it to mutilate her. Maker’s Land really came to pass because of her. and a few feelings, even if they were bad.
If she is rescued after that point, she will still While this is not true, Judy’s belief that Pretty
willingly tell the truth, but she will no longer be Polly is wicked will lead her to mistrust and Polly began screaming at the sight, which Punch
Pretty Polly—she will be Blind Polly, and her hate the dancer, especially while Polly remains did not like. He hit her with his stick to knock
face will be a dreadful reminder of the terrible unable to speak in her own defense. her down and then used an extremely powerful
price that puppets pay for being more popular lacquer to glue her pretty mouth shut, so that she
than Spite. Actor-puppets will have to protect Pretty Polly could not make sounds that displeased him or
if they want to keep Judy from chasing her and tell his secrets to anyone. Fortunately for Polly,
her friends out of town with her whacking-stick, she was more resilient than Punch imagined. She
Innocents and straight into the arms of Spite and the lured him into dancing with her, and as soon as
Nutcrackers. Alternatively, if the players are his grip on her wrists slipped, she ran away. She
JUDY: Judy is a wise and kind leader, but she able to plead successfully for mercy, Judy may continued to run and hide until she was found by
is also the former wife of Punch. Judy used to throw Pretty Polly and her friends in the Corner, Semar and the Shadow Orchestra, and became
love Punch, back when they were younger. But the jail of Respite, to think about what they’ve their star performer.
Punch became increasingly erratic over the done until they’re ready to tell the truth, explain
years, more and more likely to do serious harm themselves, and apologize. Pretty Polly is sadder and wiser now, and she
with his japes and pranks, and he behaved less would tell her story if she could. Unfortunately,
and less like a hero or a good husband. One Judy’s description and abilities are on page 48. she cannot communicate except with simple

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 gestures and charade-like hints. Until someone beautifully cut from leather and decorated with the Maker died by keeping them continuously
uses a solvent on her mouth, she will be unable paint, lacquer, and buffalo horn. Although their moving, and stopping to perform at every
to speak and reveal the truth of her relationship construction makes them stronger, larger, and opportunity. It was his decision to take Pretty
with Punch, and the nature of his dark more durable than paper shadow puppets, they Polly under his protection.
affliction. lack many of the traditional strengths of the
shadow puppet form, in particular, the ability to RAMA DING-DONG: Rama is a bold
She is also unable to declare her love for Rashi become fully invisible. troubadour adventurer with a fiery disposition.
No-Toes, the mute hand-puppet whose quiet He has the figure of a warrior king with long
sympathy has won her affections. SEMAR BIG-BOOTY: Semar is the oldest flowing black hair and shining eyes. He
member of the Orchestra, a massive, clownishly is an inspired musician but a troublesome
THE SHADOW ORCHESTRA: Semar, Rama, obese figure with a big belly, a hilariously companion, with a habit of serenading pretty
Sindi, and Simba are traditional-style shadow enormous rear end, and a kindly round face. female puppets and challenging male puppets
puppets from Java, depicting forms from the He is a great musician and a wise, gentle leader to duels.
Wayang kulit tradition. They are extremely who has protected his adopted family since

P R E T T Y P O L LY S HA D O W O RC H E S T R A SEMAR BIG-BOOTY
PUPPET TYPE: Marionette PUPPET TYPE: Shadow Puppets PUPPET TYPE: Shadow Puppet

THIS PUPPET IS: tall, medium build, ALL FOUR OF THE SHADOW THIS PUPPET IS: brave, soft-spoken, good
medium weight, fast, quite strong, ORCHESTRA ARE: tall, slender, light, at keeping secrets, and part of the Shadow
beautiful, graceful, and very charismatic. fast, and weak. Orchestra.

THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab ALL FOUR OF THE SHADOW THIS PUPPET CAN: lift and wield
things as heavy as she is; dodge things ORCHESTRA CAN: dodge things thrown drumsticks and tambourines, and play any
thrown at her if she sees them coming as at them by turning sideways, even at the percussion instrument, including pianos
soon as they are thrown; dance perfectly last moment; kick things, throw things, and xylophones, with amazing skill.
to all music; or make other puppets dance and grab things; and hide very easily
with her for as long as music is playing, behind even a thin object by keeping THIS PUPPET CANNOT: betray any
whether they want to dance or not—even their skinny edge toward the viewer at all member of his adopted family, willingly
Punch, Judy, and the Boys can be made to times. harm any puppet, or resist candy or sweets
dance if Polly takes their hands. if they are offered—if any of these three
ALL FOUR OF THE SHADOW come into conflict, they will be prioritized
THIS PUPPET CANNOT: hit things ORCHESTRA CANNOT: kick, throw, or in exactly this order.
very hard; speak unless her mouth comes grab things that weigh more than a small
unglued; tell a lie; or resist or say no to musical instrument; be invisible like a
tokens of love, especially hearts, flowers, traditional Shadow Puppet; or endure
and candy. getting wet.

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 RAMA DING-DONG SIN DI WIN DY-LIPS SIMBA SKINNY-BRITCHES
THIS PUPPET IS: passionate, bold, romantic, THIS PUPPET IS: wise, motherly, loyal, THIS PUPPET IS: innocent, fierce, loving,
and part of the Shadow Orchestra. and part of the Shadow Orchestra. and part of the Shadow Orchestra.

THIS PUPPET CAN: lift and wield light THIS PUPPET CAN: use a small knife as THIS PUPPET CAN: make and play reed
musical instruments such as the violin and a carving tool, or to cut things like ropes; instruments, dance almost as well as Pretty
bow; play any stringed instrument that is make and play small musical instruments Polly, and fight with a rattan sword.
light enough for him to hold; and lift and like pipes; and see in the dark.
wield light wooden weapons, such as a bow THIS PUPPET CANNOT: betray any
and arrow or a rattan sword. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: betray any member of her adopted family, or believe
member of her adopted family, allow any that any member of her adopted family has
THIS PUPPET CANNOT: betray any member member of her adopted family to come deliberately done wrong or acted with bad
of his adopted family; allow an innocent to harm, or believe that any member of intent.
puppet to be harmed; or resist a female puppet her adopted family has deliberately done
who asks for a kiss, or a male puppet who asks wrong or acted with bad intent.
for a duel.

SINDI WINDY-LIPS: Sindi Windy-Lips is a sisters, and will defend any member of the and he has noticed some odd behavior from his
female figure with a wild corona of bushy flame- Shadow Orchestra with her life. Her favorite brother Bashi. He is confused and sad about
red hair, the eyes of a cat, and a large rubbery family members are Pretty Polly, who has this, and worried that the Shadow Orchestra
mouth. As the flautist of the Shadow Orchestra, taught her to dance; Bashi No-Toes, the stage seems to be having close calls with Spite and his
she plays various wood-wind instruments such hand; and Mister Horse. Nutcrackers more and more often of late.
as the recorder, reed-flute, and pan-pipes. She
carves all of her instruments herself, whittling RASHI NO-TOES: Rashi No-Toes is one of MISTER HORSE: Mister Horse is a unique
them from any available stick or reed. She is the two stage-hand puppets of the Shadow marionette in the form of a Clydesdale draft
nearly the same age as Semar and treats the Orchestra. He has the form of a dark-skinned horse. He is highly intelligent and opinionated
rest of the Shadow Orchestra as her adopted man with a dark pointed beard and a bright sky- and has a penchant for bad puns. He is a valued
children, including Pretty Polly. blue turban. Unlike his brother Bashi, Rashi member of the Shadow Orchestra, but has
does not have moving mouth parts, and so is grown discontent lately because of maltreatment
SIMBA SKINNY-BRITCHES: Simba Skinny- unable to speak and eat as other puppets do. by one of the two stagehands, which he believes
Britches is a young female warrior figure with a to be Rashi, who has pulled his mane and tail,
tall stooping figure and a long plaited braid of Rashi is quietly loyal to Semar and his fellow pushed him over while he was standing asleep,
white hair. The youngest member of the Shadow travelers, but he has fallen in love with Pretty and inflicted other mean pranks and tricks.
Orchestra, she is fiercely proud of her adoptive Polly, and she now commands greater loyalty In reality his persecutor has been Rashi’s twin
family and her skill as a musician playing than his adopted family. A kind person and an brother Bashi, but Mister Horse does not know
clarinet and many other reed instruments. She excellent driver, Rashi has had an increasingly this.
regards Semar and Sindi as parents, and all adversarial relationship of late with Mister
other member of the troupe as brothers and Horse, who draws the Shadow Orchestra wagon,

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 Little Villains been collaborating subtly with the Nutcrackers, Big Villains
leaving notes and clues to lead Spite closer and
NUTCRACKERS: These are the standard-issue, closer to Pretty Polly, and eventually hopes to SPITE: Largest of the Boys, Spite is a hideous
rompin’ chompin’ marching morons that serve lead Semar and Pretty Polly into an ambush, bully tormented by self-loathing and hate. His
as Punch’s footsoldiers in any tale. and have them swept up by Spite and his thugs. mission in life is to maim and kill any puppet
who he feels is “trying to put on airs” by
BASHI NO-TOES: Bashi No-Toes is the twin Because he knows that his brother Rashi is in looking better than he does.
brother of Rashi, but the two brothers are very love with Pretty Polly and likely to go after her
different in character and abilities. Bashi has a if she is taken by Spite, Bashi has taken steps to There is no puppet in Maker’s Land that
fully working mouth and can speak whenever he alienate Rashi from Mister Horse by removing Spite hates more than Pretty Polly. She is the
wishes, and he has a wicked and envious heart. his own yellow turban and donning Rashi’s blue embodiment of everything that he can never
He would like to own the caravan and run the turban at night to torment Mister Horse while be: lovely, nimble, well-liked by all. Nothing
Shadow Orchestra himself, so long as he can the rest of the troupe is sleeping. would give Spite more joy than to tear Pretty
eliminate Semar as head of the family. He has Polly limb from limb or destroy her pretty

BA SHI N O -TO E S RA SHI N O -TO E S MISTER HORSE

PUPPET TYPE: Hand Puppet PUPPET TYPE: Hand Puppet PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette)

THIS PUPPET IS: medium height, medium THIS PUPPET IS: medium height, medium THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, quite
build, quite heavy, medium speed, and build, quite heavy, medium speed, and heavy, quite fast, quite strong, and a horse.
strong. strong.
THIS PUPPET CAN: speak; run very fast;
THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at grab things with his mouth; hide things by
at him if he sees them coming as soon him if he sees them coming as soon as they eating them temporarily and then letting
as they are thrown, throw things, grab are thrown, throw things, grab things, hit them “drop” from his rear end later; kick
things, hit things, move quietly if he is things, and move quietly if he is lucky and things very hard; carry three marionettes,
lucky and careful, lie, and betray other careful. a dozen hand puppets or a hundred finger
members of the Shadow Orchestra at will, or shadow puppets at once on his back; and
including his twin brother. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, move pull a wagon.
quieter than a finger puppet, speak, or
THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, or betray Pretty Polly. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things
move quieter than a finger puppet. thrown at him, grab or throw things with his
hooves, resist running away from things that
are scary; or resist candy if it is offered.

112
face, not necessarily in that order. He roams
Maker’s Land looking for her from time to time,
If Pretty Polly and the other members of the
Shadow Orchestra are arrested for any criminal
The Box
following rumors of her public appearances. acts in Respite, including Pretty Polly’s alleged
theft of Punch’s heart, any duels that Rama has
Spite has acquired a small vial of a very gotten into, or any disorder or destruction of ™™ By Arinn Dembo
powerful Maker’s solvent, which is capable of property blamed on the travelers, this is where
dissolving most of the lacquer and paint of they will be locked up. Bashi, if he is able to
“ ( W ) h i le t h ere i s a lo w er
any puppet’s face. The solvent was originally arrange for Polly’s arrest, will lead Spite and his
class , I a m in it , wh ile th ere
intended for healing, to clear away old scars and Nutcrackers directly to this place to break into
is a crim in al element , I a m o f
scratches before a puppet was re-painted by the the jail and kidnap all the puppets inside it.
it , an d wh ile th ere is a so u l
Maker’s brush, but now it is simply a torturous,
in prison , I am n ot free.”
mutilating acid which mars and melts a puppet’s SPITE’S CAMP: Spite and a squad of
face, sometimes causing blindness and leaving Nutcrackers have been hot on the trail of ™™ Eugene V. Debs
behind a ruin. Pretty Polly and the Shadow Orchestra, and are
beginning to close in. If Bashi’s machinations
Spite’s vial of solvent is carried by his are not stopped in time, Spite will inevitably Opening Set Piece
Nutcracker squad at all times, in case they catch find Pretty Polly and seize her, as well as any
Pretty Polly or some other particularly well- member of the Shadow Orchestra who tries The battered moon shone down on the lake of
painted puppet. An especially clever or stealthy to defend her, and bring them to this camp to milk and cookies as the Biscuit Boats went out
puppet might be able to sneak into their camp be tortured at leisure with pails of hot water, for their morning run. Still hot from the forge
and steal it from them; a group of smart, brave fire, or solvent dripped onto their various body of creation, the new cookies spun idly on the
puppets might be able to raid the camp to steal parts. white, mirror-still surface.
it, or to rescue a puppet taken captive by Spite
and his Nutcrackers. The camp has a simple arrangement, with a The warm cookies and the chilly milk created a
circle of tents around an open fire pit which thick, sweet-smelling fog which covered the lake
Spite’s description and abilities are on page 45. holds a cauldron of water. Stakes driven into the and rolled up onto the shore. The Biscuit Boats
ground and guarded by Nutcrackers will hold slid silently through the sugar-scented mist,
any puppet taken prisoner here; finger puppets visible only as shadows from the docks. In each
Set Pieces will be stuck to a corkboard with thumb tacks, boat, one puppet rowed or pushed the vessel
hand puppets will be crudely sewn to the stake along with a pole, while the second puppet
THE CORNER: This is what passes for a jail to hold them in place, shadow puppets will be aboard reached out with a slotted spoon to scoop
in Respite, a cozy cottage with no windows held in place by glue, and marionettes will be the fresh cookies out of the milk before they got
and only one heavily locked door. Located far shackled. soggy, and put them in a collection basket.
outside the city limits in a quiet forest nook
near the lake of milk and cookies, the Corner The Boatmen worked quietly to avoid notice
is where puppets are sent who have been by the Nutcrackers and Boys that sometimes
disorderly, unkind, or badly behaved. Judy has patrolled the area. Punch always hated the
them remain in custody until they have had a Biscuit Boats, and took every opportunity to
chance to think about what they’ve done, speak keep the people of Respite from finding any
the truth, and apologize for any harm they’ve relief from hunger and misery in their exile.
caused to others.

113
 Nonetheless, despite the risks they took, the Judy summoned her bravest and truest puppets MacGuffins
Boatmen were happy puppets. Occasionally, together immediately. She said, “I need your
those watching might hear a whistle or a help, my friends. Respite is in deep trouble! I SAUSAGES: Generated magically by Joey the
burst of laughter when someone found a batch know that Punch always wanted to put a monster Clown whenever he wishes for them, sausages
of cookies that were particularly rare and in the lake to take it away from us, and just are superior even to candy as a desired foodstuff
interesting; although the majority of cookies on to be plain mean. But I thought he meant to in Puppetland. Joey has only to say the magic
the lake are simple chocolate chip, sometimes build something like one of his Boys, a horrible words, “I wish we had some lovely sausages!”
a round of Jammie Dodgers, gingerbread men, creature that would serve and obey him. To and the four linked sausages instantly appear in
or snickerdoodles would bring a little extra unleash the Crocodile is madness—even for the pocket of his clown suit. When this happens,
happiness to the citizens of Respite. Punch! Joey will immediately pull them out and begin
searching for a frying pan and a fire to prepare a
On this dark morning, however, the sound that “I need you to go to the Box, and find out meal.
broke the silence was a terrible crunch, followed how Punch managed to get inside. Please,
by a shout of surprise. Somewhere out on the my friends, find some way to break into that It is not difficult at all to persuade Joey to hand
lake, there was a sudden flurry of splashes, and perilous place. There’s a puppet in that prison over the sausages while he searches for a frying
puppets screaming, and dreadful gnashing, who can help us—he has an unlimited supply pan, and he will hand over any number of
and wood splintering and shattering! Many of the one treat that the Crocodile loves to eat sausages to any person he believes to be Punch
Boatmen shouted and rowed toward the sounds more than milk, cookies, puppets, boats, and… in particular, as Punch is his favorite person in
of disaster, hoping to reach the stricken puppets well…everything else. the world.
before they drowned in the chilly white depths
of the lake, but they could not help. The first “Please, my friends, find some way to reach THE KEY: The Key to the Box…is that there
flurry of crunching and screaming was followed Joey the Clown!” is no Key. The doors and locks of the prison
by a second, and a third, as one boat after are run by an automaton puppet, Tommy
another was smashed, and its occupants torn Turnkey—in many respects, Tommy is the
apart. Questions and the Ante Box, as he consciously operates all the locking
mechanisms within the prison.
Those waiting on the shore danced anxiously What is the Box? Who built it, and why? And
and cried out to the Boatmen, until at last a why are puppets put there? How do you get in Tommy’s passkey mechanism is simple. At the
drowning puppet managed to cry out in pain and out? front door, he will ask each puppet a single
before it was dragged under: question: “Impossible, or Improbable?” The
Who is Joey the Clown? How can he help Judy and puppet must choose one of the two, and then
“Get away from the Lake! Row and run as fast the puppets to rid the lake of the Crocodile? perform a deed which is listed on his or her
as you can! “This Puppet Cannot” list.
If the actor-puppets fail to find and an answer
“It’s the Crocodile!” to these questions, the lake of milk and cookies In order to open any door within the prison,
will become a hazard zone for the foreseeable the puppet must achieve a feat which is either
When the first puppets running from the scene future. The Crocodile will always be waiting Impossible due to the physical limitations of
reached Judy, she immediately put a guard there to devour any passerby, whether good or being a puppet of that type, or Improbable due to
on the paths to the lake. The Crocodile was wicked. the quirks of personality.
much too dangerous to allow any of her beloved
friends to go near it.

114
As an example: a Nutcracker who wanted to the doors of the prison and allow one or two other a true friend—a puppet who never saw anything
enter the Box, or operate any of its doors, would puppets to slip through. but the best in him. Judy may be willing to help
have to dodge something thrown at him, feel an your actor-puppets with information about Joey
emotion, allow disobedience, or betray Punch. If THE BOOK: There are only four prison cells the Clown and his relationship with Punch, as
Judy wanted to cross the threshold of the Box, in use within the Box. One of them now lies she has memories dating back to the early days,
she would have to dodge something thrown at her, open, and once contained the Crocodile. Joey soon after Joey was made.
tell a lie, allow a puppet to suffer, or hurt Punch the Clown is in a second, and Jack Ketch is in a
directly. third. The fourth contains the Book, a prison for She remembers Joey as a buoyant, happy puppet
wicked and terrifying shadow puppets. who quite miraculously never seemed to be hurt
Punch once crossed the threshold of the Box by anything Punch said or did, and who was
by doing the impossible and killing his Maker, The Book takes the form of a massive leather- always there to help Punch if he ran into trouble
sewing a mask of flesh, and creating the Boys. bound black journal, the kind which might or needed assistance. She also remembers Joey’s
Performing these impossible deeds enabled him serve as a sketchbook for a serious artist. Its full sausages quite vividly.
to incarcerate Joey the Clown and Jack Ketch. title is The Book of Shadows, which is written in
But if Punch wanted to enter the Box today, he large gilt letters on the cover. It has a large brass JOEY THE CLOWN: Joey the Clown is a circus
would have to dodge something thrown at him, hasp to hold it shut. The simple mechanism puppet dressed in a white onesie with large
be happy, survive without his mask of flesh, or for opening and closing it can only be operated pompom buttons. His face is painted in the
allow disobedience. from the outside. The Book sits alone on the whites, reds, and pinks of a typical comedic
stone floor, and is big enough that it would take performer for children, with bright blue eyes
Needless to say, Improbable Acts (those which at least two marionettes to open it. and a cheerful smile. He has three tufts of
are against one’s moral and personal nature) brilliant pink hair, one above each ear and one
are easier for most puppets to perform than Trapped between the pages of the Book are all at the top of his head.
Impossible ones. The price for acting against of the shadow puppets which the Maker once
one’s Nature is high, however, regardless of used to create Tales of Horror for his audiences. Joey was created for one reason and one reason
whether the act is Impossible or Improbable. If the actor-puppets open it, Schreck and any only: he exists to love Punch. Years ago, when
Any puppet who performs an act which is number of malevolent shadow puppets of the the Maker realized that Punch had become a
against his or her Nature will have to fill in a puppetmaster’s invention may escape and freely troubled and troubling puppet, he created Joey
puzzle piece—and this will have to be repeated roam the Box, and possibly even escape the Box to cheer him up, and help make him less scary
for each door that is opened. At minimum, it by slipping out through the gates when some and better loved by audiences of children. It is
would cost two puzzle pieces to enter the Box other puppet passes through them. Joey’s basic nature to be happy, bright, friendly
this way—one to get in, and another to get out. and helpful to all people, but most particularly
to be a friend to Punch, to see the best in him,
This mechanism is not intentionally cruel. The Innocents to put a positive spin on his actions and motives,
Box was meant to be freely opened only by and to help him in any way he could.
the Maker, who could do the Impossible and JUDY: Judy’s description and abilities are on
Improbable on a regular basis. page 48. Judy is the leader of Respite and the Joey is a very good person himself, which makes
Resistance, but she is also the former wife of it all the more ironic that he truly believes that
On the bright side, the locking mechanisms Punch. Judy genuinely loved Punch when they Punch is a swell guy. Nevertheless, this is an
of the Box have not been oiled for quite some were younger, and had great faith in him. immutable fact of Joey’s existence. The idea that
time. The doors open and close slowly, and one Punch could be a wicked person, and one who
puppet—or in the case of the Five Finger Boys, She is not the only puppet who ever truly loved does significant harm to others, is confusing and
one group of puppets—could hypothetically open Punch. Along with a loyal wife, Punch once had distressing to Joey as a rule, and for the most
115
 part, he seems blithely unaware of the dark deeds JACK KETCH (THE HANGMAN): Whether individually. He cannot outwit and force Punch
and cruelty that his old friend has been up to. Jack Ketch is a good or an evil puppet depends to put his head in the noose, however. Any
largely on one’s point of view. He is a tall direct confrontation with Punch will inevitably
In many respects, Joey is also an extremely and rugged marionette built in the form of a end with Jack Ketch putting his own head in the
powerful puppet. The Maker created him to be a hangman, wearing a long black coat and a black noose and being hanged by Punch instead.
companion to Punch, a puppet who had become mask to conceal his eyes. He is partially bald,
dangerously aggressive, and Joey is magically with a bulging pate in the front and a wild mane This is not a happy ending for Punch, however.
immune to that aggression. He cannot be of black hair flowing behind him. He carries a When Jack Ketch is killed he becomes the
physically harmed by Punch or any Pulcinella. bundle of planks tied with a length of rope over Skeleton, and the Skeleton is a persistent
his shoulder at all times. annoyance that even Punch can do without.
Joey’s evasion skills are designed to be comedic
and are best explained by example. Joey is Jack Ketch is the embodiment of brutal justice,
never aware that Punch is trying to harm an executioner who punishes the guilty for
him. If Punch swings a bat at Joey, Joey will their crimes against the Maker. He can sense
see something interesting on the ground at and name any crime or infraction of rule or JOEY THE CLOWN
that moment and bend over so quickly that he law committed by any puppet, and will usually
ducks the swing. If Punch aims a kick at Joey, mention it when he sees them. This can be “A friend is someone who will help you
Joey will suddenly feel the urge to skip and disconcerting, as Jack often introduces himself move. A true friend is someone who will help
coincidentally jump out of the way. If Punch to other puppets by naming their crimes: you move a body.”
throws a rock at Joey, Joey will miraculously “Hello, Sally Red Buttons. I see you took
choose that moment to take up an exercise Molly’s cookie while she wasn’t looking.” PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette)
regimen that has him doing jumping-jacks.
Even a puppet who has pilfered a piece of candy THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy,
In practical terms, this ability could be very or told a lie will have its sins written on its face slow, and quite strong.
useful, but Joey is completely unaware of this to Jack’s remorseless eye. This being said, the
power, and has no means of exploiting it for gain. Hangman has little interest in punishing petty THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab
He can only believe the best of Punch, and is crimes and misdemeanors. Jack’s mission in life is things; hit things very hard; magically
never aware when Punch is trying to hurt him. to punish the sin of murder. evade or avoid any physical attack made
Nevertheless, Punch himself is keenly aware of against him by Punch or a Pulcinella
the fact that Joey is the one puppet immune to his In the presence of a murderer, Jack’s planks without being consciously aware he is doing
physical attacks. This is part of the reason that he magically form a gallows, complete with a it; and spontaneously generate strings of
lured Joey into the Box. hanging noose. Jack will then bend all of his sausages which are quite delicious, and
force of will and strength of body and purpose irresistible to most puppets.
Joey is not similarly immune to Punch’s Boys, to force the neck of the murderer into the noose.
who can manhandle him at will, and he can be Once he succeeds in encircling the villain’s neck THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things
harmed by other puppets as well. with rope, they will “take the drop” and die thrown at him (unless they are thrown by
permanently. The scaffold and rope are quite Punch or a Pulcinella), actively attempt to
Joey’s other magical ability allows him to effective and sufficient to end the life of any do Punch harm for any reason, knowingly
spontaneously generate sausages to provide puppet, regardless of type. cooperate in schemes to harm Punch, see
meals and treats for his friends. See “Sausages” or understand that anything Punch does is
in the MacGuffins section of this scenario to see Jack is a formidable opponent, evenly matched intentionally wicked, or refuse any favor or
how this is done. or slightly stronger than any of Punch’s Boys help that Punch asks, if Punch asks nicely.
116
THE SKELETON: The Skeleton only appears In general Tommy is not a vicious or malevolent less determined or clever enough to figure
if Jack Ketch is killed, and has no function personality, but he is bound by the magical laws out a way to perform a Key act. If players
other than to bother, bedevil, distract, and that govern the prison. He has no choice but to reach this stage of the scenario and need a
terrorize the puppet responsible for killing ask any puppet who wishes to enter or leave the clue, the puppetmaster’s voice may intrude by
Jack Ketch. It does so mainly by harassment, Box the Key question. He also has no choice saying, “As every puppet knows, things that
constantly tapping its victim on the shoulder but to act accordingly if the puppet gives the are Impossible for one puppet are often easily
and then dashing or leaping away to remain appropriate answer to the Key question, and accomplished by others! A marionette has legs
unseen, moving smaller items around or hiding performs an appropriate Key act. for kicking, while a hand puppet does not, and
them when they are needed, setting small but so kicking is Impossible for the hand puppet.
potentially vicious traps, etc. The morality of the puppet performing the But Improbable acts are actions are things
action is irrelevant to Tommy; both good and that a puppet avoids doing not because they
The Skeleton is essentially a ghost or haunt, evil puppets can perform Key acts at times, are physically incapable of them, but because
and represents the vengeful spirit of the Ketch, although most puppets are not clever enough they feel wrong. It would be highly Improbable
the lawman still hunting down the guilty and to solve the riddle of the Key question, much that Judy would tell a lie, but she does have a
punishing them from beyond the grave. The mouth…”
Skeleton cannot be physically harmed or
killed, and it will not rest until the puppet
responsible for the death of Ketch has been
destroyed. Once this occurs, the Skeleton JACK KETCH THE SKELETON
will go to the Graveyard and lie down (THE HANGMAN)
in the grave of Ketch, and never trouble PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette)
Puppetland again.
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette) THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, slender, light,
TOMMY TURNKEY: Tommy Turnkey is the quite fast, medium strength, vengeful,
presiding consciousness of the Box, a rare THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, stocky, heavy, cunning, and relentless.
automaton-style puppet built into the structure slow, quite strong, righteous, brave, grimly
of the prison itself to serve as its warden. determined, single-minded, and fanatical. THIS PUPPET CAN: throw or grab small
He consists of a system of moving parts objects; dodge things thrown at it by
and mechanical pulleys and levers threaded THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or turning sideways, even at the last moment;
throughout the Box. grab things; hit things very hard; find and follow the puppet who killed Jack
sense a puppet who has broken the law; Ketch; cause any puppet (including Punch,
Tommy’s face is built into the faux stone façade spontaneously generate a gallows in a Nutcracker, the Crocodile or any other
above the prison gates, a giant brass circle with the presence of a lawbreaker; execute by puppet which is normally without emotion)
blinking blue eyes made of glass, and fully hanging any puppet guilty of breaking the to feel fear and panic.
functional mouthparts and ears. Additional law; and become the Skeleton if killed.
eyes and ears exist throughout the Box, so that THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick, throw,
Tommy can see and hear what goes on within THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things or grab things; hit things very hard;
every hallway and cell, although he has no thrown at them, outwit Punch or force his physically injure another puppet, even its
other mouths and cannot speak to prisoners or neck into the noose, resist the urge to punish primary victim; be physically harmed by
visitors to the prison, even to issue warnings. a murderer, or survive his own noose. another puppet; or cease its mission until its
Tommy also controls the locks and doors within victim is destroyed.
the prison, and can open and close them at will.
117
 As a general rule, Tommy will also refuse to Tommy can explain many things, including Individually, they are fairly normal puppets
answer any questions about the prisoners held how Jack Ketch and Joey the Clown came to of their type who are quick, cunning, and sly,
within the Box, and what they are up to. Security be locked up, why the Maker built him, and but unable to perform any unusual feats. When
is a serious matter, and he also respects the who was the last puppet to open the gates—a they come together, however, the Five Finger
privacy of those held within his walls, and does thieving finger puppet known as Migsey the Boys become greater than the sum of their
not wish to have his prisoners tormented or Sneak. If he is on friendly terms with the parts. They are able to operate as a hand puppet
teased. He will also refuse to answer questions actor-puppets, he might also attempt to issue known as the Invisible Hand, and exercise the
about the recent prison break of the Crocodile, warnings to them once they are inside the Box strength and abilities of a hand puppet.
unless he is won over by kindness and courtesy by opening and closing prison doors loudly,
from the actor-puppets. rapidly blinking his eyes or wiggling his ears to The individual personality quirks and abilities
get their attention. of the Five Finger Boys separately are listed
Tommy has been guarding the Box for a very, below. For purposes of this scenario, they
very long time, and no attention has been paid See the MacGuffin section to learn more are considered an anomalous group of finger
to his needs or wants since the Maker died. A about the Tommy’s role as a turnkey. puppets who can easily and readily do the
puppet who showed him kindness, freely offered Impossible, because when they join to become
him a treat like a piece of candy, or who wiped the Invisible Hand, they can do things that
the dirt from his brass face might be able to win Little Villains are Impossible for any finger puppet. For this
him over and enter into his confidence. reason, the Five Finger Boys can easily waltz
THE INVISIBLE HAND (AKA “THE FIVE in and out of the Box whenever they please,
FINGER BOYS”): Migsey, Jigsey, Pinky, without losing puzzle pieces or suffering any
Winky, and Hobb are a set of charcoal grey other loss.
TO M MY T U R N K E Y finger puppets with tiny black beads for eyes.

PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Automaton)

THIS PUPPET IS: the presiding consciousness

of the Box; as tall, stocky and heavy as the MIGSEY THE SNEAK JIGSEY THE FENCE
Box itself; slow; and quite strong.
PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet
THIS PUPPET CAN: lock and unlock, and
open and close all the doors of the Box; and THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light, THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light,
enjoy candy and other snacks. quite fast, weak, greedy, sneaky and clever. quite fast, and weak.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things (he THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown
has no legs or feet), throw things or hit at him even if he only sees them coming at him even if he only sees them coming
things (he has no arms or hands), grab or at the last moment, and move very at the last moment, and move very
receive anything except with his mouth, be quietly. quietly.
tricked into opening the Box or any cell door
within it without a Key act being performed, THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things,
or resist opening the doors for any puppet throw things or grab things; betray his throw things, or grab things because he
which commits a Key act. brothers; or let any of them come to harm. has no legs or arms; betray his brothers; or
let any of them come to harm.
118
Once the gang realized the trick of getting in, MIGSEY THE SNEAK, A FIVE FINGER BOY: PINKY THE QUICK, A FIVE FINGER BOY:
they exercised their option to explore the prison. Migsey is the leader of the gang and the natural Pinky is the smallest, fastest, and quietest
This was how they stumbled onto Cell Two, spokespuppet for their opinions. In general, member of the gang, built to fit on a pinky
where Joey the Clown was kept, and figured he is of the opinion that stealing is fun, and finger. He is extremely good at serving as a
out that Joey would give them any amount of that taking things from other puppets is a look-out, scout, and spy, and can often hide in
sausages they wanted if they used the swazzle to harmless and playful act. He is not by nature circumstances that would be challenging even
imitate Punch’s voice from outside his cell. cruel or brutal, and he may suffer qualms of for a shadow puppet because of his tiny size
conscience if he discovers that his latest caper and unobtrusive grey color. It was Pinky who
Unfortunately, they also stumbled onto Cell has indirectly led to loss of puppet life. studied the patrol patterns of the Nutcrackers
One, the Lair of the Crocodile, and ended up at Box Mountain and helped his brothers slip
opening the gate out of curiosity, looking for JIGSEY THE FENCE, A FIVE FINGER BOY: through them without being caught.
something to steal. When the Crocodile lunged Jigsey runs the Pawn Shop and is the brains of
out of its pond and tried to snap them up, they the Five Finger Boys, keeping the accounts and WINKY THE WISEGUY, A FIVE FINGER BOY:
fled the Box, and the Crocodile ran out through identifying the value of the things they steal. Winky is not particularly interested in stealing
rusty gates after them. Like his brothers, he is not particularly cruel for its own sake, but he loves his brothers and
or brutal, and likes to point out that he always will go along with whatever they have in mind.
Although the Five Finger Boys easily gives a discount to any puppet who comes to He is a prankster and enjoys telling jokes and
outdistanced the Crocodile and suffered no the shop to recover a stolen item that actually making people laugh; he will suffer serious
harm from their escapade, they were badly belonged to them personally. He will be the qualms of conscience if he finds out that anyone
shaken by the incident and will need significant member of the team most likely to respond to was seriously hurt as a result of the gang’s latest
persuasion to become involved in any scheme the offer of a reward for their help. caper.
to return to the Box, much less recapture the
Crocodile.

PINKY THE QUICK WINKY THE WISEGUY OLD HOBB

PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet

THIS PUPPET IS: quite short, quite slender, THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light, THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light,
quite light, quite fast, and weak. quite fast, weak, and fond of jokes and fast, and weak.
pranks.
THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown
at him even if he only sees them coming THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown at him even if he only sees them coming
at the last moment, and move very at him even if he only sees them coming at the last moment, and move very
quietly. at the last moment, and move very quietly. quietly.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things,
throw things or grab things because he throw things or grab things because he throw things or grab things because he
has no legs or arms; betray his brothers; or has no legs or arms; betray his brothers; or has no legs or arms; betray his brothers; or
let any of them come to harm. let any of them come to harm. let any of them come to harm.
119
 OLD HOBB: Old Hobb is larger than the average the Box are taken captive by the Nutcrackers Schreck is trapped in the Book along with
finger puppet, as he was made to fit over a and marched with an armed guard to be many other horror puppets who were once
thumb. A quiet and thoughtful person, he is interrogated by Vengeance. used for Halloween shows and scary stories.
also the muscle of the team and the key operator He is a cunning, malevolent being and will do
of the Invisible Hand. He is the sole member of This being said, the Nutcrackers are not very anything possible to escape the Box once he has
the gang who is indispensable to the operation bright, and their orders do not specify how been released from the Book which held him in
of the Hand—without him, the team loses most many Nutcrackers need to be sent along with check. His only real weakness is his vanity; he
of its ability to hold and throw things. Like the any given prisoner. If your actor-puppets are misses being a movie star and will be unable to
rest of the team, he is neither brutal nor cruel, unable to fight a large team of Nutcrackers, resist a puppet who cleverly strokes his ego.
but unlike the others he is also stubborn and just by getting arrested, a single puppet could
has a streak of moral conscience. If he finds sacrifice himself/herself and distract all nine Schreck wants to hear, at length, how
out that other puppets have died as a result Nutcrackers who are guarding the Box. marvellously scary and special he really is.
of the gang’s visit to the Box, he may insist A sufficiently cunning trickster might even
that Migsey help the actor-puppets put things If the team opens the Box and manages to persuade him to re-enact his emergence from
right…provided that no one has threatened any acquire sausages or set free any of the prisoners the Book, like his character’s emergence from
of them with harm. inside and still has time left before an hour is the coffin in the original movie, as the scariest
up, they may be able to free their brave fellow entrance ever.
THE INVISIBLE HAND: When the Five Finger puppet before the Nutcrackers reach Vengeance,
Boys come together to form the Invisible Hand, or rescue their friend from the Boy’s evil
they literally appear to be the grey fingers of a clutches. Big Villains
glove which is otherwise invisible. The rest of the
phantom hand, although strong, is neither visible SCHRECK: Schreck is an actual film star, THE CROCODILE: The Crocodile is a menace
or open to attack. Objects thrown at any of the the silhouette of a nightmarish vampire. He unique in Maker’s Land, an antediluvian relic
finger puppets usually pass through the invisible was made in the 1920s for a silent film called surviving from a bygone age. It is a rare but
palm and miss, just as if they were still simply Nosferatu. He takes the form of a tall, stooped, powerful hand-puppet, huge and aggressive,
finger puppets dodging, but an exceptionally slender man with a bald head, protruding and possesses no human personality or
well-targeted missile might knock out one of the pointed ears, and freakishly long arms. His consciousness per se, beyond the low cunning of
finger puppets and cause the Hand to dissolve. hands are unnaturally large and bony, his fingers a natural killing machine.
long and tipped with ragged, claw-like nails. His
While they form the Invisible Hand, the Five face is weak-chinned and features an overbite The Crocodile is an all-devouring maw with an
Finger Boys each generate a tiny robber’s hood with two long, rat-like fangs replacing the inexhaustible hunger for puppets and parts of
which covers their faces and prevents them from incisors a normal human would have. puppets. Its nature is to find a hidden place,
being recognized. ideally under water, and wait for puppets who
Schreck is a creature who sustains and amuses are swimming, boating, or walking near the
NUTCRACKERS: The tunnels and caverns himself by causing fear to others. By throwing shore. Then it lunges out and starts crunching.
which surround the Box are patrolled by nine his shadow on another puppet, he fills them
Nutcrackers who are instructed to keep all with a sense of cold despair, of hope and life If the Crocodile catches a puppet in its jaws,
other puppets away. They answer to Vengeance, draining away. The strength and life force of that puppet will lose two puzzle pieces and
who has been charged with security of the Box the victim flows into Schreck, and makes him whatever limb or extremity the Crocodile has
and its occupants. Any puppets caught in the stronger and quicker, his shadow larger and bitten. The puzzle pieces and puppet parts
tunnels of Box Mountain or trying to break into more sharply edged. are never recoverable. Given the opportunity,
the Crocodile will keep crunching any puppet
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which cannot run away from it fast enough, surrounding the entrance to the Box in the
until that puppet is destroyed utterly. heart of Box Mountain. Any puppet caught by
the Nutcrackers will be taken immediately to
This puppet was built before the dawn of time, Vengeance to be interrogated in his dungeon.
long before the Maker created Puppetland and Vengeance will be quite interested to know why TH E CRO C O DI LE
most of the puppets who live and struggle there this puppet was nosing around the Box and/or
today. When Puppetland was built and the trying to get in. PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Hand Puppet)
Maker decided to remove it from contact with
the human world, he deemed the Crocodile too Vengeance is unaware that the Crocodile has THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, quite stocky,
dangerous to roam his new land unfettered. escaped and has no idea that there is a team quite heavy, slow, and quite strong.
of puppets who can open and close the Box at
The Box was originally built for no other will. He himself is incapable of opening the THIS PUPPET CAN: grab things with its
purpose than to contain the Crocodile. doors and does not understand the Key. He will mouth, hit things with its snout and tail,
find any information gleaned from the slow move quietly, and crunch up any puppet or
In terms of available counter-measures—there torturous death of his victim very interesting, object at will with the horrific power of its
are none that will be effective without the and will take it directly to Punch; this will mighty jaws.
proper lure. The Crocodile is aggressive, but not eliminate any element of surprise that might
stupid, and it has found quite a cozy lair in the exist in leading Punch or his Nutcrackers to the THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things
lake of milk and cookies. It will not allow itself lake of milk and cookies to be ambushed by the thrown at it, feel emotions, or resist the lure
to be drawn into the open to be attacked or led Crocodile, for example. of sausages or the opportunity to crunch
into a trap, unless the actor-puppets exploit its up another puppet. Given a choice between
one weakness—sausages. Vengeance’s description and abilities are on crunching up sausages or puppets, it will
page 46. always prioritize sausages!
The Crocodile will follow sausages wherever
they lead, trying to snap up the delicious meat
before it can get away. A puppet sufficiently Set Pieces
brave and quick could even lead the beast all the
way back to the Box, so long as he or she had BOX MOUNTAIN: Box Mountain is a massive The tunnels and caverns of Box Mountain are
enough sausages and a handy stick to impale crag set in the wilder portion of Maker’s Land, regularly patrolled by a team of Nutcrackers.
them on. far from Puppettown and Respite. It is a lonely
peak with a warren of tunnels and caverns THE BOX: The interior of the Box offers only
VENGEANCE: Vengeance was created to be riddled throughout and beneath it. four accessible locations to the actor-puppets,
a tool of Punch’s “justice”. He is a sadistic unless the puppetmaster chooses to add other
monster whose special talent is hurting puppets. Buried deep in the heart of Box Mountain prisoners.
He knows many ways to make a puppet scream is the Box itself. The entrance to the Box is
and delights in finding new ways he hasn’t approached through a tunnel that opens into Cell One was the holding pen of the Crocodile.
thought of before. a large cavern. The walls of the Box itself are A long and broad tunnel leads down to it, with
made of finished stone, and the face of Tommy a huge and heavy gate which now stands open.
Vengeance has many duties in his service Turnkey, the warden, is visible from a fair Looking beyond, the actor-puppets will see a
to Punch, and one of them is providing distance, shining like a brass moon in the light broad black lake with many little stone islands.
security to the Box. He has assigned a team of of eternal sconces. Silvery puppet fish will leap from the water if
Nutcrackers to guard the tunnels and caverns
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 a torch is brought within sight of them; they
were placed in the pen to provide the Crocodile
items for puppets. His inventory includes
spectacles, mittens, etc., as well as some more
The Bottler
with regular exercise, although they were far too useful items like candy and medical supplies
quick and clever to be caught by its jaws. (needles and thread, paint and brushes, new
buttons for eyes, etc). ™™ By Arinn Dembo
Cell Two is a simple prison cell with a bunk and
“ Ce nt u r i es a g o th ere li v e d. . .
a plain wool blanket. It has enough room for a The Pawn Shop is, in fact, the home of a gang
‘A kin g!’ my little rea ders
marionette to walk five steps in any direction, of puppet thieves, the Five Finger Boys, and
w i l l s ay i m m e d i at e ly .
but not much more. This is the current home of its basement is full of stolen goods—including
N o, ch ildren , yo u are
Joey the Clown. one of Joey the Clown’s sausages. If confronted
mistaken. Once upon a time
about the whereabouts of his brother Migsey,
th ere was a p i ece o f w o o d.
Cell Three is an identical copy of Cell Two, but Jigsey will likely flee down a trap door behind
It was n ot an expensive piece
houses Jack Ketch and his planks. the counter into the basement. Only a slender or
o f w o o d. Fa r f ro m it .
quite short puppet will be able to follow him, as
J u s t a c o m m o n b lo c k o f
Cell Four is a larger sealed room which the trap door is built for finger puppets.
f i rew o o d, o n e o f t h o s e t h i c k ,
contains the Book.
s o l i d lo gs t h at a re p u t o n t h e
Those who find a way into the basement will
fire in winter to make co ld
THE DUNGEON OF VENGEANCE: This is a find a variety of useful stolen objects, including
ro o ms cozy a n d warm .”
typical medieval-style Inquisition for puppets, glass eyes and weapons, and a variety of tools
containing a variety of horrible tools to of the trade for thieves, including keys and ™™ Carlo Collodi, 1881
cause pain and suffering, both emotional and lockpicks to open doors, a swazzle to imitate the
physical. Vengeance keeps a brazier of hot coals, voice of Punch, and a masked disguise which
buckets of water and solvent, scissors, hammers, appears to be built for a hand puppet. The gang Opening Set Piece
thumbtacks, sticks, and seam rippers handy for known as the Invisible Hand or “Five Finger
use in his interrogations. He also keeps cages Boys” will also be present. Just as Judy was putting the Baby down for a
and jars from which puppets cannot escape. nap, she heard a desperate fluttering of tiny
THE LAKE OF MILK AND COOKIES: The lake thumps at the door. Hurrying to open it, she
THE PAWN SHOP: The Pawn Shop is a store of milk and cookies is already well described. looked down to see a finger puppet standing on
in the seediest neighborhood in Puppettown. It should be considered one of the active her front step.
Those who go inside will find a friendly finger locations in this scenario, as it now contains the
puppet proprietor named Jigsey sitting behind Crocodile. “Why, Pipkin Mouse!” she said, bending to
the counter, selling a variety of small personal pick up the small puppet. “Just look at the
state of you! You’re all filthy, and your ear is
torn. And your poor tail! What in the world has
happened?”

“Never mind me, Miss Judy!” said the brave

mouse. “The Boys are onto us! Mother Ugly and
Donkey Hoe-Tee are leading the Nutcrackers a
merry chase through the Canyons of Confusion,
but they’re getting closer! I only barely escaped
from a Nutcracker myself. And we couldn’t lure
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Grief away from the entrance. He’s nosing around Judy hugged all of her friends goodbye. “Please standing in his way, and then the fairy Nurse
the rocks and grass, Miss. I think if we don’t do be careful. And if ever you doubt or fear, Blue and the Bottler for the crime of being sad.
something, he may find the Sky Caves soon!” remember this: someday the sun will shine He will then return to Punch and lead him back
once again—and it will be thanks to you!” to the area.
“Oh, this is terrible!” Judy tucked the tiny She shivered. “But if we fail this time, the
puppet into the pocket of her apron. “I must consequences are too terrible to think about.” From the corpse of the Bottler, Punch will gain a
call my best puppets to help us. We can’t let practically inexhaustible source of magical flesh
Punch and his Boys find the Bottler!” from which to make new Boys, monsters, and
Questions and the Ante masks to his wicked heart’s content.
And so Judy called together her friends, the
best and brightest and bravest puppets she What secret were Pipkin Mouse, Mother Ugly, If the Bottler dies, the Crank—which has the
knew. And when everyone had gathered around and Donkey Hoe-Tee trying so hard to protect? potential to raise the sun over Puppetland and
her table, and had a cup and a cookie, she spoke. even bring a taste of Autumn Twilight or Spring
Where does the Secret Door in the Canyons of Dawn—will also be impossible for anyone, even
“We don’t have much time,” she said. “I need Confusion lead? Punch and his entire army together, to move.
you to help some very brave puppets who have
run into trouble with the minions of Punch.” Why do the Knights of Day keep their lonely By moving, the sky can bring hope to all
vigil in the Sky Caves? puppets, and despair and rage to Punch. If the
Judy opened a scroll of paper and showed her actor-puppets fail, it will be Darkest Night, and
friends a map of Maker’s Land. “You must Who is the Bottler? Why must he be protected nothing else, until the Maker returns…if he
travel far and fast, away to the west, to the with so much secrecy and devotion? And why is ever does.
forbidden mountains where even Punch and his he the only one who can bring the sun back to
Boys do not often go. Those who travel too far in the Land?
that direction will touch the sky itself, but you MacGuffins
will not go quite that far—not yet.”
Consequences of Failure THE FOUR PICNIC BASKETS: Mother Ugly,
She pointed to a tangle of lines among the Pipkin Mouse, and Donkey Hoe-Tee carry four
jagged peaks. “Here you will find the Canyons If the actor-puppets fail to rescue Mother Ugly picnic baskets for the Knights of Day. Each
of Confusion, where two very brave puppets and Donkey Hoe-Tee and keep them from being Knight receives a special meal every few days
are trying to stay just one step ahead of the crunched up by the Nutcrackers, the Knights which nourishes their strength, and provides
Nutcrackers chasing them. You must find a way of Day will not receive their rations and will be all the energy they need to fight with courage,
to free them of pursuit, and if they need help weakened by starvation when they encounter valor, and style.
completing their mission, please assist them. The Grief and his troops.
work they do is terribly important!” When properly fed, each Knight is able to
If the actor-puppets do not assist the Knights defeat a few Nutcrackers, and can give any one
Judy placed Pipkin Mouse on the table beside of Day in their battle against Grief and the of the more powerful Boys an evenly-matched
the map. “This is my dear friend Pipkin, a very Nutcrackers, the Knights will be killed, duel. If the Knights are strong, and assisted by
experienced traveler. He can take you to the and they will not be able to keep Grief from the actor-puppets, it is very unlikely that Grief
Canyons and help you find his friends. If all else reaching the Cave of Summer Day. and the Nutcrackers will pass even one of the
fails, he can show the way to a secret door in the Caves without retreating right away. Bullies do
Western Mountains, and you will complete the If Grief reaches the Cave of Summer Day, he not like fair fights! If Grief and his defeated
mission yourselves.” will kill the heroic puppet Bradamante for minions escape alive, it is still a win for the
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 actor-puppets, because the odds that Punch and sky above Puppetland into Autumn Twilight, THE CLOAK OF FLESH: The most complete and
his Minions could ever find their way back to Summer Day, Spring Dawn, Winter Storm, or convenient piece of flesh available in the land
the Secret Door are very low—they call them Darkest Night. is the cloak of flesh belonging to Silence. If
the Canyons of Confusion for a reason. your actor-puppets have previously recovered
THE WOUND: The Bottler suffers from a the cloak, or know where to find it, using the
The individual Picnic Baskets and their grievous wound in his right upper chest. Those cloak to heal and waken the Bottler will be a
contents are described below. who get near enough to look into it will see that simple, one-to-one exchange of life for life. The
it is at least two finger puppets across, a round cloak of flesh will disintegrate upon contact
™™ THE CHECKERED BASKET: This is the meal red hole with a pool of sticky sap at the bottom. with the Bottler’s wound, the Bottler will be
of Harley Keeno. It consists of a bottle of healed and awakened at once, and Silence will
wine and an assortment of fruit, bread, and Here, a small object was thrown at the Bottler be permanently destroyed.
cheese, all made of marzipan. with such horrible force that it pierced him
through and nearly snuffed out his life. Only If the cloak of flesh is used in this manner,
™™ THE FLOWERED BASKET: This is the meal because the Maker was nearby and able to bring Silence will have a grave in the Graveyard, and
of Konjo Oni. It contains miniature rice the Bottler to Puppetland was the Bottler able become the Devil’s new favorite slave in Down
balls made from cotton, a tiny bottle of to survive. Below. He will not re-enter the game with this
saké, and a variety of sushi rolls made of team of actor-puppets unless Punch is willing to
candy. While he lies peacefully in the Cave of Summer venture Down Below (or the actor-puppets are)
Day, tended by Nurse Blue, the Bottler’s wound and get him back—and of course, provide him
™™ THE OPEN BASKET: This is the meal is slowly healing. The healing would proceed with a new cloak of flesh.
of Ursula the Terrible. It contains an much more quickly if the Maker were there to
assortment of honey drops and a variety of help, and repair the marionette body with a
candies shaped like fish. father’s touch…but the Maker is lost, and the Innocents
Bottler will lie stricken for a long time unless he
™™ THE SUNFLOWER BASKET: This is the receives a specific kind of help. JUDY: Judy is the former wife of Punch, and
meal of Bradamante. It contains an the founder of Respite…but she is much more
assortment of lemon-flavoured candies, FLESH OF THE MAKER: There are multiple than that. She is also one of the most ancient
and a blue bottle of fairy elixir for Nurse pieces of the Maker’s living flesh currently in surviving puppets in Maker’s Land, and the
Blue. play, in Puppetland. Punch is wearing a magical only survivor who is in full possession of her
mask cut from the Maker’s flesh, and all six mind and memories.
THE CRANK: The Crank is a huge handle of the Boys are constructed of flesh. If any of
set into the floor of the Cave of Summer the Boys were to be torn apart, a piece of the Wise, sweet-natured, and honest as she is, Judy
Day. Driven through the rock into the deep Maker’s flesh might be left behind. is not without her secrets. She still grieves
mechanisms below Maker’s Land, the Crank is over Punch’s degeneration into a tyrant and a
how the sky canvas revolves over the world. The flesh is very valuable to the Bottler. murderer. She still regrets the loss of every life
A salvaged patch of flesh gained from the to the savagery of his Nutcrackers and Boys—
The massive handle and heavy machinery can destruction of one of the Boys could serve as a and remembers a time when Nutcrackers were
only be operated by two beings; the Maker and life-giving bandage. It represents the touch of the guardians of children, and the Maker’s flesh
the Bottler. Although turning the sky is quite his Father’s hand, and can be incorporated into stayed right where it belonged.
strenuous for the Bottler, as he is just a boy, the Bottler’s body to help heal the trauma he
he knows how it is done, and he is able to turn received when he was shot as a real boy. She still mourns the Creator of Puppetland,
the sky twice per day, in order to make the and hopes to revive him. Holding his silver tear
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within a thimble, she waits for the chance to Judy seems to know the answers to all these
“Th is mo rn in g a fine idea
resurrect him, and thus restore order to this questions, and moreover she remembers that
came to me.”
tiny pocket universe. the Maker was not the only human who once
“ Let ’ s h ear it .”
lived in the tiny, joyful shop with its basement
“I th o ught of making myself
But why does Judy believe this is possible? She theater. There was another child of the Maker,
a bea utifu l w o o de n m ario n et te .
has not lost her memory of the ordinary humans once upon a time, and he was not a puppet. He
It m ust be won derfu l , one
she once entertained as part of the Maker’s was a little boy called Joseph—named after the
th at will be a ble to dan ce,
puppet shows. She knows that humans are born, Maker’s own Maker. And Joseph had a job.
fen ce, a n d t urn so mersa u lts .
and live, and die as quite ordinary flesh…
With it I inten d to g o aro u n d
and that once they die, they do not come back He was the Bottler.
t h e w o rl d, t o e a r n my cr u st o f
to life, as a rule. If you asked her, she would
bread an d cup of wine. Wh at d o
honestly admit that in the old world, human Judy will not tell the actor-puppets all she
yo u th in k?"
death was permanent. knows. If they want to hear the full story, they
will need to earn it by dealing effectively with ™™ Carlo Collodi, 1881
Especially if you were to hit someone with a Grief and his Nutcrackers, and saving the life of
mallet and flay him. the Bottler and Nurse Blue. The Maker of Puppetland once had a Bottler of
his own. The role was filled by his son Joseph,
And yet Judy knows that in the Maker’s case… Judy’s description and abilities are on page 48. a small but strong and clever child with pale
things are not so cut-and-dried. She seems to skin, black hair, and blue eyes. Joseph was the
believe that the Maker was unlike other humans. THE BOTTLER: In traditional Punch and Judy apple of the Maker’s eye, and he helped with
And she knows there is still hope. shows prior to the 20th century, the Punchman, every aspect of puppetry and performance, from
or Puppeteer, was not a one-man show. making and painting the puppets to turning the
But why? Who was the Maker? What was his Although he might make all of his own puppets, Crank to change the sky backdrop.
nature? Why is it possible to transform his props, and stage, he would also have some
flesh, living or dead, into such powerful, assistance in creating the magic. The assistant Joseph was not a human child by birth. The
magical puppets? Why does Punch desire access would help with stage tasks like swapping out Maker first created him as an extremely large
to that magical flesh above all things? props, puppet costumes, and backdrops, or and lifelike marionette, and he was later
repeating lines spoken by a puppet that had a transformed into a human boy by means of
What was the original relationship between voice too squeaky or scratchy for clarity. But unknown magic. Judy, who knew the Maker
the Maker and the most ancient puppets of the most important job of all for a Bottler was when he was a boy, will remember, if prompted,
his collection—the Crocodile, the Devil, Jack to recruit an audience for the theater, bring that the Maker himself went through a similar
Ketch, Punch, and Judy herself? He was the them to the performance, and then collect their process of evolution as a child, beginning as a
Creator of hundreds, perhaps even thousands of donations for the entertainment. The money marionette and eventually becoming human—
puppets, and the Builder of a magical sanctuary collected was called the “bottle” of the show. first a real boy, and then a man.
for their protection…but did the Maker really The person who performed all these tasks and
make Punch? And for that matter…who made more was called the Bottler. It was because of the Maker’s magically imbued
the Maker? Where did he come from? flesh that this miracle of transformation was
possible. The Maker was carved from a stick
of magical wood, and forever retained the
properties of the wood. He existed in a highly
magical liminal state, on the threshold between
human and puppet worlds. The Bottler was
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 he was finished, his son was entombed in the this out. But it is more likely to be a useful way
How True Is This Tale? Sky Caves far below the surface of Puppetland, to spy on Punch and his Boys, if the actor-
slowly healing the terrible wound in his breast, puppets have regular access to the Bottler after
while the puppets above lived their own happy completing this tale.
How much of the story of the Bottler lives for as long as necessary until the war went
and his relationship to the Maker away, and humans were ready to be happy again. If the Bottler awakens, he will still be an
is true? Maybe it’s only the way oversized marionette with the heart and mind of
Judy and the Blue Fairy interpreted Before the Maker was killed, the Bottler was a child, unwilling and unable able to confront
glimpses of the Maker’s moments often visited by his doting father at night, while Punch or his minions directly. He will always
caring for the boy. Or maybe the the puppets in the world above slept. The Maker need protection until his Father returns. But
actors’ puppets have here the true would hold Joseph’s hand and tell stories of the he will be able to change the sky at will, and
nature of the Maker himself. It’s up past and the future, of his own childhood and any change of weather or light will make Punch
to you. of what the two of them would build together quite frantic and fill the hearts of the puppets
when Joseph was well. All the while Nurse Blue in the world above with wonder and hope—the
sat close by, knitting and listening intently. She belief that even the Darkest Night can end.
learned a great deal.
carved from the same magical wood, although DONKEY HOE-TEE: Donkey Hoe-Tee is a
he is much smaller and younger than the Maker. Since the Maker died, the Bottler has had no unique marionette in the form of a Donkey. He
Accordingly, both the Maker and the Bottler visitors. Although he is technically in a coma, is highly intelligent and extremely brave, a good
are strange and wonderful beings, capable Joseph is aware enough of his condition to friend to his comrades Mother Ugly and Pipkin,
of miraculous feats from the perspective of feel a growing sadness, which is beginning but unable to speak since Punch glued his
ordinary humans and puppets. to be powerful enough to attract Grief to the mouth shut. He does not mind this presently,
Western Mountains. Without his father’s because he knows that if he is captured, he will
When war came to the human world, the Maker touch, the Bottler’s rate of healing has slowed be unable to give information to interrogators.
tried to ignore it at first. He was not by nature significantly, and no puppet loved the Maker
a violent man, and both he and his son were ill- more, and misses him more painfully, than his MOTHER UGLY: Mother Ugly is the cart driver
suited to soldiering and could not be drafted— favorite son. of her team, and holds the magic word which
the Maker because he was very old, and the opens the Secret Door to the Sky Caves. She is
Bottler because he was far too young and small. Even while sleeping fitfully, Joseph still retains a hand puppet made in the form of a hideous
However, war came to the city outside the one of his traditional powers: he is able to repeat old crone, with a long projecting nose and
theater nonetheless, and Joseph was accidentally the words most recently spoken by any puppet chin, deep-set eyes, and a checkered babushka
struck by a stray bullet on the street outside the in Maker’s Land. All you have to do is ask wrapped around her head. She began life as
puppet shop. the question, filling in the name of the right a Witch Puppet, and would always have been
puppet—“What did Punch say?” or “What did a bit ill-favored, but her ugliness was greatly
Devastated by the injury to his beloved son, Molly Green-Jeans say?” —and the Bottler will increased when Spite melted the paint and
the Maker carried the boy into the theater and magically repeat the last sentence spoken, clearly varnish of her face and blinded her with a splash
turned him back into a marionette to preserve and without inflection. of solvent.
his fading life. Over the course of the next day
and night, the Maker brought all of his puppets If a former friend is currently singing the Mother Ugly is the only puppet who knows the
into the theater and removed all of Puppetland death-song of Down Below, asking the Bottler magic word which opens the Secret Door to the
from contact with the human world. By the time this question might be a disturbing way to find Sky Caves easily. The word is “Collodi”.

126
 THE BOTTLER D O N KE Y H O -T E E M O T H E R U G LY
PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette) PUPPET TYPE: Unique (Marionette) PUPPET TYPE: Hand Puppet

THIS PUPPET IS: enormously tall; THIS PUPPET IS: tall, stocky, heavy, THIS PUPPET IS: medium height, stocky,
enormously stocky; enormously heavy; medium speed, quite strong, and a quite heavy, slow, quite strong, brave,
of unknown strength and speed; badly donkey. crafty, elderly, and blind.
injured until healed; asleep until healed
and awakened; and composed of the same THIS PUPPET CAN: run; grab things with THIS PUPPET CAN: throw things and hit
miraculous composite of wood, flesh and his mouth; kick things very hard; carry her target if it makes a noise, grab things,
sorcery as the Maker himself. three marionettes, a dozen hand puppets, or hit things, and move quietly if she is lucky
a hundred finger or shadow puppets at once and careful.
THIS PUPPET CAN: repeat the words most on his back; pull a wagon, and navigate the
recently spoken by any puppet, anywhere in Canyons of Confusion. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: see, dodge
Maker’s Land; slowly regenerate to heal his things thrown at her (she cannot see them
own wounds, if left undisturbed for a sufficient THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things coming), kick things (because she has no
length of time; and operate the sky mechanism, thrown at him, grab or throw things with legs), move quieter than a finger puppet,
if awakened. his hooves, or betray Judy or his friends. or betray Judy or her friends.

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: move while

asleep; awaken without the touch of the
Maker; harm or injure any puppet, whether
innocent or villainous; or confront or harm
Punch and his minions directly.

trim, the Knights require regular support from

watch them dance, leap, and burn helplessly, Judy and her resistance movement; without
PIPKIN MOUSE: Pipkin Mouse is a finger unable to put out the flames without hands. regular deliveries of food and drink, the
puppet in the form of a small pink mouse with Pipkin will never break under interrogation Knights will weaken and starve.
oversized ears, small bead eyes, and a long silky or surrender to Punch, his Boys, or the
tail. An accomplished operative, he has spent Nutcrackers. Despite his small size, he has a HARLEY KEENO, KNIGHT OF DAY: Harley
a long time working in the Western Mountains will of steel and a very large heart, and would Keeno is a vintage marionette. He was created in
with his friends, Mother Ugly and Donkey Hoe- gladly give his life to save his friends. the form of a tall, slender male figure wearing a
Tee, serving as a supply team to the Knights of black domino mask and a tight-fitting jacket and
Day, who guard the Bottler by making camp in THE KNIGHTS OF DAY: There are four brave trousers of red, black, white and gold diamond
the Sky Caves. marionette warriors stationed in the Sky shaped motley. The scabbard of a steel fencing
Caves, and each of them has taken an oath to foil (formerly a hatpin) is buckled around his
Pipkin was once a member of a family of finger protect the Bottler, and let no one pass who is hips. He has black boots, white gloves, and a
mice, but his brothers, sisters, and parents were not a friend to Judy and the Maker. In order white ruffled collar.
killed by Mayhem, who lit them one by one to to remain at their posts and maintain fighting

127
 HARLE Y KE E N O KONJO ONI, KNIGHT OF DAY: Konjo Oni, the
PIPKIN MOUSE “Flower Demon”, is a marionette in the form of
PUPPET TYPE: Marionette a Japanese samurai. His broad, powerful body
PUPPET TYPE: Finger Puppet is dressed in a suit of colourful bamboo armor,
THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, medium painted with hollyhocks and vines. He wears
THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light, build, medium weight, fast, quite a steel helm on his head, his long back hair
quite fast, weak, fiercely brave, cunning strong, brave, witty, and clever. plaited into braids on either side of his face. He
and sneaky. is well armed with a spear and a fighting chain,
THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or the latter fitted with a vicious grappling hook.
THIS PUPPET CAN: dodge things thrown grab things as heavy as he is; move Konjo’s fighting style is to hurl the chain to
at him even if he only sees them coming very quickly; dodge things thrown at hook his opponent, and then drag them close
at the last moment, move very quietly, him if he sees them coming as soon as enough to be stabbed and torn by his spear.
map and remember every curve and twist they are thrown; commit amazing feats Perhaps not coincidentally, it is a strategy that
of the Canyons of Confusion, and find the of acrobatics and agility; and wield a is especially effective against opponents made
Secret Door. fencing foil. of flesh!

THIS PUPPET CANNOT: kick things, THIS PUPPET CANNOT: hit things very Konjo normally appears to be an ordinary
throw things, or grab things because he hard, break his sworn oath, resist the human-type puppet with the face of a stern,
has no legs or arms; betray Judy or his chance to make fun of a bully, allow an handsome Japanese man in his late 40s. If
friends; or surrender to Punch, his Boys, or innocent to be harmed, or leave the Cave angered or insulted, however, his head will
the Nutcrackers. of Autumn Twilight before the Bottler spin like a top and present his second face, the
awakens. terrifying brick-red mask of a Japanese ogre, or
Oni. In this form he has bulging, cat-like yellow
eyes and the tusks of a boar jutting upward from
his lower jaw.
Harley is a warrior, courtier, and valet from an violence. This is being said, his tongue is his
earlier generation of puppet theater. It is his sharpest blade, and his wits are his best weapon. When in his demon form, Konjo Oni has greater
nature to be a comedic companion to princes, a If he is engaged in battle with Nutcrackers speed, strength, and ferocity, but less control
sharp-tongued, quick-witted mountebank who or Boys, he will lead them on a merry chase and ability to tell friend from foe than he does
alternates between serving the realm and the through a battlefield that he has taken weeks to as a human warrior. If the actor-puppets are
legitimate needs of his prince, and amusing prepare, and destroy many of them with traps present when he changes form, they should run
himself at the expense of the unwise, the he has built specifically to thin their ranks. immediately or get out of sight, so as not to be
unkind, and the unworthy. attacked accidentally!
Like all the Knights of Day, Harley Keeno
A puppet of astonishing speed and agility, made a sacred oath to protect the Bottler from Like all the Knights of Day, Konjo Oni has sworn
Harley Keeno performs acrobatic feats that are harm. He will not leave his post or allow any his life and service to protect the Bottler from
impossible for most marionettes, including puppet to pass him, unless he is defeated and/ harm, and he will not leave his post or allow any
somersaults, back flips, high kicks, and or destroyed. He guards the Cave of Autumn hostile puppet to pass him unless he is defeated
whirling leaps. He is an excellent fencer, and Twilight with a quip and a smile, and he is far and/or destroyed. He guards the Cave of Spring
uses his foil to good effect if forced to use deadlier than he looks. Dawn with the honorable purpose of a man and
the ferocity of a demon.

128
URSULA THE TERRIBLE, KNIGHT OF DAY: Urusula guards the Cave of Winter Storms, and Posted to the Cave of Summer Day, Bradamante
Ursula the Terrible is a fighting marionette in is uniquely well-suited to endure a constant is the last line of defense for the Bottler, and
the form of a large brown she-bear. Dressed in blizzard. Her thick shaggy coat, large body, and she takes her role very seriously. She is an
a steel breastplate, greaves, and partial helmet, savage heart keep her warm as she stands watch expert swordswoman, she has built defensive
she is bigger and stronger than the average over the last bastion before intruders reach the structures out of stone, and she has trained
human-shaped marionette and able to do Cave of Summer Day itself. herself long and hard to use the weather of the
dreadful damage to any puppet made of wood Cave to her advantage. Although she has had a
with her long rending claws and sharp white BRADAMANTE, KNIGHT OF DAY: Bradamante great deal of time to acclimatize and get used to
teeth. is a warrior marionette made in the Sicilian the blinding, constant summer sun which burns
style, created for performances of the Song overhead, most of her opponents are much more
Ursula does not use human-style weapons, as of Roland, the Trial of Joan of Arc, and other accustomed to low light.
her talons, teeth, and strength already make medieval plays. She is dressed in a suit of
her a formidable opponent. She is capable of shining plate armor. Her body is that of a She uses the light as a weapon, often arranging
intelligent conversation and has a motherly love beautiful old woman with dark skin, large dark to come out of the sun by attacking from above,
of finger puppets, who she regards as cubs to eyes, and long curling white locks flowing from or to tilt the highly polished mirror surfaces of
be protected. If challenged by the minions of beneath her helm. She carries a bright steel her sword, shield, and armor to dazzle, befuddle,
Punch, she will fight savagely to defend her blade and a highly polished round shield. and blind her opponents. Even if she is caught
cave and honor her oath. at her weakest, Bradamante will take one or two

KO NJO O NI BRADAMANTE U RS U L A THE T E RRI BLE

PUPPET TYPE: Marionette PUPPET TYPE: Marionette PUPPET TYPE: Marionette

THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, quite stocky, THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, medium THIS PUPPET IS: quite tall, quite
quite heavy, slow, quite strong, and build, heavy, medium speed, quite stocky, quite heavy, medium speed,
possessed of two personalities, one human strong, skilled, intelligent, and ruthless. quite strong, maternal, fearless, and self-
and one demon. sacrificing.
THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab
THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or things as heavy as she is; hit things very THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab
grab things as heavy as he is; hit things hard; move at medium speed; and use a things as heavy as she is; hit things very
very hard; spin his head around on his sword, a shield, and her own armor very hard; rend things with her massive claws;
shoulders to show either a human face or effectively. crush things with her terrible jaws; run on
an ogre face; see behind him at all times; all fours at medium speed; and withstand
and use a spear and a fighting chain. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things the cold and wind of a Winter Storm
thrown at them, break her word, or leave without suffering ill effects.
THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things the Cave of the Summer Day until the
thrown at him, resist changing to his Bottler has awakened. THIS PUPPET CANNOT: dodge things
demon face if he is injured or insulted, run thrown at her, break her word, harm a
from battle, or leave the Cave of Spring finger puppet or allow a finger puppet to
Dawn until the Bottler has awakened. be harmed, or leave the Cave of Winter
Storms until the Bottler has awakened.
129
 Nutcrackers with her before she falls, and she a trained cadre supporting Grief in his search NURSE BLUE
will be urgently motivated to destroy Grief if she for the source of sadness that lies within the
can. Western Mountains. PUPPET TYPE: Marionette

NURSE BLUE: Nurse Blue is a tiny marionette THIS PUPPET IS: short, slender, light,
crafted in the shape of a Blue Fairy, wearing a Big Villains fast, quite strong, loving, loyal, and
modest blue frock, a flower hat, and curling- patient.
toed shoes. In addition to her delicate arms GRIEF: One of Punch’s first edicts upon
and legs, she is equipped with gossamer wings, becoming dictator was that “Everyone must THIS PUPPET CAN: kick, throw, or grab
which flutter quite effectively and allow her always be happy!” Grief was created to enforce things as heavy as she is; dodge things
to dart like a dragonfly around the Cave, both this law. thrown at her if she sees them when they are
to bring information to Bradamante, and to first thrown; move fairly quickly; and fly.
protect the Bottler. Grief often wanders the land aimlessly, sensing
unhappiness all around him and looking for THIS PUPPET CANNOT: hit things very
Nurse Blue serves as a caretaker and a surrogate sources of exceptional sadness which stand out hard, break her word, abandon the Bottler,
mother to Joseph. She was posted to the Cave to from the general background hum of misery. or leave the Cave of Summer Day until he
monitor the Bottler’s condition and report to his This work is difficult, and Grief often becomes awakens.
Father how the boy was doing when the Maker confused for short periods of time by his own
came to visit. She is trained to provide care to unhappiness, which dampens the input he
the Bottler’s wound, and thanks to her position receives from others.
of trust and intimacy during visits by the Maker,
she knows a great deal about the nature of the When Grief finds a puppet who is obviously sad, Set Pieces
Bottler and the history of the Maker himself. for any reason, he rips that puppet limb from
limb. The Bottler is a very large puppet, and the THE CANYONS OF CONFUSION: This is a
If the actor-puppets reach the Cave of Summer ripping would take Grief a considerable length twisting maze of treacherous, stony defiles at
Day victorious, bringing the picnic basket of of time, but given the depth of Joseph’s sadness, the feet of the impassable Western Mountains.
Bradamante intact and happy news of the defeat it would be well worth the effort from Grief’s Because the passes are so narrow and the
of Grief and the Nutcrackers, Nurse Blue will perspective. mountains are so high and steep, the Canyons
happily let them visit the bedside of the Bottler, of Confusion are very dark, and can only be
share his story with them, and even request that In general, Grief will not be excessively navigated well by those who have memorized
the players bring her Punch’s mask, Silence’s interested in the Knights of Day or even the the maze.
cloak of flesh, or any surviving fragments of the actor-puppets in this scenario, except to the
Boys back to her after some other adventure. degree that they stand in his way. Given a choice While Pipkin Mouse can lead the actor-puppets
between stopping to kill a puppet who is only into the Canyons and navigate the maze quite
moderately upset, and following the siren call of easily, the players will find that Mother Ugly
Little Villains the Bottler’s profound sense of loss, Grief will and Donkey Hoe-Tee have been cornered in a
make the latter his priority. dead-end Box Canyon by six Nutcrackers. When
NUTCRACKERS: There are twenty Nutcrackers the actor-puppets arrive, the Nutcrackers will
in this scenario, six of which have committed Grief’s description and abilities are on page 46. be held off only by the fact that they cannot
to search for and capture Mother Ugly and approach en masse. Mother Ugly has cleverly
her donkey cart. The remaining fourteen are gathered rocks to throw at them whenever she

130
hears them coming, and Donkey Hoe-Tee keeps The drawstring for the door is very finely A complete description of each Cave and the
kicking them as they try to come through the counterbalanced, and even a finger puppet weather and environmental effects of the sky
narrow crack in the rock. But that won’t last could probably pull it by mouth to escape the that hangs over it follows.
much longer. Sky Caves, if sufficiently determined.
THE CAVE OF AUTUMN TWILIGHT: Puppets
The players will have to come up with a way The magic word, which Mother Ugly can give fleeing from the entrance into the Sky Caves
to eliminate, chase away or lure away the them if they ask, is “Collodi”. Use of the magic will first enter the Cave of Autumn Twilight,
Nutcrackers in order to save the lives of Mother word will open the Door quickly and efficiently which is guarded by Harley Keeno.
Ugly and Donkey Hoe-Tee. If they succeed, the and allow the party to pass, giving them
rescued puppets will hand over the Four Picnic time to get a good head start on Grief and his Like all the Sky Caves, this a vaulted cavern
Baskets and help them to pass through the Nutcrackers, who will have to batter down the with a great deal of space, at least five
Secret Door to the Sky Caves. door. marionettes high. Large yellowish stalagmites
rise from the floor like the pillars of a
Suggested methods to handle the Nutcrackers If the actor-puppets arrive at the Secret Door Cathedral, until they almost touch the ceiling.
include: a swazzle to imitate the voice of Punch, without having saved Mother Ugly or having They are girdled with grass and lichens growing
impersonation of Silence via the cloak of flesh, an uninjured shadow puppet, they will have to in patches of pale green, red, and gold leaf.
or an avalanche to destroy the Nutcrackers by open it by main force or jimmy it from within
burying them under falling rocks (but only if themselves. This will give Grief time to home in The light of the sky is warm and coppery, and
the party includes an uninjured finger puppet on them, and by the time they enter, the Boy and the sun peeks out at the horizon through clouds
or shadow puppet light enough to make the his entourage of remaining Nutcrackers will be which are stained with a palette of brilliant, fiery
climb and start the avalanche without being in hot pursuit, or already attacking. autumn colors. The paint used to the render the
caught in it or setting it off too early). sunset seems to molt spontaneously from time to
THE SKY CAVES: The Sky Caves are a series of time, creating leaf-shaped flakes of red, orange,
THE SECRET DOOR: In a clearing which looks underground caverns in which the different sky and yellow which are picked up by gentle winds
like every other nook and cranny of the Canyons backdrop for Maker’s Land are stored when not and drift and twirl down to the cavern floor, very
of Confusion, there is a place where a small in use. In each cavern, there is a sky overhead much like real autumn leaves. The rest of the sky
green glass wine bottle lies broken at the foot of which creates lighting, weather conditions and fades to a deep electric blue in the east, the first
a cliff. This is the only visible sign of the door an environment appropriate to the time of day stars of evening beginning to appear. Puppets
leading to the Bottler. and the season it depicts. who take a deep breath will find that the air
smells of apples, cinnamon, and campfires.
Actor-puppets who arrive at the Secret Door will The magic of Maker’s Land is powerful, and the
be able to feel around and perhaps even figure sky backdrops are a potent active agent in the The floor of the cavern is strewn with very
out where the hidden edges of the door may be, environment. When the proper sky is overhead, large boulders and trees cloaked in autumn
but they will not be able to open it unless they the paint on the landscape may shift colours, colors, which serve as excellent camouflage
know where and how to whisper the magic word. either subtly or dramatically. Formerly green for Harley Keeno. In his gold, red, white, and
The only other non-violent option is to have an grass will turn white under the Sky of Winter black motley, he blends in beautifully with
uninjured shadow puppet within the party, who Storms, while the trees will turn red and gold his surroundings, and sometimes can almost
can slip through the hidden crack beneath the under the Sky of Autumn Twilight. seem to disappear. The rocks and clumps of
door and pull the string which opens it from the forest also create a twisting path full of unseen
inside. ambush sites and hidden nooks and crannies.

131
 The exit at the far side of the cavern leads to the wake up in his or her own bed, whether that is convince any puppet that bringing the Spring
Cave of Spring Dawn, but reaching it can be a a camp site outside the Sky Caves or even miles Dawn back to Puppetland would be a gift to all.
challenge. away, in Respite or Puppettown.
In the center of the cave there is a Shinto shrine,
If the actor-puppets reach the Cave of Autumn Harley considers this a cleaning service. and it is upon the steps of the shrine that Konjo
Twilight without the Checkered Basket, Harley Oni sits waiting. When strangers enter his home
Keeno will not let them pass willingly. They If the actor-puppets arrive in the Cave of he will rise and greet them politely. He will not
will have to either battle him or flee from him, Autumn Twilight with Harley’s basket in hand, ask for his Basket, but if he is offered the proper
and try to avoid his traps, which come in three they will have the fun of fighting alongside one one, he will offer to share his meal (which the
categories: Hidden Pits, Trip Wires, and Tangle of the greatest warrior puppets of all time. They actor-puppets should politely decline), or a duel
Traps. can join him in leading the Nutcrackers a merry (which they should very hastily decline), and
chase and luring them into Traps. Harley will allow them to pass unmolested.
A Trip Wire is the simplest of the three types, be weary, having not eaten for a few days, but
and consists of a strong thread of nylon or will recover his strength by swigging wine and Those who are rude or insulting to Konjo Oni
black fiber, which is difficult to see. Puppets crunching marzipan as he fights. will bring out his demon side. Wise puppets will
running from Harley Keeno or chasing after flee immediately, even if they brought his tribute
him will sometimes trip over the wire and fall Regardless of the start and the outcome of the basket initially—Konjo Oni is very dangerous
sprawling, giving him a chance to knock them battle between the Nutcrackers and Harley in demon form, and does not distinguish
out, blindfold them, or cage them. Keeno, Grief will not engage in battle. Harley between good puppets and bad when committing
is much too joyous a puppet to attract his mayhem. Regardless of how the battle between
Hidden Pits are holes dug into the floor of attention. He will slip past all the traps, leading the Nutcrackers and Konjo Oni begins, Grief
the cave, and covered with a tarpaulin which five dedicated Nutcrackers, and reach the Cave will once again move on while his soldiers take
cleverly mimics the drifts of leave mould and of Spring Dawn. the worst of the damage. Konjo Oni is a creature
the green grass of the forest floor. A victim of rage, not sadness, and does not make an
stepping onto the tarp will fall into a deep hole THE CAVE OF SPRING DAWN: The Cave of attractive target.
which is very hard to escape. Spring Dawn is the home of Konjo Oni, the
Flower Demon, and he has spent his free time Even if things are going very well for the Knight
Tangle Traps are concealed nets which catch continuously landscaping it to ease his worried and the actor-puppets, Grief and at least two
the victims up and hold them helpless in a mind. The entire cavern has become a Japanese Nutcrackers will break free of Konjo Oni’s
tangled lump above the cavern floor. Harley garden, complete with a koi pond of puppet fish rampage to reach the Cave of Winter Storms.
Keeno can mock and poke them to his heart’s in the center, a stone garden of pebbles for Konjo Whether the actor-puppets are ahead of them or in
content, and unless they have something sharp, to re-arrange with his rake when he is restless or hot pursuit is a matter of choice and chance.
it is difficult for anyone larger than a finger lonely, and many trellises of blooming wisteria,
puppet to escape. rows of blossoming cherry trees, and a variety THE CAVE OF WINTER STORMS: Puppets
of paper flowers arranged over the rolling green entering this cavern will immediately be
The purpose of Harley’s traps is to catch and grass. buffeted by blasts of icy wind and the sounds
hold his enemies until the end of the “day,” of crashing thunder. Shadow puppets will
when all puppets fall asleep and are magically The sky above is a pale spring blue, with the sun need assistance from heavier friends to keep
restored to their rightful places. Any puppet just appearing in the east to wash the canvas from being instantly carried away by the wind
caught in Harley’s traps and not rescued or able with delicate pastels. The air in the cavern and possibly damaged or destroyed; finger
to break free will fall asleep eventually and be smells of lilacs, wisteria, and cool water. Taking puppets will tumble along the ground and find
removed from the Sky Caves. That puppet will a deep breath of the cool spring breeze should it difficult to keep from being tossed around if
132
they cannot find someone to stabilize them or a particularly charming finger puppet might continuous fortification, she can jump and run
carry them. successfully recruit the hungry Ursula as an ally around the whole structure very easily, and
by treating her as family, and claiming to be a she uses it to gain a height advantage over her
The light of the Cave shifts continually from lost cub. opponents and throw nets onto them, shine
nearly day to nearly night. The sky above is a beams of harsh sunlight into their eyes, or hurl
molten mass of tumultuous black, white, and Puppets who wish to pass beyond into the Cave of rocks and bottles at their heads.
grey clouds, which seems to shift and roll and Summer Day will have to reach the exit on the far
spin upon one another, spontaneously producing side of the cavern and survive both Ursula and Puppets who arrive in the Cave of Summer Day
painted lightning bolts of yellow, violet, and the weather. Grief will certainly do his best to must give Bradamante her basket immediately,
white every so often, always accompanied move through the cavern quickly, following the or she will declare them enemies and hunt them
by crashes of thunder noise in the distance. siren call of terrible sadness to find his chosen without mercy. She takes her role as the last
Periodically the white clouds above seem to victim. Ursula will be able to catch three or four defender of the Bottler very seriously, and will
shed very small flakes of white paint, which fall Nutcrackers at most, if she is well fed when Grief not be willing to allow the players to approach
and drift and blow across the ground like snow. and his minions arrive—fewer if she is not. the pallet without challenging them if they
arrive empty-handed. If the actor-puppets do
All green-flecked surfaces have turned bone- THE CAVE OF SUMMER DAY: This is a large slip past her while she battles Grief and the
white in the Cave of Winter Storms, and all redrock cavern with a floor covered in pale, Nutcrackers alone, Nurse Blue will do her best
puppets will shiver and feel cold there, with glittering quartz sand. The sky is cloudless pale to fight and distract them as well.
smaller and more slender puppets feeling the blue, almost white, and the sun burns directly
cold the most keenly. Finger puppets will overhead. The air is baking hot and many If Bradamante is deprived of her lemon drops,
tremble uncontrollably and shadow puppets will puppets will complain that their clothes feel she will be weary and not able to fight at full
be acutely miserable, even if the can find a way scratchy and say they would like to take off their strength against any puppet. Without her
to turn edge-on to the shifting winds to avoid jackets. This is noon in a hot, dry climate—and bottle of fairy elixir, Nurse Blue will also be
being blown away. Bradamante, the Sicilian warrior puppet, feels weakened, and her flight will be the more like
right at home. the lazy wobble of a moth than the flashing
The cavern floor is made up of deep glacial speed of a hummingbird or dragonfly. Both
mounds, and leafless trees, and there are The center of the Cave is occupied by a huge puppets will need help if Grief and his brute
many obvious holes in the surrounding cliffs platform in the shape of a camp pallet. Several squad arrive at full strength.
and mounds which are probably rock shelters enormous flannel blankets have been folded into
and tunnels. These are the places that Ursula a makeshift bed for a supersized marionette, There is no visible exit on the far side of the
the Terrible sleeps, and when she is hunting the Bottler. He lies on his back on the blankets, cavern, but there is a huge Crank set into the
unwelcome visitors she will come charging with another blanket covering his body and floor. See the MacGuffin section for notes on the
in and out of the dark places, swinging and pulled up to his chest. Beside him on a small Crank. With it the Bottler can move the sky.
growling and roaring in a most terrifying flat rock there is a large parasol which provides
fashion. shade for a doll’s bed and a rocking chair for the
tiny marionette attendant, Nurse Blue.
Puppets who come to the Cave without bringing
Ursula’s Picnic Basket will have to run from The warrior puppet Bradamante has hewn
her. She will not converse with anyone who into the rock of the cave with her sword and
doesn’t bring her food, and harming a finger quarried Maker Stone to build herself a series
puppet in her presence will also cause her to of makeshift walls and towers surrounding
attack without any further warning. In a pinch, the pallet. Although they do not provide a
133
134
My Life in Puppetland
™™ By John Scott Tynes

My life in Puppetland began in Memphis, Tennessee, where I grew up. Comics, and an endless series of Garry Trudeau’s Doonesbury collections.
The main branch of the public library there was a wonderland to me. It That was also where they kept books on pop culture, so when I designed
was a large, late-model modernist building, all concrete and metal, but my own Star Trek roleplaying game and wanted to paste images of their
the inside was the important part. The children’s section had its own phasers and tricorders into my pages I photocopied them out of books
fanciful archway with flags, and just inside to the left was a wooden from those shelves. Years later, I even stumbled across a samizdat edition
cabinet with two portholes in the doors, which served as a vitrine for of the Star Trek: The Next Generation Writer’s Bible a couple of months
little dioramas and assemblies created by the staff. I discovered so many before the first season had even started airing, mysteriously acquired
wonderful things in that part of the library: the Alfred Hitchcock and the through some kind of pre-internet geek underground I still cannot
Three Investigators books; endless Hardy Boys volumes; an audiobook on comprehend.
vinyl of a young-adult novel called It’s Like This, Cat which haunted my
young mind with its melancholy; and of course, Daniel Pinkwater’s brain- Special Collections included an arts-and-crafts area, and that was where I
melting Alan Mendelsohn, The Boy From Mars. met Punch and Judy.

But there was another part of the library that gradually pulled me away The book seemed innocuous enough. It was a slim hardcover all
from those things. In the main stacks ascending into the high ceiling, about finger puppets. Each chapter was a different craft project with
there was an elevator shaft that only seemed to go to one place: a small instructions and patterns for making a particular set. I remember a get-
area known as Special Collections. A card-catalog entry sent me up there, well card that, when opened, revealed a set of finger puppets tucked into
and door after door opened up. This was where they kept art books, the interior posed in a little sick-bed tableau—I made that one for my
including comic-book reprints, so I read Alex Raymond’s Flash Gordon grandfather when he was in the hospital after being struck by a car, and it
comic strip from the 1930s, and the Smithsonian Book of Comic-Book depicted him in bed surrounded by doctors and nurses.
135
 One chapter was devoted to Punch and Judy. I’d never heard of them
before, living as I did in Memphis, a million miles away from their native
ecosystem of British summer seaside towns. The book briefly explained
their history, summarized their traditional story, and then got on with the
business of showing how to cut and sew your own finger-puppet versions
of the characters: Punch, Judy, the Baby, the Policeman, the Crocodile,
and the Hangman. A black-and-white photograph showed Punch and Judy
performing in a little finger-puppet stage made from a shoebox covered in
striped contact paper, the Baby launching over the side to Judy’s horror. I
never forgot the last line of the cursory plot summary: “And then Punch
hangs the Hangman.”

That sentence was a cosmos. It was a moral inversion of the world I knew
as a boy: a world of cops and robbers, soldiers and Nazis, Luke and Vader.
And the characters it featured were grotesques, strange-looking things
who behaved even stranger.

Somehow I persuaded my mother to make them for me. She meticulously

sewed little Punch and Judy puppets, each of their heads built around a
thimble. She made a little Baby and guided me in making the Crocodile
myself from a clothespin and green felt. Later, I prevailed on her to
expand the cast with the Policeman and Hangman, and I made my own
Ghost using crumpled paper taped onto a popsicle stick—the book didn’t
talk about a Ghost, but I needed one for a script I’d written. Because I
abandoned the traditional story almost immediately and wrote my own
scripts, nonsensical adventure stories I’m still at a loss to explain. In one,
Punch crashes a biplane into a swamp, meets and fights the Alligator, and
then teams up with him when they are menaced by the Present People,
a sentient stack of Christmas presents who fell out of Santa’s sleigh and
turned feral and vicious in the swamp.

Punch and Judy became wholly my own. I’d still never seen an actual
Punch and Judy show and so I put them into service of my own ideas.
While it was their grim narrative and surreal appearance that captured
my interest so obsessively, I took them in other directions. Soon I
had a little basket full of finger puppets, props, backdrops drawn on
construction paper, and my handwritten scripts. I’d tote that basket with
me whenever I was out with my parents doing boring grown-up things,
sitting in the back of the car or an unused room at the church, spinning
out my stories with my tiny characters.

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At my grandparents’ house in Mississippi, I put on puppet shows with a I was so disappointed that I never went to see the puppet show of my
friend from next door. We’d actually charge admission to our families, a script. I simply refused and tried to forget about the whole thing. Instead,
deeply suspect maneuver conceived to earn candy money that my father I used the money to buy a primitive graphics tablet for my computer,
refused to play along with—he’d actually stay in another room and not which was by then far more interesting to me than puppets were. Of
come see our shows because he thought paying me a dime for the privilege course, that’s all a computer really is: a puppet manipulated by our minds
was ridiculous. I still respect him for that principled stand against the and hands.
tyranny of greedy children.
Just as my father refused to pay a dime for the privilege of seeing my
Eventually I moved on. My basket of puppets ended up in the attic of my puppet show, I refused to see a puppet show made from my beloved script.
grandparents’ house and stayed there. I got interested in other things, The acorn does not fall far from the tree.
making plays with friends in my attic and other creative pursuits. I
mostly forgot about Punch and Judy.

But they hadn’t forgotten about me. When I found my passion for puppets again, it was not from puppetry
itself, but from film. In college I took every film-studies course I could
find, starting with a two-semester survey course of the history of film
offered by the English department and followed up with country-specific
A few years after my time with the Punch and Judy finger puppets, the courses offered by the various foreign-language faculty in German,
Memphis Park Commission sponsored a contest for young playwrights. I Italian, and Russian. It was in the spring of 1990 that I was introduced to
think I was about twelve years old. I wrote a play about a radio-show ghost Ingmar Bergman’s film Fanny and Alexander, which immediately became
hunter who encounters the real thing. To my very great surprise I won the one of my favorite movies.
contest. They held the little award ceremony on a drizzly afternoon at the
Wallenberg Shell, a striking open-air amphitheater built by the WPA in Fanny and Alexander tells the story of the Ekdahl family in Uppsala,
the 1930s. Sweden, in the early 1900s. The title characters are the young children
of the family and it is through their eyes, particularly Alexander’s, that
I was deliriously happy. I was receiving an award and a cash prize for my we see the stories of the family unfold. Most significantly, they see the
very own play! Standing there, I imagined the opening night, there on death of their beloved father and the remarriage of their mother to Bishop
the stage, and coming out afterward to take my bows in a tuxedo while Vergérus, a cruel ascetic who makes their lives miserable. The family
the crowd cried, “Author! Author!” because that’s what I’d seen in old is saved by the children’s grandmother who recruits her old friend Isak
movies. Jacobi, a Jewish mystic and merchant who wields surprising and obscure
magics. Isak spirits the children out of the bishop’s house and they stay
Then the head of the Park Commission revealed the horrible truth: my with him temporarily. He has two grown nephews living with him: the
play would be produced as part of their Puppetmobile program, traveling playful scoundrel Aron and his androgyne sibling Ismael, who lives
from park to park throughout the summer to perform my play for kids. locked up in a forbidden room none may visit. It is Ismael who unlocks
Alexander’s gifts of storytelling and when Alexander imagines the bishop
I was crushed. I had loved puppets once but I’d written a play, not a dying horribly in a fire, that is exactly what happens.
puppet show. I wanted to see it with actors on a stage, not puppets in the
back of a dodgy panel van.

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 But before the encounter with Ismael, Alexander is sneaking around I found the scene electrifying. I’d always been fascinated by mysticism,
Isak’s house and shop late at night. It’s full of imported statues, the occult, and the surreal. But I had never found a place for puppets in
furniture, paintings, and bric-a-brac, shadowy and mysterious. He my thinking—there was no dusty shelf or dim corner of my mind where
enters a room with a very large puppet theater and from it comes a voice puppets resided. And now, led by the image of a false and fallen God
challenging him. The door to the puppet theater starts to sway and it’s operated by a trickster mystic, they arrived in force and took up residence
clear that someone is inside trying to get out. in my creative life. Punch and Judy didn’t come back to me, not right
away, but their heralds came and cleared the path, covering it in faded
“Who is behind the door?” Alexander cries, terrified. silken flowers for their eventual procession.

“It is God behind the door,” comes the answer, and then the door swings Meanwhile, however, puppets seeped into my work. Months later when I
open and wooden sandaled feet belonging to a large marionette of the began writing of Carcosa and the King in Yellow, life-sized marionettes
bearded deity emerge. Alexander is terrified, and then the puppet falls to took a central role as the bellhops and stewards of the strange Hotel
the floor. Aron emerges, delighted and laughing at his prank. Broadalbin in 1920s New York City, a hotel whose basement Whisper
Labyrinth led to Carcosa. The cousins of puppets, the automata,
manifested as the Clockwork Child in a story about Ambrose Bierce lost
in the shifting city beneath the Hyades.

All of this unspooled over a handful of years. And then, after college, I
came to Seattle in the spring of 1994 to work for Wizards of the Coast,
and two critical things happened.

The first was that I saw the film Faust, directed by Jan Švankmajer, the
most potent depiction of black magic I’d ever seen. In the film, Faust
visits a theater and is tempted by a puppet Satan to impregnate a puppet
Helen of Troy, from whose wooden womb emerge tiny puppet demons.
The film is a nightmarish vision of corruption and seduction, and it
captivated me wholly.

The second thing that happened was a visit to La Tienda in Seattle’s

University District, a store of folk arts and crafts from around the world.
Upstairs, in a far corner, was a glass wall behind which stood dozens of
Balinese marionettes and Indonesian shadow puppets. I returned to the
store again and again to study them. I knew a little of shadow puppets from
another of my favorite movies, The Year of Living Dangerously, and seeing
them here made me consider the diversity of puppet traditions worldwide.
In my head, the European black magic of Faust merged with the Jewish
mysticism of Fanny and Alexander and the shadow puppets of Asia, and
from this confluence Puppetland was born.

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In those early years in Seattle, I didn’t have a car and didn’t really want I should say something about the game system. I hadn’t read or played
one, so I spent a lot of time riding the bus and walking everywhere. the Amber Diceless Roleplaying Game, but knew the general idea. I created
That in turn gave me a lot of time to think, which was a blessing. And as simple and minimal a system as possible, mostly because I thought
somewhere in those rangy walking days, I started thinking about Punch making something more elaborate and traditional seemed like a waste of
and Judy. time. The system meant nothing to me—it was just a vehicle to deliver
the characters and their world in a way that let me call it an RPG. I
That line was still with me: “And then Punch hangs the Hangman.” But even capped gameplay to an hour as a hard rule because I had so little
if the Hangman can be a puppet, Fanny and Alexander showed me that confidence in the entire experience being satisfying.
God could be one too. That led me to create the ultimate Punch story, in
which Punch murders God. It was the final expression of Punch’s vicious Looking back, I think that hour time limit was the salvation of the whole
response to authority figures of all kinds. system. Almost anything can be fun for an hour. Puppetland still doesn’t
really have much of a system; it just has a framework within which everyone
Of course, I also knew the mystical concept that you become what you agrees to enjoy themselves. And the requirements of play are tricky enough
destroy. It made perfect sense. Punch would always resent God for being that they succeed in very clearly delineating the roles and authority of
what he himself could never be: human, since in this case, God was not player and puppetmaster. Had I done the whole thing in GURPS, I would
the Biblical deity but the Maker of puppets. Not being terribly thoughtful still be having arguments with players about how many dice Nutcrackers
about the way metaphors work, Punch would seek to actualize them by should have or whatever.
taking the Maker’s skin and using it to make a new face for himself,
setting him apart from all other puppets in Puppetland by becoming Puppets and puppet shows require a substantial suspension of disbelief.
almost human, and then using the rest of the Maker’s skin to bring his We have to accept that inanimate objects are moving and speaking on
own horrible ideas to life in the form of his Boys. In this way, he really their own. Puppetland’s rules are their own puppet show: if you choose to
did become the new Maker of his world. believe in them, they will work.

The rest was details. I was in love with this concept, these characters, and
this landscape. I wanted to do something with it. Creating a roleplaying
game was a natural step for me since I was a game designer, but I Puppetland found a warm reception in the early days of the web, where
thought there would be little interest in such a project at any commercial gamers were natural early adopters, forging online communities and
publisher, including the one I owned—Pagan Publishing. Pagan had migrating them from earlier networks like AOL and Delphi. It was soon
plenty of Call of Cthulhu projects in the pipeline, and I couldn’t justify reprinted in a wonderful and sadly short-lived British games magazine,
delaying our other books for my weird little side project. Instead I Arcane, with a brilliant cover painting by Clint Langley for the February
decided to bang out a quick game system and publish the whole thing on 1997 issue.
my personal website. This was 1995 and websites were still a new idea,
but I thought gamers might take a look at Puppetland if it were just a free I insisted the reprint include my contact information—even my fax
webpage rather than a book on a store shelf. number!—because I had this weird idea: that gamers my age were now in
real careers and one of them might be in a position to love Puppetland and
want to do something with it.

139
 A couple of weeks after the magazine was released, my fax machine fired
up with a letter from Sweetpea Entertainment. They wanted to fly me
to Los Angeles to discuss turning Puppetland into a movie. This was the
first time I ever had any dealings with Hollywood, although it would not
be the last.

Sweetpea was the creation of Courtney Solomon, a young producer

and gamer who had managed to secure the movie rights to Dungeons &
Dragons. He spent years working to get it made and finally succeeded,
although the resulting film made few gamers happy. At the time he
contacted me, the D&D movie was still a few years off.

Courtney loved Puppetland. He saw it as a Pixar-style computer animated

family film, which I found to be a novel interpretation of my work. But
whatever, it was Hollywood calling and I thought it was worth taking a
shot. I flew to Los Angeles and spent a day with Courtney and his small
staff at their offices near Rodeo Drive. We discussed terms and I flew
home, clutching a copy of the current screenplay for Dungeons & Dragons
to read later.

We did the deal, I made more money from Puppetland than I ever had
for anything else I’d written, and Sweetpea retains the movie rights to
Puppetland to this day. I liked Courtney quite a bit and I thought the
draft of the D&D movie I read was pretty good—it was clear that he was
trying to take a Spielberg pop approach to the material, rather than the
blood-and-thunder of John Milius’s Conan the Barbarian, and the script
had some good comedic lines as well as a pretty cool extended sequence
in an underground land of the undead. The script continued to evolve
beyond that draft with the final results we saw in theaters; ultimately,
I think Courtney’s inexperience as a director and his limited budget
hobbled what might have been a fun romp through swords and sorcery.
Whether lifelong D&D fans really wanted a fun romp is another question.

I found Courtney’s idea of a rated-G Puppetland movie both odd and

delightful. It was as if in just a couple of years, Puppetland had already
made the journey so many ancient folk tales had, in which the raw and
ugly early version becomes sanitized and smoothed over in later versions
across generations and editions. Had the movie been made, there would
always have been two Puppetlands: the cleaned-up version for kids and the
wicked little booklet for obsessive grown-ups. That would have been fine
with me.

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While the movie never happened, I did cross paths with Courtney again The journey from Puppetland to breakthrough story games like My Life
a while later. Even before they pursued Puppetland, Sweetpea invested With Master, Dogs in the Vineyard, and many more has been wonderful to
in Marc Miller’s science fiction RPG Traveller to bring it back to print see. By the time I completed my work on the second edition of Unknown
in hopes of establishing it as a movie or television franchise. When Armies and on Call of Cthulhu D20 circa 2002, I had little enthusiasm left
their chosen publisher, Imperium Games, wasn’t working out, Pagan for big-book roleplaying games. RPGs for me had always been vehicles to
Publishing made a proposal to Sweetpea and Marc Miller to take over explore worlds, stories, and characters. The game systems often just got in
publishing for the revived game. In the end, the deal didn’t happen, the way.
which I’m ultimately grateful for—Pagan was not prepared to support
Traveller properly no matter how much we loved the game. While the RPG industry continued on its trajectory, Puppetland gradually
disappeared. Hogshead Ltd. ended in 2002 and Puppetland left the
market. The last box of Puppetland books arrived at my house one day
around that time, thanks to Eric Rowe at Wizard’s Attic, who shipped
Puppetland’s appearance in Arcane did not only lead to Hollywood. It the final inventory to me the year before Wizard’s Attic itself went out of
also led to London, in the form of my friend James Wallis’s publishing business.
company Hogshead Ltd. James had published his own tiny diceless
roleplaying game, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, in 1998 and now And for that matter, I kind of went out of business too. I left Pagan
wanted to produce a print edition of Puppetland with some new material. Publishing in 2002 and resigned from my work on Unknown Armies in
We made an agreement, reused Clint Langley’s cover from Arcane, and off 2003. At that point, I was done with roleplaying games. Punch, Judy, and
we went. The Hogshead edition of Puppetland was released in the summer all the other denizens of Puppetland went into my basement and stayed
of 1999. A Spanish edition came from the wonderful people at Edge there, out of print and only somewhat remembered, for a decade.
Entertainment in 2001 with a brilliant new cover by Alejandro Terán—a
cover I loved so much that we’ve used it for the Arc Dream edition you’re It wasn’t until the spring of 2012 that I decided to bring Puppetland back
reading now. into print in a revised and expanded edition. By then, I was married with
a daughter and a full-time job at Microsoft, a world away from where I’d
Alongside Atlas Games’ Over the Edge and Ron Edwards’ Sorcerer, I been the last time Puppetland was on the market. I wrote the new edition
believe that Baron Munchausen, Puppetland, and the other titles James during the fall and winter of 2012–13, put it away for a year, and finally
published under his New Style imprint led pretty directly to the Indie made an agreement with Shane Ivey at Arc Dream Publishing to run
RPG/Story Game movement in terms of design approach and scope. I a Kickstarter and get it published. Of course, the Kickstarter brought
also suspect Puppetland is the first complete roleplaying game to ever stretch goals—including this very essay—and I did a lot more work on
originate on the web, launching as it did in 1995 just a few months after the manuscript.
the release of Netscape Navigator 1.0 supplanted NCSA Mosaic as my web
browser of choice. And sure enough: once Puppetland started showing signs of life, puppets
came crawling back into my life in other ways, too. And much to my
surprise, it started in Moscow.

141
 The Obraztsov State Puppet Theatre & Museum is the largest in Russia
and must be one of the best puppet museums in the world. While their
holdings are naturally strong in Soviet-era republics, they also have
examples from the rest of the world, from those Indonesian shadow
puppets that captivated me in La Tienda to a handful of characters from
The Muppet Show and many more.

When I visited in the late winter of 2013, I needed the help of a sort of
relay of babushkas. The first was the theater’s ticket taker, who spoke
no English but understood I wanted to see the museum. She muttered
something and led me into the lobby where she spoke with another, who
managed a stall selling cheap toys. That babushka led me across the
deserted lobby and into the darkened museum, whose lights were out
except for a desk lamp in a far recess where the third and final babushka
was reading a magazine. They had a brief conversation and then the third
babushka led me out of the museum and around a corner to a utility closet
where she flipped a circuit breaker. We then returned to the museum,
whose lights were now on.

She gave me a brief tour in Russian, just indicating the different display
cases and their regions and themes. Finally she asked me a direct
question, and I had to admit that I didn’t speak the language, information
which the sturdy but low-bandwidth babushka relay had not transmitted.
She shook her head sadly, but then led me to a nearby case containing an
antique child’s puppet theater and puppets, something so important to
her that she insisted on showing it to me despite the language gap.

“Nikolai,” she indicated. “Familiapuppen.” She pointed to a photograph.

“Rasputin,” she said darkly.

For these were the toys of little Alexei Romanov, son of Czar Nicholas,
murdered by the Bolsheviks. The theater and puppets were made in Paris
and still bore the maker’s label on the front. I nodded in understanding.
“Bolsheviks,” I said. Satisfied, she returned to her desk.

Of course, this was only the beginning of the collection. They had puppet
fragments as much as a thousand years old and many, many from the
last five hundred years. Punch and Judy were there of course, as were
numerous other cultural characters from various traditions. The ones
from the twentieth century showed the dramatic influence of artistic

142
trends, from stylized characters of the 1920s and 1930s influenced by To this day, I am not sure how Nutcrackers came to Puppetland. They
modernism to pop-art assemblages of the 1960s such as a monkey whose might have been a suggestion from my friend Daniel Gelon, whom I
body was a tin can. bounced a lot of Puppetland ideas off of way back when. But when I
decided Punch needed soldiers, there they were, jaws a-clacking.
For twenty minutes I wandered the museum in silence. The labels for the
displays were helpfully provided in both Russian and English, without Leavenworth, Washington, is an odd little town. It’s up in the Cascade
which I would not have known where most of these came from. There was mountains and lives or dies each year on the tourist trade. Decades
something amazing in every case. I particularly loved a complete cast ago, the town leaders decided to stand out from the other small towns
from a puppet version of Macbeth done in the 1960s; the three witches competing for winter-sports dollars by doing something different.
were a single large puppet, almost an Indonesian-style flat silhouette, In other parts of the country, this might have meant building the
made of ragged scraps of burlap and only barely suggesting human forms. world’s largest ball of string or constructing an enormous statue of
A knight from Belarus in the 1950s was a modernist abstraction, just a a cow. Leavenworth decided to become a Bavarian village, or rather
hulking black obelisk with a stylized head topped by a grim cross and two a romanticized version of one, complete with black-letter signs for
cones for arms. businesses, Alpen chalet architecture, and plenty of schnitzel. To be clear,
the town had no German ancestry. There was no immigrant community
But nothing fascinated me so much as the puppets of Tuzlukov. He who brought their traditions forward. It was just a vast rubber stamp,
worked at this theater in the 1950s and 1960s, and his puppets were far inked in Bavaria and applied to this town.
and away the most beautiful and striking that I saw. They had the clarity
of line and simplicity of form you see in the great cartoonists, but in three Today, it’s a continued success story. The whole downtown has adopted
dimensions, with flat colors and distinctive faces. Even their clothes were the style. Numerous restaurants serve a panoply of sausages and imported
beautiful: stark, graphic, memorable. I know very little of Tuzlukov but I beers. The people don’t actually try to speak German, which is a blessing,
will never forget his beautiful puppets. but the whole place is sweet, charming, and utterly American in its gleeful
appropriation of culture for the sake of commerce.
Having toured most of the museum in splendid isolation, a bell sounded
and the current show in the theater ended. A horde of parents and Among the little boutiques and pubs, there is the Leavenworth
children emerged, and soon the museum was brimming with happy kids, Nutcracker Museum. Occupying a large second-story space downtown,
as it should be. this extensive museum is the very real and genuine culmination of a
lifelong obsession with nutcrackers. Founded by Arlene and Carl Wagner,
The museum was an amazing experience and I am grateful to that relay they have amassed the world’s largest collection: more than six thousand.
of babushkas for opening it early, to accommodate the tall American who And while the majority of their nutcrackers are of the wooden character
wanted to leave this world behind for a while on a cold and snowy Moscow variety, they have acquired numerous other mechanisms and tools, some
morning. of them primitive stones dating back thousands of years.

143
 I took my family to visit the museum in the summer of 2014 and was
fairly awed by what I saw: aisle after aisle of glass cases containing endless
nutcrackers. There were soldiers, to be sure, but every kind of character
imaginable was represented: priests, kings, football players, Star Wars
characters, and on and on. It’s more than a little intimidating, all those
eyes and teeth staring out at you, hungry for something to gnash.

The next time we visited Leavenworth, I went back to the museum alone.
On the drive, I had been thinking of the museum and realized that in all
those thousands of characters, there simply must be a Punch and Judy.
When I entered the museum, Arlene Wagner was working the desk as
she usually does. She is a retired ballerina and ballet teacher, her elderly
face framed by a halo of white hair. “Do you have any Punch and Judy
nutcrackers?” I asked.

She looked surprised by the question and then replied that they didn’t.
Disappointed, I entered the museum anyway and wandered the aisles
again. I’d been so sure of success, confident that I would find Punch and
Judy in here, someplace. They had turned up in so many ways and places
over the years that it seemed inconceivable they wouldn’t be here as well.

A few minutes later she found me. “I just remembered,” she said. “Follow
me.”

Arlene led me to a large glass case containing pocket-sized brass

nutcrackers from England in the nineteenth century. Each one was
sculpted into a character of some sort, many of them caricatures of royalty
or politicians or other prominent folk. And then there they were: two
nutcrackers side by side, adorned with the faces of Punch and Judy.

I looked closer. The two nutcrackers were actually two of the same:
each one had Punch on one side and Judy on the other, facing opposite
directions, like the old god Janus. Punch and Judy were forever conjoined
in brass and always looking away from each other. They were both
together and apart.

144
I studied them for some time. Then I checked a copy of The Art & And let me add one more item to your reading list. In 2014, the author
Character of Nutcrackers, a beautiful hardcover compilation by Arlene Yoon Ha Lee published a short story, “Combustion Hour,” at Tor.com
of their collection and its history. I found the section on these brass which begins with the wonderful and accurate line, “This story is about
nutcrackers and sure enough, the very Punch and Judy I’d just seen was the eschatology of shadow puppets.” It is a brilliant and original story,
depicted in the book. I bought a copy from the smiling author. and on her website, Yoon credits Puppetland as a key inspiration. I doubt
I will ever craft a story as beautifully written as hers, and I take real joy
If Punch’s dreams of conquest ever require him to raise a truly vast in knowing it exists in part because of my game. I gave Yoon a guest
army, I know exactly where he’ll go: to that faux-Bavarian town high in appearance in the Puppetland tale “Boys at Play,” in which she is eaten by
the Cascade mountains and up the narrow carpeted stairs to Arlene’s horrible babies because I thought she’d appreciate it.
museum. There he will summon his horde with a swazzled shriek and all
the glass will shatter at once. From each case the Nutcrackers will come Thank you for reading this odd personal history—and for funding it,
marching to his call, their secret destiny finally fulfilled. if you are one of our Kickstarter backers. I have always believed in the
value of creators directly addressing their audiences, ever since I was
a kid reading Stephen King’s warm and generous introductions and
afterwords to his own books. That sense of being spoken to by the author
My life in Puppetland has been a long one. Puppets have been one of my made a powerful impression on me and I hope that for some of you, this
major creative themes for nearly four decades now and I don’t doubt there particular journey has nourished your own inspirations.
are many more chapters of this essay that I could write in years to come.
But this version of the tale is now at an end, with the book (or ebook) in The final truth I will leave you with is that I am afraid of puppets. I
your hands. always have been. They inspire in me that vertiginous awe once associated
with divine experiences, the sensation that the world is falling away
If you are as intrigued, mystified, obsessed, and horrified by puppets as beneath you and some greater reality is momentarily revealed. I believe
I have been, I hope you will find a copy of Victoria Nelson’s 2002 non- the day an early human first made a little pretend human out of clay or
fiction book The Secret Life of Puppets. I almost devoted a section of this sticks or leaves, and then stood it up and moved it around in a semblance
essay to her incredible book but decided to leave this as an exercise, and of life, something profound changed in us.
a profound joy, for the reader. Suffice it to say that I cannot imagine a
finer cultural history of puppets and their symbolic role in our lives, and It is changing us still.
that her detective work in stitching together global traditions going back
thousands of years is astounding.

145
146
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to our Kickstarter backers who funded the creation and production of this book. Thanks to all of you, Punch’s schemes and Judy’s hopes
will never die.

@kindofstrange Fred John Behrendt Mike Caprio (@mik3cap)

Ryan Abrams Scott Bennett Noah Carden
Angus Abranson Stuart John Bernard Ryan Carpenter
Rob Abrazado J. Michael Bestul Dominic Carroll
Matthew Ackerman Brian Bethel Chris Cassino
The Adventure Game Store & Dragon’s Lair BHabs Celebrochan
Aleksi Airaksinen D. Bixler Charles
Justin Alexander Edvard Blumentanz Dawn Hsi Chen
Alexis, El Titiritero Loko Arthur Boff Alexander “Lxndr” Cherry
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EZ Almighty Tim Brandis Mark C. Chu-Carroll
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Scott David Aniolowski Bill Bridges Cintain 昆游龍
Shannon Appelcline Marcus Brissman Chris Cirillo
Aquaranger Jon Bristow Casey C. Clark
Mark Argent Lee Brooks Richard Clayton
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Astro Nick Brownlow Jon Cole
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Norbert Baer Sage Brush Russell Collins
Phillip Bailey Stephanie Bryant Craig Comer
Rafe Ball Matthew Burke Chris & Ben Conrad
Nat “woodelf” Barmore John D. Burnham Chris Cooper
Douglass Barre burningcrow Ian Cooper
Steve Bassett Rob Bush Jason Cordova
battlegrip.com Andrew Byers Dave Corner
Bazz Dave Cake Jason Cotton
Beachfox Phill Calle Christopher Coulter
Gene Beeber The Cap’n Mark Coultrip
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 Th a n k s , P u n c h !
Jeff Craig Brett Easterbrook Charles Gerard
Annie Crain Mark Edwards David Gettman
Colin Creitz Julia B. Ellingboe Sion Rodriguez y Gibson
The Crippled Plaything Lindsay Elliott Felix Girke
Walter F. Croft Tim Ellis David Goffin
Cthulhu Girl Jesse Ephraim Ramon Gomez
Dave Cummins Adam Everman Edgar Gonzalez
Andrew Curl Evil Hat Productions Sebastián Brugnoli González
Kirt “the Angel” Dankmyer Michael G. Eyler Judd M. Goswick
Peter Darley John F. James Graham
Charles Jason Davies Gregory Faber Courtney the Great
Jonathan Buddha Davis David Farnell Richard “Vidiian” Greene
Nick Davis Thomas Faßnacht Derek Grimm
Death Machine Press FelTK Dan Grundy
Aubrey Dee Leandro Raniero Fernandes Derek Guder
Sean Demory Aveleena Feywine Jack Gulick
Sarah DeSoto Filthy Monkey Chris Gunning
Stefan Deutsch Ken Finlayson Matt H.
Simon Ding Wilhelm Fitzpatrick Marc Kevin Hall
Mark Dingle Daniel Flood Greg Hallam
Thai Divone Brian Foster Tim Hannon
Dokkalfar Kurtis Franks Michael Bergh Hansen
Stuart Dollar Simon Fraser Malcolm Harbrow
R. N. Dominick Robert Max Freeman Brian Hardy
Thad Doria Amber Freeman Chris “Warcabbit” Hare
Paul “the Bastard” Douglas Eric Freeman Scott Haring
Steve Dulson Leslie J. Furlong Dan Harms
Darin DuMetz Jennifer Fuss Pat Harrigan
Charles Dunne Mike & Brian G. Katie Harwood
Jacques DuRand Scott Gable James Haughton
Bryant Durrell Esteban Alcadio Osorio Gallardo Ria Hawk
David E. Durrett Jr. Pierre Gavard-Colenny Richard Hawkins
Herman Duyker Silvio Herrera Gea Cameron Hays
Jason E. GeekGirlsRule.net Dustin Headen
148
Rob Heinsoo Ryan Junk Andrea Lo
Tegan Hendrickson Jason C. Just Austin “and then I take the hankersniff and tie
Lauren Herrmann Mark Kadas it in a k’not” Loomis
Hespa Jeffrey Kahrs Zed Lopez
Michael Hill Brad D. Kane Orrin A. Loria
M. Alan Hillgrove John Kantor Lorrraine
Jonna Hind David Karoski Ralph Lovegrove
Juhana Hirvonen Jonathan Munch Keim T.S. Luikart
Kevin Hislop Ralph Kelleners Erik Lundbom
Stephen Ho Tad Kelson Fredrik Lyngfalk
Gareth Hodges Andrew Kenrick Brittani-Pearl MacFadden
Christopher Hord Jack Ketch Ryan Macklin
Jeffrey Hosmer Tea Kew Steve Mains
Vincent Howard Thom Kiraly Daniel C. Mainwaring
Mark Damon Hughes Michael Kirkbride The Tick-Tock Man
Rory Hughes Patty Kirsch Jon Kobold Dude Maness
Richard Hunt Motoi Kito Ryan A. Mannix
Pete Hurley Greg Klein David Maple
Blake Hutchins James Knevitt Kevin J. “Womzilla” Maroney
John Shadowcat Ickes Joseph Boggoff Kogin Mike Maughmer
Erik Ingersen Jonathan Korman Donogh McCarthy
Alexander J. Ingham John Kovalic Ian McFarlin
M.R. Innes Ed Kowalczewski Jed McClure
Iren Thore Kries Jesse McGatha
Brian Isikoff Greg Krywusha Thomas McGrenery
Jaesz François Lalande Mike McKeown
Steve Jakoubovitch Nick LaLone Tyler McLaren
Jamie JamBam Richard Lambert Chris Meekings
jamie Alexis Lamiable Andreas Melhorn
Jorge Jara Didier Stacy S. Lang S. Ben Melhuish
Lasse Moses Tarp Jensen Marc Langworthy
Jillyjally Andy Law

e B e s t
t h
Jiminy Kevin Lawrence

I s
Pu n c h
Jinx Jingle-Jangle William Lee
Karl Jepson Kris Leeke
Rob Johns Ned Leffingwell
Scott K. Johnson Joseph Le May
Vijay Johnson Paul Levy
Kanane Jones Daniel Lewis
Rob Jones Daniel Ley
Wren Jones Oliver Lind
Patrick Joynt Instant Roleplay Live
149
 Patrice Mermoud Herbert Nowell John F Rauchert
Jerry L. Meyer Jr. Duane O’Brien Christopher Reed
Nicole Mezzasalma N. Ohnesorge Aaron Bloody Jim Reimer
Chris Miles Ospprod Randy Reitz
James Millburn Lisa Padol Bryan Rennekamp
Andrew Miller James Palmer Sean K. Reynolds
Marshall Miller Nathan D. Paoletta Michael Richards
Todd Miller Tom “palfrey” Parker Guy Riessen
Mitch Gregory Parsons Carl Rigney
Gary “Sneezy the Squid” Mitchel Derek Patton Pearcy Ken Ringwald
M. Sean Molley Teppo Pennanen Mark Rinna
Ignatius Montenegro Pete Petrusha Chad Roberts
Benjamin Moore Michael Pevzner John Roberts
Simon Moore Rodney L. Phillips Stewart Robertson
Marcus Morgan Chris Phillips Trista & Daniel Robichaud
Randy Mosiondz Michael Maikeruu Pierno Rodolphe
S. Scott Mullins Michael Pietrelli Derek Rompot
Ari Multhauf Tom Pleasant Puppet Ronin
Will Muñoz Frédéri “Volk Kommissar Friedrich” Pochard Joe Rooney
Liam Murray Brian Poe James W. Rouse III
Luke Nagel pookie Jérémie Jemrys Rueff
Rick Neal Ed Possing Thom Ryng
Casidhe Nebulosa Christopher Pound Caoimhghin S.
John Nephew Brendan Power Liz Sander
Miles Nerini Dak Powers Ralf “Sandfox” Sandfuchs
Phil Nicholls Darren T. Priddy John “evernevermore” Scheib
Matt Nixon Neil Pritchard Kai Schiefer
Nathan Nolan Michael Pureka Mark A. Schmidt
Ray Nolan Ben Quant Mendel Schmiedekamp
MU Skulls Mike Noorman Simon Skippy Rafferty Erica “Vulpinfox” Schmitt
Christian A. Nord Adam Rajski Tobias Schulte-Krumpen
Jack Norris Zaccarius Rath Paul Schulze

Ev ery pu pp et is h ap py
150
David Schwartz Doug Tabb Bill White
Mat Segal John Taber Sean Whittaker
Marcin Segit Sylvain OgGy Tanguy John Wick
Shari & Don Tannyx et Miettinator Alex Wickersham
Martin Shaver Doyle & Sandra Tavener Barac Wiley
Rachelle Shelkey Paul Tevis Jon Wilkie
Rhea Shelley Theo Chris Williams
Randy Shipp John L. Thomasovich Patricia Williams
Ami Silberman Sean Thorne: teacher Russell Williams
sillage Joel Thurston Otis Shae Williamson-Christy
Andrew Sirkin Alex M. Tice John Wilson
Skavvy Mr. Toad Stew Wilson
Daniel (bowmore) Smith Cassady Toles, Esq. Kevin Wine
Michael C. Smith Peter Troia Jaymes Winger
Sean M. Smith Russell J. Turner Anna Wolfe
Michael R. Smith Karen Tynes Victor Wyatt
Jemearl T. Smith J. Jack Unrau xerode
Lester Smith Nicola Urbinati Andromeda Wong Tsz Yui
Grady W. Smithey III Pablo Valcárcel Austin Zalewski
Chris Snyder Damon Van Demark zannmato
Wednesday Sophia Kelley Vanda Sam Zeitlin
Abigail Southall Scott Vandervalk Tristan Zimmerman
Julie Southworth Allen Varney Jeff Zitomer
Trip Space-Parasite Luis Velasco Pedro Ziviani
Rosie Sparks Steven Vest Zombie with Cheese
Chris Spivey Alexander “Lokkjo” Vinogradov Zontco
Amsel von Spreckelsen Michael Waite David Zumsteg
Daniel Stack Christopher E. Walters
David Starner Jonathan Walton
Storium.com Lily Wanisko

Th a t ’ s
Matt “King Friday” Sturm Phil Ward
Livia von Sucro Simon Ward
Paul Sudlow Nadra Wass
th e w
Bill Sundwall Timothy J. Watkins
ay t o d
o it !
S. Adam Surber Steven K. Watkins
Claes Svensson Darren Watts
Rebecca Swainston Nick Wedig
John and Ginny Swann Christopher Weeks
Chad Swenson Donald & Wendy Welsh
Matthew Swetnam Drew Wendorf
Marek Szkaradek Benjamin Wenham
Craig T. Bryan Whalen
151
152
Index
picnic baskets, four 123, 124
piece of the Ten-Year Pie 86, 87
recipe for sticky dots 76
sabotage of Punch’s factory 90
Sally Shoeleace 95
sausages 114, 115, 116, 119–122
actor-puppets 28, 29, 31, 34, 39–42, 57, 58, hammer, Punch’s 10, 11, 18, 20, 22, 27, 44, scroll, rhyming ritual 97, 98
62–67, 69, 74, 76 101, 125 Silence’s skin 47, 76, 82, 83, 124, 130, 131
actors 28, 29, 31, 34, 39–42, 62–67, 69, 74, 76 humans 27, 44, 53, 69, 91, 105, 106, 120, 121, solvent, Spite’s 109, 110, 113, 126
Art & Character of Nutcrackers, The (book) 145 125, 126, 139, 145 swazzle 76
attributes, puppet 32–41, 63, 74 Joseph (son of the Maker) 125, 126, 130. See talking goose 76
can 32–41 also the Bottler under puppets thimble, Judy’s 76
cannot 32–41, 42, 74 King in Yellow, the 102, 103, 138. See also le tools to dismantle Nutcrackers 90
is 32–41, 74 Roi en jaune wish of the Great Sage 85
Biscuit Boats 113 kisses 8, 13, 17, 20, 111 wound, the Bottler’s 124, 126, 130
Book of Shadows, The 115 Lee, Yoon Ha 145 magic in Puppetland 28, 40, 44, 51, 54, 66, 74,
Boys, Punch’s. See puppets Live Action Roleplaying (LARPing) 69 83–85, 88, 94, 96–98, 101, 104, 105, 114,
Grief. See puppets Lost Giant, the 106–107 116, 117, 123–126, 131, 132
Haunt. See puppets MacGuffins 74, 76, 77, 78 Maker’s Land 27, 28, 44, 51, 53, 54, 77, 102,
Mayhem. See puppets aqueduct 99–100 106, 113, 120, 121, 123, 124, 126, 127, 131,
Silence. See puppets babies, Spite’s 82–84, 145 160
Spite. See puppets baby, Judy’s 68, 76, 122, 136 aqueduct 99–100
Vengeance. See puppets Book, the (Book of Shadows) 115, 120, 122 Bedlam Circus 58, 103
Carcosa 101, 102, 103, 138 buttons, three, the 77, 78, 79 boil, the 77
Carcosa Song, the 101, 102, 103 candy converter 90 Box Mountain 119, 120, 121, 122
children 27, 31, 67, 106, 115, 125, 126, 135, captivating book 103 Candy Cave, the 54, 68, 74, 97
137, 143 catapult 90 Canyons of Confusion 122, 123, 124, 127,
Collodi, Carlo 122, 125, 126, 131 cloak of flesh. See Silence’s skin 128, 130, 131
“Combustion Hour” 145 Crank, the 51, 123, 124, 125, 133 castle, Punch’s 51, 53, 64, 68, 69, 71,
day 51, 123, 124, 131 diagram of Punch’s castle 76 73, 76, 77, 79, 83–86, 89, 95, 97, 99,
death, puppet. See puzzle pieces flesh of the Maker 124 101–103, 107
eating 27, 52, 53, 54, 61, 71, 82, 83, 92, 93, Key, the 114, 116, 117, 118, 121 Cave of Autumn Twilight, the (Sky Caves)
112, 114, 116, 123, 124, 127, 132, 133 Lemony Emblem 101–103 128, 131, 132,
examples of play 29, 31, 42 Lost Giant, the 106–107 Cave of Spring Dawn, the (Sky Caves) 128,
Fanny and Alexander (film) 137, 138 magic tree 94 129, 132
Faust (film) 138 Maker’s control bar, the 96, 97 Cave of Summer Day, the (Sky Caves) 123,
fire 47, 52, 53, 54, 62, 64, 71, 74, 95, 98, mirror 94 124, 129, 130, 133
99–100, 113, 114, 131, 137 music box containing the Clockwork Cave of Winter Storms, the (Sky Caves)
flesh 27, 44, 54, 78, 82, 83, 106, 115, 123–125, Ballerina 92 129, 132, 133
127, 128, 130 Nutcracker disguise 90 Corner, the (Respite) 109, 113

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 Down Below 54, 57, 97, 98, 107, 124, 126 woods, the 73, 84, 85, 93, 94, 106, 107 107, 110, 112–116, 122–127, 128, 130,
dungeons (Punch’s castle) 69, 76, 121, 122 Maker, the 3, 8–10, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 25, 139. See also Grief, Haunt, Mayhem,
factory (Punch’s castle) 54, 89, 90 27, 44, 48, 51, 53, 54, 58, 59, 68, 69, 74, 76, Silence, Spite, Vengeance
Graveyard, the 59, 117, 124 78, 84, 86, 87, 89, 91–93, 96–98, 104, 105, Bradamante 123, 124, 129, 130, 133
Grief’s Cave 85 108, 110, 115, 116, 118, 121, 123–127, 130, Bran Quick Gloves 89–90
lake of milk and cookies, the 27, 48, 51, 139, 160 Butter 86–87
54, 74, 76, 79, 93, 94, 96, 97, 99, 101, mallet, Punch’s. See hammer, Punch’s Cassilda Corn-Silk 101–103
102, 103, 113, 114, 121, 122 marionettes. See puppets, marionette Chocolate É. Claire 87
Land of Sweets, the 104, 105 mask, Punch’s 22, 27, 44, 58, 91, 103, 115, 124, Clockwork Ballerina 92
landscape 51, 131 130 Constance Stern Thimble 97, 98
Midwinter Feast 93 Mouse King, the 104, 105 Cookie Muenster 87
moon, the 3, 51, 99, 103, 113, 160 Muppet Show, The 142 Crocodile, the 114, 115, 117, 118, 119, 120,
Mysterious Tunnel, the 104 names, puppet 34, 39 121, 122, 125, 136
old farm, the 76 night 3, 18, 23, 25, 44, 51, 54, 77, 85, 89, 93, Dandelion 74, 102
parade, Nutcracker 69, 71, 77 101, 104, 105, 112, 123, 124, 126, 133 Darwin Happy Beak 93, 94
Pawn Shop, the (Puppettown) 119, 122 out-of-character conversation 29, 69 Derek Purple Galoshes 74
Punch Village 95 puppet creation 39–40 Devil, the 54, 57, 97, 98, 125
Puppetland 3, 9, 25, 27, 44, 48, 51, 53, 54, Puppetland (proposed film) 140–141 Donkey Hoe-Tee 122, 123, 126, 127, 130,
59, 61, 67, 69, 74, 77, 82, 83, 85, 86, 91, puppetmaster, the 28, 29, 31, 32, 39, 40, 42, 44, 131
92, 96, 97, 99, 101, 104, 105, 106, 107, 48, 62, 63, 64, 66–68, 71, 87, 97, 122, 139 Dragon, Punch’s 71, 73, 99
114, 117, 121, 123–126, 132, 139 puppet page, the 34, 39, 42 Dweezil Stinky Lips 69, 71
Puppettown 3, 12, 22, 44, 48, 51–54, 58, puppet page, finger puppet 35 Egg 87
61, 71, 73, 77, 78, 79, 82, 84, 86, 89, puppet page, generic 157 Fanny Smirky Cheeks 74
90, 92–95, 97, 98, 99, 101, 102, 106, puppet page, hand puppet 36 Farmer Red Hat 77–78
121, 122, 132 puppet page, marionette 38 Farmer Rhubarb 99
Puppettown Dance 78 puppet page, shadow puppet 37 Filch 95
Puppettown Square 22, 79, 82, 101 puppets Five Finger Boys, the 115, 118–120, 122
Respite 27, 48, 51, 54, 66, 68, 73, 86, 89, Ali Sali 74 Flour 86
90, 93–95, 97, 98, 106–109, 113–115, babies, Spite’s 82–84 Foppity Fredworth 78
121, 124, 132 baby, Punch’s 13 Freddie Salted Caramel 87
Shacklebones Trails, the 85 baby, Judy’s 68, 76, 122, 136 Freddy Green Finger 98
sky, the 9, 19, 21, 51, 71, 77, 85, 87, 88, 99, Bashi No-Toes 111–113 Great Sage, the 84–86
101–104, 107, 108, 123–127, 131, 132, Ben Budge 95 Grief 44, 46, 84, 85, 96, 97, 123–126,
133, 160 Betty Doxy 95 130–133
Sky Caves, the 123, 126, 127, 131, 132 Billy Squarejaw 96 Guignol 61
sun, the 3, 12, 22, 25, 51, 123, 129, 131, Blue Fairy, the 107, 126, 130 Hangman, the. See Jack Ketch
132, 133, 160 Bottler, the 123–131, 133 Harley Keeno 124, 127, 128, 131, 132
Thimble Theatre 61 Boys, Punch’s 23, 27, 29, 44–47, 53, 54, Haunt 44, 45, 46, 73, 84, 93, 94
Wedding Cake Castle 86, 87, 88 58, 66, 67, 68, 73, 78, 82–84, 85, 86, Henrietta Penny 77, 78
Windy Pass, the 86 87, 90, 93, 95, 97, 98, 101, 103, 106, Invisible Hand, the 118–120, 122

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Jack Ketch (the Hangman) 115–118, 122, Pecan Sandy 86–88 Tommy Turnkey 114, 117–118, 121–122
125 Pie-Maker Penny 86–88 Torn Puppet, the 102–103
Jacob Starbright 14–16 Pinky the Quick 118, 119 Ursula the Terrible 124, 129, 133
Jemmy Twitcher 95 Pipkin Mouse 122, 123, 127, 130 Vengeance 42, 44, 46, 69, 106–107,
Jenny Sweetie Mermaid 71, 74, 76, 102 Polly Peachum 95 120–122
Jigsey the Fence 118–119 Polly Squeaky Dimples 74 Wat Dreary 95
Jippy 105 Pretty Polly 108–113 Willy Chilly Tuff 85
Joey the Clown 114, 115, 118, 119, 122 Pulcinella 58, 103, 116 Winky the Wiseguy 118–120
Jolly Ollie Puff 85 Punch the Maker-Killer 3, 8–24, 27, 28, Wolley Rex 101–103
Judy 8–14, 18–21, 24–25, 27, 42, 48, 51, 44–48, 51, 53, 54, 57, 58, 59, 61, 64, wolves of the woods, the 106–107
54, 66, 68, 69, 71, 76, 84, 87, 89, 90, 66, 67, 68, 69, 71, 73, 74, 76, 77, 79, Yoon Stormrose 82
93, 95, 97, 101, 104, 106–110, 113–115, 83–99, 101–110, 112–117, 119, 121–131, puppets, animal 53, 58, 85
118, 122–128, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 135–139, 141–145 puppets, finger 27, 33–35, 39, 40, 47, 61, 74,
141, 142, 144, 145 Rama Ding-Dong 108, 110, 111 77, 82, 87, 92, 95, 108, 112, 113, 118–120,
Karl the Nutcracker 91–92 Rashi No-Toes 110–111 122, 124, 127–129, 131–133, 135, 136
Knights of Day, the 123, 127, 128, 130 Rosie Sparks 34 puppets, hand 27, 33, 34, 36, 39, 40, 77, 78, 86,
Konjo Oni 124, 128, 129, 132 Roxxy Flocksie Buff 85 93, 95, 102, 106, 108, 110–113, 117, 118,
Lucy Lockit 95 Sally Red Buttons 31, 34, 40–43, 50, 64, 120–122, 126, 127
Macheath 95 82, 116 puppets, marionette 33, 38, 44, 48, 57, 58, 69,
Macheath’s Gang 95 Sally Shoelace 95 77, 78, 84–86, 94, 96, 97, 105, 107–112,
Mary O’Nette 96 Schreck 115, 120 116, 117, 122, 124–130, 133, 138
Mayhem 44, 47, 68, 73, 84, 91, 99, 100, 127 Semar Big-Booty 108–112 puppets, shadow 33, 34, 37, 39, 59, 69, 74, 82,
Melvin Grey Chisel 89 senile hunters, the 73 87, 99, 102, 103, 108, 110, 112, 113, 115,
Migsey the Sneak 118–120, 122 Sexton, the 59 119, 127, 131–133, 138, 142, 145
Milk 87 Shacklebones 84–85 puppets, unique 44, 45, 46, 47, 85, 111, 112,
Mister Horse 111, 112 Shadow Orchestra, the 108–113 116, 117, 118, 120, 121, 126, 127
Molly Bluebell 106 Silence 44, 47, 76, 82–83, 87, 124, 131 Puppettown. See Puppetland
Molly Brazen 95 Silly Billy Gruff 85 puzzle pieces 34, 39, 42, 57, 59, 62, 66, 67, 98,
Molly Wooly Stuff 85 Simba Skinny-Britches 108, 110, 111 102, 115, 119, 121
Monsieur Babypants 99 Sindi Windy-Lips 108, 110, 111 puppet death 42, 57, 59
Mother Ugly 122, 123, 126, 127, 130, 131 Skeleton, the 117 rats 92
Mrs. Coaxer 95 Spite 44, 45, 78, 79, 82–84, 93–94, 98, Roi en jaune, le 99. See also the King in Yellow
Nester Hayseed 77–78 101–103, 109, 111–113, 126 rules, three important 28
Nurse Blue 107, 123–126, 130, 133 Splotch Flaggy 29–30 (1) An hour is golden, but it is not an hour
Nutcrackers 3, 23, 27, 31, 41, 42, 44, Spongecake Bob 87 28, 76, 139
48, 53, 54, 63, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 71, staff, Punch’s 73 (2) What you say is what you say 29, 69
73–79, 83–87, 89–94, 95, 98–105, 109, Sukey Tawdrey 95 (3) The tale grows in the telling, and is
111–113, 115, 117, 119, 120–125, 127, Susan Fuchsia Penny 89 being told to someone not present 31,
128, 130–133, 139, 143–145 Swimming Orchid 93–94 41, 62, 67
Old Hobb 119, 120 Tim Thimbletoe 82 Secret Life of Puppets, The (book) 145

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 shop, the Maker’s 27, 125, 126 “Overtime at the Factory” 89 innocents 74
sleep 11, 16, 20, 28, 42, 66, 69, 71, 91, 94, 103, “Pretty Polly” 108 putting it all together 77
109, 111, 112, 126, 127, 132, 133 “Punch and the Beanstalk” 91 MacGuffins 74, 76
Solomon, Courtney and Sweetpea “Punch Dammed It!” 93 set pieces 76
Entertainment 140–141 “Punch Village” 95 villains, big and little 73–74
Sugar Plum Fairy 104–105 “Puppet Masters” 96 worksheet 79
swazzle 58, 76, 91, 119, 122, 131, 145 “Rhyming Ritual, The” 97 tear, the Maker’s 20, 21, 24, 25, 27, 48, 68, 76,
tales 28, 57, 62, 64, 66, 68–74, 81–133 “Tale of Three Buttons, The” 77 125, 160
“Bottler, The” 122 “Terrible Fire, The” 99 theater, the Maker’s 27, 106, 125, 126
“Box, The” 113 “Vada Wolley Rex” 101 thimble, Judy’s. See MacGuffins
“Boys at Play” 82 “Visions of Sugar Plums” 104 timer 28, 41
“Great Sage OF, the Mountain!, The” 84 tales, making 69 Tuzlukov 143
“Lost Giant, The” 106 ante 69, 71 winter 3, 86, 93, 124, 129, 131, 132, 133
“Missing Peace, The” 86 based on Cans and Cannots 74 Year of Living Dangerously, The (film) 150

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Your Puppet
NAME:

PUPPET TYPE:

THIS PUPPET IS:

THIS PUPPET CAN:

THIS PUPPET CANNOT:

NOTES:

157
 Conclusion
Puppetland is a game about children and what happens to us as children. The gameplay is meant to create the
kinds of stories one finds in a children’s book; hence the insistence on in-game dialogue and narration. But
because the elements in the setting are not the sort of thing one finds in children’s books, I hope to allow actors in
the game to get a look at the realities of the childhood experience through childhood trappings, yet with an adult
sensibility.

The world of the game is a world of innocence that has been corrupted. This is a timeless theme and one that I
hope has a lot of resonance for the game’s participants. Actors in the game adopt the roles of child-like puppets—
the kinds of folk who say things like “Gracious! The Nutcrackers are at the door!” The threats faced by the
puppets are bizarre and often senseless, presented much as children perceive the world of danger that lies beyond
the safety of home and family.

Puppetland presents a world in which a single adult—the Maker—has created a world in which children—the
puppets—can live safely. But the puppet Punch has entered adulthood, or is trying to, and has usurped the rule of the
Maker. Punch is an adolescent, full of rage and confusion and the desire to strike out against authority. Judy is also an
adolescent, but has apparently followed a different path than her ex-lover.

The world, then, is a world of childhood and innocence that has just begun to feel the pains of growing up.
Maker’s Land may be a beautiful place, but all children grow up, and perhaps it is the destiny of Maker’s Land
to grow up, too. Judy claims the Maker’s tear will restore everything to the way it was—will it? That’s up to the
puppetmaster. Perhaps Judy is mistaken and it’s time for the inhabitants of Maker’s Land to grow up now that
their parent is gone. Perhaps Punch can be redeemed. Perhaps Judy is correct and Maker’s Land is a golden place
where no one need ever grow up once the sun and the moon again trace their ancient tracks through the sky. The
choice is yours.

Now I have set my puppets down for you to take up and bring to life. Please do so with your friends. As my wife,
a poet, wrote: “Let roses, days, and love and hay be gathered, seized, and made.” So too games and stories and the
myths we pass on to our children, that they may learn from our trespasses and sew a world anew.

158