Marsupoly: A Tale of Dice and Wombat

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

Will had absolutely no idea what happened.The last thing he remembered was eating some Beef Stroganoff at his brother's place.And than he woke up in a grassland in the middle of nowhere.As a wombat, of all creatures.As strange blue boxes start appearing in front of the confused and newly-wombatized Will, he starts to realize that he is trapped in a weird board game.And that moving between the spaces on the board is...Disturbing.

Winner of the October 2024 Royal Writathon

What to expect:

A LitRPG game, where the world is a combination between Monopoly and Talisman.A classless, skill based progression system with serious depth and customizability to it.Blue boxes. Snarky blue boxes.Sillyness and puns.Some jokes and references to the wombat's unique physiology. Hopefuly without any TMI.Pickles. Eeeeevil pickles.Updates M,W,FCover image AI-generated using NightCafe

Information

Status: Hiatus
Year: 2024
Author: Tamir Buchshtav

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.6/ 5.0
Followers: 63
Views: 38,668

Chapters(66 total)

Reviews

No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!

Community Reviews(5)

AsteridsRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Loved this! Had a blast so far.
Style: nothing too out of the ordinary but well executed. Blue Boxes for days. Kinetic combat. Humor abounds. Doesn't linger to long on anything so as to be snackable as heck! The map that is constantly updated it a brilliant mechanic I haven't seen before.
Grammar: Fine. No big mistakes. Couple here or there but nothing worse than is typical of the web fiction. We're all writing fast.
Story: Look, when you got a book with the subtitle 'a tale of dice and wombat' you hope it's funny. It's funny. Such a joy to read. Snarky system and puns abound. You want excellently crafted litRPG with a non-human protagonist? Buddy you got it. My one concern is that it moves so fast, even with a prologue, that we don't have a great idea where the system comes from or how anything works. But if I had to choose between that or pages of exposition dump I'd choose being a little lost on how this is happening over bored.
Character: Would love to see a couple more supporting characters but I'm still a little early in the book. Will, our marsupial hero, is great. And the item vendor is funny. Maybe I'll update this section as I get further.
Overall: Pleasantly surprised! It's hard to do humor and action well and this one nails it!
LiarbytradeRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Hmm, I'm just going to get right into it. First off...
Style: I really love Marsupoly's style. I've seen a lot of litrpgs, but I don't think I've ever seen one attempt to adapt the genre for a board game of all things, which is sad because this really works. The movement mechanic - the reasoning behind how we've gotten to this point (as explained in the prologue) - it's all just delightfully whimsical; especially the little board at the start of each chapter that updates the character's progress. It's actually at the point where I feel like the more typical, rpg elements weaken the story. Indeed, I would have loved some kind of gamified dice combat system ala GURPS, or by using D&D-esque skill checks on a d20. They're not necessary (and probably would have been a pain to implement), but Marsupoly's realism (in combat) definitely weakens the story's motif from what could have been a 'theoretical six' to a 'mere' five stars.
Story:  The story's solid. The pacing's quick; the conflict and the antagonist are both readily apparent, and the action's solid. I feel like starting the game with two players, instead of four, was a missed opportunity to add some easy interpersonal drama, while still playing into the narrative, but that's just my opinion. There's nothing objectively wrong here. It just works.
Grammar:  The grammar could be tighter. I'm picky about this sort of thing; the idea that there's any errors immediately twigs my perfectionist nature and makes me want to say 'Four.' I can't do that, though: not in good conscience. See, I know I'm biased, and there are some really badly edited stories on royalroad, so I think it's only fair to round this up a bit and call it a four and a half. The mistakes are there, but I don't think the majority of your readers will have a serious problem with them.
Characters:  I feel like Will's a bit too 'everyman' in nature. Maybe, it's because of how well fleshed out everyone else is, despite the short time they're
R. C. VettaRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
Holy Smokes, Wombatman!
Style- I have to admit I was a little unsure of what to make of this board game inspired LitRpg, but after reading this I am a believer! This story is so Quorky (get it quirky, but Quokka nvm I'll leave the puns to this guy cause he does them best!) The "game" the story takes place in is a very different take on the whole "system" that is in most LitRpgs. When you read Monopoly in the description do not shy away, the author works it together masterfully. Especially the roll to move around the board mechanic!
Grammar- I am the first to admit my editing skills for fiction is average, but even still I need a story to flow and boy does this flow! I didn't even realize I had read so many chapters by the time I put it down to write this.
Story- If I say the story is adorable you may get the wrong idea. There is plenty of combat and crunchy bits for all you LitRPG-ers, but even the combats are adorable when I imagine them so yeah this story is adorable. The story does have a lot of combat and all those blue boxes, which can sometimes be too much, don't feel overdone here.
Character- Who wants to read a story about a Wombat? You do, trust me it's awesome, fun, and hilarious. Will the Wombat is such a cool little guy just doing his best.
Overall its a great story and a real work of Dunnart! You're missing out if you don't read about Will the Wombat.
Now Koala(c'mon) everybody and read this story!
Okay now I'm out of terrible puns!
ArthicernRoyal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
This story is a bit off beat for a LitRPG and yet at the same time functions well as a light hearted romp through the genre, with an interesting system that mixes together the board games Monopoly with Talisman.
When combined with a propensity for puns and absurdist humor such as the unpreserved -undead vegetables responsible for famine- marsupoly develops a style and beat that stands apart from other LitRPGs even as it follows the fundamentals of the genre.
The actual story seems to be an interesting plot involving a 'Student' Creator deity of some kind and the protagonist Will -and one other- being forced to test The Board without any warning, before being turned into marsupials. Though it is occasionally slowed down by grindy sections, that admittedly are something of a standard within LitRPGs.
Characters it feels are both a strength and a weakness here, because while a number of the characters do have enough to make them stand apart like many other stories within this genre the actual time spent fleshing this characters out -beyond the protagonist- is somewhat minimal in favor of monster hunting or short interactions.
Regardless, though, Marsupoly is definitely on the more intriguing side of LitRPGs -which on RR there are a lot of- and makes for a solid lighthearted romp for any fan of the genre with it's many puns and it's system's... productive commentary.
possumflavoredRoyal Road
★★★ 3.0
An amusing concept alongside some good puns, but a book with such heavy combat focus isn't my thing. The MC also doesn't really seem to feel pain (or self preservation) despite having no skills to supress it. Primary example being on deaths door but refusing to use healing items. He is supposed to be in massive pain based off his injuries. Grammer and spelling seemed good. The furry potatoe also ate some potatoes, which was amusing.