Adventure seeds for indecisive players

[Christopher Kubasik]

Hi Jeff,

Yes.  Kickers are often difficult to get a handle on.  (Note that there's a whole *new* thread covering them up in RPG theory.)

And speaking of that:

RE: Kickers again

I do have a negative comment about kickers. I don't mind the idea as a whole, but it has a bad side, at least to me. The problems is that it allows players to dabble with the 2% inspiration side of things, but leaves the 98% persperation in the hands of one person. It's reflective, in part, of a lazy attitude that I can't stand. (I sense I just got in trouble.)

I don't know if you're in trouble or not, because I'm not honestly sure I understand what you're saying.

Would you mind upacking that paragraph?  ;-)

As far as letting each person pursue their own story.... Well, that's a tricky issue, but one better served by a thread on RPG theory.

As it is, I'm trying to answer you're original question -- how to helpl design scenarios that make the players more active.

I think you'd find that using Kickers would actuall encourage the players to do a lot more work -- on the fly -- and not depend on you doing a lot of prep. (If that's what you meant by the quote above.)

As for people running around all over the place, there are of course more tools for that -- Premise, and Relationship Maps and the like.  

(I think it's important to recognize that this stuff isn't about being Artsy Fartsy.  These are machines used to make players: focused, proactive, and engaged in what's going on whether their character is in the scene or not.  It's the same stuff I used when writing a script to make sure the audience is going to hang around to the end.  We all know that the best SFX and fight scenes in the world aren't inherently going to sustain a movie for 90 fucking minutes in the dark when you're not supposed to wander away or wonder how long you've been sitting there.  (I mean think about it: aside from driving, how often will anyone sit in the same seat for 90 to 120 minutes without getting up to stretch?  Good storytelling is one of the most fucking amazing things in the world.  It's an absolute miracle.  And that's all do to tools like Kickers, Premise and character relationships and so on.))

Anyway, I know it's investment of time to look into all of this, and then get you're group to go along with it.  But the the blunt reality seems to me to be is this: the tools were created because the standard way of running games (for the first 25 years of the hobby) usually ends up with the very problems you're describing. So it's probably (and I am using the word probably) either saying  a) "Fuck it, it's good enough, we like getting together even if it's frustrating," or b) "You know what, if we're going to get togther and do RPGs instead of playing nerf football, we're going to have to make some changes if we want to have a good time doing it."

But make sure to get back to me about the quote above, 'cause I'm really not sure what you meant.

Take care,
Christopher

[Christopher Kubasik]

Hi,

I cross-posted with Ron's post...

And if he's right and all I've been advising is wrong, I'd go back to my first idea:

A scenario with meaty rewards and penalty for stratetgic and tactical objectives.  I really think there's no shame in this at all.  Of course the players characters will still be heroes, of course there will be the veneer of reality... But I think it'd be really cool to give them the focused mission briefing, let them know what the wins and losses are, and let them rock and roll.

It would be focused, it would suit the fun the players want (from what I've read), and it would solve these problems.  

That seems good, doesn't it?

Christopher

[Jake Norwood]

As I recall, you're looking for adventure ideas. Here's one I run with folks at demos. It's short, sweet, and gamist (I think...)

Start your characters out a caravan. They aren't chained up, but they are equipment-less and inside of a locked wagon (remember that scene from Dragonlance: DoAT?). Outside are Marmuluks (or whatever else fits your world/setting). They get to choose what to do, but be explicit inletting them know that they're off to be sold, and that the "point" is to get out and get home. Give them an SA reason to go home, like a lover or a king or something. It'll allow that to come into play as well.

Throw one or two other people in the wagon as well. Preferably at least one girl.

How do they get out? I've run this about 5 times, and I've seen swidling, lockpicking, board-breaking, singing, and all kinds of wierdness. Be sure to include a fight--preferably a duel or some other stuff. Let them sneak around the marmuluk camp at night killing sleeping guards...let them have a grudge against the caravan leader, or an amor for the caravan leader's concubine...

It's a pretty "cliche" old trick ("You wake up in the back of a prison wagon...what do you do?"), but hell if it doesn't work.

Jake

[Jaif]

1) Regarding GNS, I think we're seeing the same things.  The dirty details are that I'm more simist (along with another player), a couple others are more narrativist (draw pretty pictures, write complex and continuing backgrounds), two others are pretty gamist, and all of us fall back on gamist habits (round down? might as well put that point here instead -or- do I get the points now? can I spend them?).

It's not all black-and-white.  When everybody's alert (the good-ol-days), all of us were pretty much simists, with some more game oriented and others more narrativists.  We played aftermath, ICE, and Powers & Perils.(Hah, know anybody else who played tons of P&P?<g>)

Now, with less time on our hands, we tend to fall back on quick & dirty challenges & rewards, with the strong narrativists still playing their hands, and the strong simists playing their's.

Btw, I assume that simist refers to the story setting as well as simple physics: people react "normally/believably" -or- the city does have a water supply because that many people would really need a lot of water.

2) Kickers.

Let me explain.  Simplistically, as the GM, I come up with an idea and then design the world.  Sometimes that's an overarching idea and the whole damn universe; other times, it's the motivations of a noble, and the layout of his castle and town.

The latter parts of that, laying out the castle & town, along with the important people inside and so on, I consider to be work.  I may spend hours drawing that up and writing it out.  The other part, the ideas, I consider easy.  I just daydream along until an idea comes; damn, now I got to go to work.

Along comes kickers.  "Next adventure, a noble from Rohan invites me to his villa, offering me a place to rest and some supplies for our journey.  He'd like my help in a certain matter, but will explain more when we arrive."

Grand, just grand.  Now I've got to come up with a noble, a villa, including all the rooms, outlying buildings, grounds, and what have you, a matter in which he needs help, an explanation of why a Rohan noble has a villa in Gondor in the first place, and try to make it something up that player's alley.

Oh, and that's just one player.  I've got hours more effort for each.  Great.

That's what I'm saying.  I'm willing to give it a try and see how it turns out, but man there's going to be work.

RE: Player input

I typically grab for inspiration from the players anyways.  If a narrativist PC writes something up in his private journal that seems important, I may just grab it and run with it.  Likewise as to player speculations regarding the universe, metaplot, minor plot, or what have you.  If I hear something that fits & sounds fun, I'm as likely to grab it as anything else.

-Jeff

[Christopher Kubasik]

Hi Jeff,

Well, this is way off topic (off the board to boot), but I'll just say, as far as I can tell (and this GNS stuff is new to me too) narrativist play has nothing whatsoever to do with "draw pretty pictures, write complex and continuing backgrounds".  All the GNS stuff is about what players actually do during actual play.

As far as your understadning of the Kickers goes...  well, again.  A lot of these ideas take a while getting used to... And one has to guage one really needs to spend time getting used to them. But if you are curious about them, there's a couple of notches of understanding left to go.

But that's neither here nor there.

I'm hoping my posts, in some sort of dribbling logic, will be of help -- perhaps as ideas for what you don't want to do.  If not, know they were meant with the best of intentions.

Good luck with the game.

Take care,
Christopher

PS If "draw pretty pictures, write complex and continuing backgrounds" is what everyone thinks of narrativist play, no wonder those of us who love it are seen as idiots. :-)

[Jaif]

Well, this is way off topic (off the board to boot), but I'll just say, as far as I can tell (and this GNS stuff is new to me too) narrativist play has nothing whatsoever to do with "draw pretty pictures, write complex and continuing backgrounds". All the GNS stuff is about what players actually do during actual play.

Man, can't get a break.  I was messing around (though it's a wonderfully apt description, whether you like it or not.)

The narrativist players are the ones who tend to want to speak rather than roll, who are into where the story's going rather than simple success and failure, and who are most likely to whine about how other people are playing the game.

RE: Jake's idea.

That may be what I'm looking for, or at least a variant.  Thanks. (It's Corsairs of Umbar, just like the good book says, btw.<g>)

-Jeff

P.S. Yes, I slipped another in there.  Couldn't help myself. :-)

[Bankuei]

I'm rather sorry to have missed out on most of this thread.  This is some really good stuff.  If you are playing only once a month, do remember that a long, overarching story is unlikely to work out.  It's much worse than trying to take mythological epics of 14.000 books and slam it into an hour long pilot TV movie.  Bite sizes, ok?

My highest recommendation that will allow you to compromise the different play styles, whatever they may be:  Start by giving your players a definite goal.  Let them "know" how its going to end, generally... You can do it very easily by either doing a flashback, or a journal.

For example" June 14, 8th Year of the Fallen King, the sacred mirror was restored to the holy temple of Behem.  I write to chronicle the living and the dead, and of that night in the tower...."  And then play it out.  Everyone knows at least one person makes it back, but noone even knows who it is, or what is going to happen as far as the game.  They don't even know if the journal is being written by an NPC.  For Sim folks, the history angle is fun, Nar folks will like the story, and it gives a definite goal for the Gam folks to keep them on track.

As far as the overcautious player syndrome, I completely and totally blame the instant kill-ness that D&D has trained into everyone.  If you let everyone know that they will never play that character again(no point in coveting precious xp), if you give dice or mod bonuses for cool actions and decisive choices, and remember style over physics, you can really loosen folks up.  Feng Shui is a great game for doing that.

Also, if you get a chance, check out scene framing, its really great.  It keeps up the tempo, and your players will have to act and will want to.

Chris

[Christopher Kubasik]

Hey Chris,

That framing device gave me chills.  That was fucking great.  I am doing that next time I get to GM a one-shot.

Thanks,
Christopher

[joshua neff]

Chris--

I've often thought about starting a scenario (either long-term or short-term) with that kind of prologue, but was never sure how to really make it work. You just solved that for me. Thank you.

[Blake Hutchins]

Ah, very cool.  I used basically the same framing device for an Everway game I ran at a con a few years back.  My take was to use a wizened old storyteller for the prologue:  "Come here, children.  Closer, closer so you can hear me.  Today I shall tell the tale of the siege of the White City and the heroes who fell there, long ago, before your parents were born.  It was the Year of the Spotted Horse...."

This technique provides a pretty darn versatile tool.  You can use journals, spoken stories, monologues, dreams, and even epic poetry for your initial frame.  It's great way to start a game.  I once wrote and performed a twenty minute monologue that re-enacted the verdict and judgment of a trial in which the characters' past lives were condemned to death.  Rationale was that it was a common nightmare plaguing their characters in the present.

Best,

Blake

[Bankuei]

Actually, what gave me that idea was Bungie's Myth games, which are the best example of "Humans vs. horde of undead evil" done right ever.  Each mission began with a journal entry and a great bit of voice acting that totally provided the grim and dark atmosphere.  

I highly recommend that you check out the site (http://myth.bungie.org/legends/journal/index.html) and look at the journal examples... They kick ass.

Also, I found that most of game time ends up in trying to find out "What are we supposed to do next?" as opposed to actually doing it.  If you give people a definite goal, it frees them to actually doing it.  This is one thing that helps avoid the "check every inch and pump info till the npc is dry" syndrome.

Chris

[Mike Holmes]

Jeff,

You're afraid that all you're prep will go down the drain? Becasue the players will ignore what you have prepped? Would that stop the game from getting played, or would the play just happen in a less well defined atmosphere? The latter I'll bet. You just end up winging it a bit, right? I mean do players always stick to your well designed plots and maps all the time anyway? I'll bet you've had to develop some of those winging skills like almost every other GM.

So, don't do all that map-making prep and whatnot. For real.

This is one of the advantages to Kicker style play, you see, and why we think it's comical that you feel that you'll have to do more prep. In actuality you have to do less. Since the players already have a good idea of what to do, they don't have to have maps to tromp around, and preplanned plots to encounter. None of that.

Instead, just make up a number of NPCs that are interesting for their characters to get involved with (the good NPCs, with real motives), and several encounters or events that can be thrown in anywhere, in case things do slow down. Stuff that will challenge the players as they like, and still make sense to the backdrop (no wandering monsters, here, just well designed encounters).

For real fun make sure these NPCs, encounters and events all allow the player to say something about the character's Kickers. Frex, if one player has a Kicker about being the best warrior in the realm, come up with a rival that shows up repeatedly and have the rivalry build to a head over time. Again, just give them material to play their Kickers against.

BTW, if you use Kickers in TROS, they should be directly linked to SAs. I hope somebody mentioned that, already. But I'll repeat it anyhow. SA's are like unformed Kickers. Once you decide how to address the matter that the SA is about via the Kicker, then you'll really be off an running. So if my SA is "Duty to the King" my character's Kicker should be something like "Borob has found evidence of an assassination plot amongst the nobility to kill the King. It must be stopped!" Remember that a Kicker for a "Campaign" style game should take several sessions to resolve, don't jst make it the subject of a session. All you need to do for this Kicker, is think up some bogus reason why some nobles want to kill the king (or why the character has been misinformed!) and what their plans are. Simple.

Then let the players drive the game direction. As Chris says, this requires some getting used to, but once it gets going, you'll find that your job is much easier. And you'll find that the player apathy about story fades, and that they come to each session remembering everything that happened last time, even if it was a month ago. Because it's important to them. Because you let them choose something that was important to them, and you let them drive their character's trail through your fantasy world instead of leading them around uninvested in what's going on.

It works. Really. You just have to try it.

Mike

[Christopher Kubasik]

A little thing...

But since we've got a Chris here [Bankuei], I'm going to keep being Christopher.   I know, I know, it's five more letters. But I know y'all can do it.

Thanks,
Christopher

[Jaif]

Hah, this is funny for me to read.

I used to do it.  I used to run not only on-the-fly games, but I made up an entire campaign on the spot on a challenge from a friend (one of those college nights where no one else was around, and we wanted to roleplay). But it didn't stop there - I listened to the characters very carefully, tried to get the feel of where they were going, and changed stories on the fly.  I used to tell them things like "don't just ask if there's a spoon in the room, tell me what you're thinking, why you want the spoon, and I'll let you know if there's something close, even if it's not a spoon."  What I didn't say was that I was pumping them for more information so I could keep a plot running.

Two things have changed.  I still do things on the fly, and I'll still mutate the game towards a line more in keeping with the player's thoughts, both to mesh better and to challenge.  However:

a) We don't have time.  I can't keep track of everything, nobody else can help, and I lose details.  In the past, when we played more than once a week, it was easy.  When a month or more goes by, I just can't remember every little twist and decision.  That's why the prep work, so I have the dumb things recorded already.

b) Player feedback. My players like maps.  They like tactical situations.  They like continuity.  If I setup a city, it better have a water supply, source of food, leadership, and what have you.  They want details.  And if they come back to that city two years later, it better be the same, or the differences better be reasonable and not obvious mistakes on my part.

There's nothing about me that's wedded to anything in my campaign other than some very abstract ideas, and the building blocks.  So, I've introduced 3 religions, but if someone were to push (or even hint) at another, and the other sounded interesting, I'd chomp it up.  If someone pondered a split of opinion in one of the churches, that might become a subplot.  And so on.

Let me a few related thoughts:

1) You're barking up the wrong tree.  I'm the guy who'd play with kickers in a heartbeat.  It's the players who are, at best, lukewarm about the idea.

2) Trust me, your desire to throw out design time is comical to me as well.  It's like you're one of the bad Star Trek writers who makes plot mistakes and continuity errors, all in the name of some story. "But how do we unage her?" "I dunno, use the transporter or something." "But then why don't we just return everyone to their youth?" "That's not important - what's important is how she faced growing old, and how she grows as a person through the experience."  I despise that attitude, the one that says a writer isn't responsible for reason & detail in their writing, and I won't carry that attitude into my gaming.  Besides, my players would crucify me if I did.

3) You seem to think the group has the time to have 4 people wandering around on all their little side-quests.  We don't, and we all recognize it.

4) Many of the respondants here (not all) seem to be deliberately disingenious, and in many ways downright rude.  I think I've made it painfully clear what kind of group we are, and what the specific need was.  However, rather than have a simple discussion around my very direct question, you've twisted this into some sort of crusade to beat narrativism into my soul.  The stupid part of it is that narrativism's there, and rather than type all that out, all you had to do was a) give me a specific idea, and b) suggest that I look into the idea of kickers, found in such-n-shuch threads, and trust that as a human with half a brain I could figure out all by myself how to use them.

5) Ok, that last paragraph was harsh, but I'm keeping it because I think some people here could stand to have a bit of water tossed in their faces.  Not every issue needs to turn into a massive game theory discussion.  You could have just spun off some adventures for a fellow GM looking for inspiration.  It's not a bad question.

6) Indecision and apathy are two different things.  In both nothing happens, but in the second players don't care.  My players do care, they're just vacillating.

7) To the person who discussed "railroading" at length.  In a way, you are right about the larger issue.  The players simply aren't as in-tune with the game world right now, and that can happen when I've done a lot more reading on it then they have and at the same time we're all learning a new game system.  They've told me repeatedly that they like the world, they want the campaign to continue, and I should keep going.  I just want to cut down their environment a bit so they can get used to a piece at a time.

Probably enough talk for now, that should give people some ammo. :-)

-Jeff

P.S. It's not throwing away "my" design time that worries me.  It's creating (to steal your kicker), the nobility, the king, the plot itself, and all the environment for the plot that has me worried.  Ok, it's not that 1, it's 4 of them at the same time.  We'll never finish anything, and I'm not sure how I'll prepare it all in time.

[Mike Holmes]

1) You're barking up the wrong tree.  I'm the guy who'd play with kickers in a heartbeat.  It's the players who are, at best, lukewarm about the idea.

Here I understand you. I have Sim players too. And actually, I'm a pretty Sim player. It's just a matter of application...

2) Trust me, your desire to throw out design time is comical to me as well.  It's like you're one of the bad Star Trek writers who makes plot mistakes and continuity errors, all in the name of some story. "But how do we unage her?" "I dunno, use the transporter or something." "But then why don't we just return everyone to their youth?" "That's not important - what's important is how she faced growing old, and how she grows as a person through the experience."  I despise that attitude, the one that says a writer isn't responsible for reason & detail in their writing, and I won't carry that attitude into my gaming.  Besides, my players would crucify me if I did.

This is a criticism often leveled at Narrativism and other styles of play. And it's not right. Any style of play that has such inconsistencies is bad. They are a product of bad play, not a particular style. G,N,or S, all players want consistency. It's just a matter of how you get it.

3) You seem to think the group has the time to have 4 people wandering around on all their little side-quests.  We don't, and we all recognize it.

Not at all. I think you have time for 4 intertwined stories about the characters. And no other plot. No side-quests. Kiskers ae not side quests. They are the goal of play. You decide on a Kicker, and then you go play that. That may still be more stuff than one GM plot, but you know what? It'll still go faster and more efficiently thatn that one GM plot because you have five players pushing the four plots as opposed to one player (The GM) pushing one plot that the others care little about.

4) Many of the respondants here (not all) seem to be deliberately disingenious, and in many ways downright rude.

Disingenious? What have we said that was not meant to help? What did we dissemble about? We are trying to give advice which you are free to use or ignore, and you are throwing it back in our faces telling us how we're wrong and it can't work for you. If it's really not something you need, then just ignore it.

I think I've made it painfully clear what kind of group we are, and what the specific need was.  However, rather than have a simple discussion around my very direct question, you've twisted this into some sort of crusade to beat narrativism into my soul.

To be precise we were discussing Kickers, and I was thinking of them in a way as to produice better Simulationism, but that's a technicality.

[/quote]The stupid part of it is that narrativism's there, and rather than type all that out, all you had to do was a) give me a specific idea, and b) suggest that I look into the idea of kickers, found in such-n-shuch threads, and trust that as a human with half a brain I could figure out all by myself how to use them.[/quote]I won't debate wether the" Narrativism is there" or not. Not important. But, again, it was your denial of the usefulness in your situation and inaccurrate claims that set off my response.

5) Ok, that last paragraph was harsh, but I'm keeping it because I think some people here could stand to have a bit of water tossed in their faces.  Not every issue needs to turn into a massive game theory discussion.  You could have just spun off some adventures for a fellow GM looking for inspiration.  It's not a bad question.

You're right. And some folks have given you ideas, including one straight from the man, Jake. You just seemed more interested in the debate.

6) Indecision and apathy are two different things.  In both nothing happens, but in the second players don't care.  My players do care, they're just vacillating.

And our point is that there are several ways around that vacillation. Kickers for one. Avoiding railroading for another. And, sure, certain types of adventures might help. But in the end you're still stuck with the same problems. Thought we could help with that.

It's not throwing away "my" design time that worries me.  It's creating (to steal your kicker), the nobility, the king, the plot itself, and all the environment for the plot that has me worried.  Ok, it's not that 1, it's 4 of them at the same time.  We'll never finish anything, and I'm not sure how I'll prepare it all in time.

Don't create the environment. I hope you've read theis far, because this is where I'm really tring to explain my position. You say your players worry about consistency, and whatnot, and that not having preprepared stuff is a problem. This seems odd to me.

If the players come into the town and ask does the town have an adequqate water supply, the answer is either yes, or if you can think of some good reason why they would reasonably not, no. Consistency problems occur when you try to outline things too well, and you make a mistake. For example, if you place a city on a plain and state that the plain never gets any rainfall, then we have a problem. If you simply refrain from making as many notes you'll find that you have less consistency errors, not more. And if you are caught in one as you make up something on the fly, either admit your mistake, or twist it into the story somehow.

In any case, you'll find that if you are playing through the stories of your player's characters, that you'll seldom have to worry about these details. Engaged players don't have a lot of time to ask such irrelevant questions. When they do it's easy to make up the details (you said you are skilled in this, so I assume that the statement is true).

Now, this is all just my opinion, which has been very much formed by using these techniques in recent actual play. I've been wrong before, and may be wrong here, too, who knows? Maybe there is some part of your group's play that I just don't get, or maybe I'm just an idiot. But I am trying to help, Jeff. I'm giving you advice that, IMO, would help. You are under no obligation to use it (obviously) or even respond to this post if you don't feel like it.

Have I clarified anything, or do you still think I'm harping?

Mike