WuShu Renegades: Considering a different way to run games.

[Tark]

I posted this on rpg.net hoping to generate some possible discussion and maybe refine this idea into something workable.  I haven't really gotten it much farther then this currently.  I don't want to overcomplicate it beyond what's necessary.

Pregame:
1. The Antagonist

Normally players would make characters and back story for them while the director would do damn near everything else. In WuShu renegades the players make the character and an antagonist for the game.

Before the game the players and GM get together and decide what antagonist they'd like to have to deal with for the game (could be one, could be all at once). As well as choosing what place they'd like to start, their relation to one another etc.

In other words the group as a whole decides where there characters are going to be why they are there and how they'll see tone another if they don't already. They'll have chosen what flavor of antagonist they want to go up against and likely determined much of the base plot of the game depending on the detail the player went into him .


2. Divide Jobs

Something I've noticed Ina lot of games I run, particularly during combat is that the GM has to divide his attention over multiple players for various things. While this in and of itself isn't necessarily bad it does tend to make the other players idle which can cause boredom. Boredom is bad mkay?

So let's give them something to do other then playing the character. So they can choose roles for themselves. They can rotate if they choose to keep it interesting.

The Writer/Director: The GM of the game. Does most of the work in interpreting that main plot and work that they normally do. The rest is divided up amongst the others.

The Assistant: Role plays out all the inane not written up Npc that you run into. Director describes coming across a fruit stand and you absolutely HAVE to stop and talk to the faceless guy? This guy handles that.Whether it's saucy barmaids or seedy bartenders who don't have the information he takes care of that The assistant also fills in for other positions whenever it's not prudent for other roles to do their own for themselves. (i.e. when the Roller has to roll for their own character the assistant rolls against their character)


Roller: Rolls for the director. The least role and good for people who are lazy or who feel aren't strong role players. Secret rolls are discouraged in WuShu Renegades.

Choreographer: Handles the care and feeding of mooks. Mooks are the extras of WuShu renegades and the choreographer handles their initiative, what they do, and how they react that they feel is dramatically appropriate.


Co - Star: A misnomer for the guy who role plays out any supporting cast members a character might have show up. If they have any relevant plot info the player might not know the director passes the note on to them so the costar can give it out as they will. Essentially it relieves the director of the burden of having to memorize and role play out the supporting cast of each and every character when they come into the picture. Good for strong role players who don't like to roll a lot.

Any other ideas would be helpful. Mostly these are interchangeable and entirely optional depending on director preference and player tolerance for a Roller's lucky streak on the bad guys killing them.

3. Build Supporting Cast

In traditional wushu renegades the the supporting cast means little more then some guys who confirm your existence as a person in the world. You have a history, a story, you exist because others confirm you do, they gave birth to you, taught you, etc.

In this method you spend the extra exp by using it to build a supporting cast. Mothers, fathers, lovers, spouses, tutors, rivals, friends, business partners. Each of the give you a minor mechanical benefit for showing up in an episode in one form or another. You can use the exp for making your character better by themselves but the benefits of having a supporting cast outweigh the disadvantages of having to deal with them (lovers need to be tended to, rivals need to be fought, etc.) The more supporting members you have the less often you have to maintain them individually but the more often you have to spend exp to have one show up for an episode.

Once characters spend the exp they write a brief description of the supporting cast member and hand it off to the assigned costar for them to use.


First Episode

The first episode of the game is the most important. It takes all what the players have worked on and considered and sets the tone for the game. The antagonist appears, does whatever the writer/director wanted him to do and the characters set off on whatever adventure they were going to get into. It also leads to the first plot direction the players make that will lead them into the rest of the game.

1.Selecting Plot Direction:

So the players have their characters introduced, the antagonist has shown up and poked the characters into dramatic action. Now the end of the session comes, xp has been doled out here we come to decision: where to go from here.

Well at the end of the session the director devises 4 possible decisions or outcomes of this episode that will determine much of the plot of the next episode. They are ranked in number of least difficult to most difficult for the characters to get through intact. Rated 0 through 4 the benefit of going harder is the extra experience points given at the end of the episode. Not to mention the extra bits of xp one gets through slogging through a harder episode.

An Example

The group ends its first episode. The characters who are all childhood friends had their village and temple burned to ash by the antagonist. Riding off with his army the pc's, covered in ash and soot have sworn vengeance on him and will not rest till the murderer is brought to justice. It being late and the pizza being cold and the beer being warm the Director decides to call ti their and gives them these decisions.

0: The antagonist escapes. The characters have little more then vague clues to go on but his threat to them is far off if any at all giving the characters time to build resources for a final showdown.

1: They find out where he's going but there's little time to rest, train and consider.

2: As above but more time constrained.

3: They catch up to the antagonist and his minions but they run into trouble along the way slowing their progress.

4: They confront the villain alone and unprepared for a conflict the entirety of their village could not have won.

While the prospect of quick revenge is appealing the players decide that nor is it fun to lose him completely so they take option one guaranteeing a relatively easy episode and a bit of extra exp for their trouble.
2. Deciding on Supporting Cast

As mentioned before you can spend a little bit of xp in character creation to build a number of supporting cast members to provide a small mechanical benefit to the character for appearing in the game (Masters would provide a +1 bonus to discipline for example). How and where they appear is mostly between the costar and the director.

The next game and onward

So the next session comes the supporting cast appears and the decisions the players made are interpreted through the lens of the directors imagination. The costar takes care of the supporting cast/character interaction and the nameless mooks are beaten by the thousands. The process repeats itself until the campaign ends.

Thus far this is the foundation on which I'm trying to build on and none of it is written all of this is from my ideas in my head. I'll probably look at it again here when I wake up in a bit to see what I can make of it and what you can add or take from it that would make it more of what I'm trying to get at.