PC interaction and party split-ups

[Emmett]

Mr. Morgan and Mr. Kim stated what My inital reaction was to this post, so I'll suggest a way that players might be encouraged to split up, but it would take some story juggleing from the GM.

Say you're gaming with six people. Four of the players want to go in direction x and two want to go in direction y. The GM takes a guess at which path will either take longer or reveal less of the story and then allows the two players going in direction y to go first. This deturmination could be based on the idea that two are likely not as good as four and therefore going to be less effective (which might not be the case for the two most powerful PCs going it alone).

The GM then conscripts the idle players to control either individual NPCs or groups of NPCs each. The "idle" players then do what the NPC would do. If the NPC is a combatant, they fight the PCs, If they are a bartender, they talk with the PC, maybe the GM could slip notes on things the bartender might know and the "idle" would act it out.

It would take a lot of effort though to go back to the other group and then play, pretending that you didn't just do all that. "You were trying to kill my character!" says player A. "I was supposed to, I was a dragon and you were trying to steal my gold!" player B retorts. Althouth player B is correct, many players would still take offence and I think it would fracture any hope of the group playing as a team or party later on. What would be worse is PC A walking up to PC B and killing him for no reason as far as the game is concerned.

That would have to be addressed in some kind of social contract, or somehow be incorporated into the game so that the Players, not the PCs expect and accept it. At that point the players are likely to work better in competition than co-operation.

In addition, how would you get the player to act not in his/her own interest. Basically the NPCs would start running up to the PC and being nice to them all the time, so the player would return the favor.

Maybe this needs it's own thread . . .

[clehrich]

Emmett,

I tried to propose a social contract and play session structure for this in my little essay on Soap Operas.  Does that help at all?  Or is this not what you're looking for?

[Jack Spencer Jr]

1. Although I do wonder in what circumstances he discovered what it feels like to have a rotting albatross around his neck, but that's another story.  :)

ahem,... perhaps that was a bit of overstatement, but I had just been wrestling with this whole party mentality for a while now. "Don't split up the party." Why? and the only solid answer is combat considerations. Bah!

[John Kim]

I tried to propose a social contract and play session structure for this in my little essay on Soap Operas.  Does that help at all?  Or is this not what you're looking for?  

Oops.  Chris -- I'm going away for a week shortly, and I don't have time for a full report.  However, I've been using your soap opera suggestions now for three sessions in my Vinland game.  Very briefly -- the first session went great.  The second session I think I was trying to hard to intercut the storylines "properly", and it came across as micromanagement.  The third session I went more with what the players wanted for cutting, and it worked much better.  I'll give a more complete write-up when I get back from vacation.  

It would take a lot of effort though to go back to the other group and then play, pretending that you didn't just do all that. "You were trying to kill my character!" says player A. "I was supposed to, I was a dragon and you were trying to steal my gold!" player B retorts. Althouth player B is correct, many players would still take offence and I think it would fracture any hope of the group playing as a team or party later on.  

Hmm.  It certainly hasn't happened in my game, but then I guess I don't have the sort of players who would take offence.  On the other hand, in general I would say they aren't team players.  They will work together at times, but they can also be at odds with each other -- such as Kjartan's rivalry with his uncle Poul (both PCs), which two sessions ago spontaneous broke out into a fight.  

I guess the short answer is, don't expect them to work as a team.  That was certainly my main motivation for going with the soap opera structure.  It was feeling increasingly contrived for all of the PCs to go together on an expedition.  They each started to have their own lives, which is a good thing in the sense that they were blossoming as characters, but a bad thing for plot devices to bring them all together.  It's not totally impossible for them to work as a team now, but it isn't required for the game to be fun.

In addition, how would you get the player to act not in his/her own interest. Basically the NPCs would start running up to the PC and being nice to them all the time, so the player would return the favor.  

Well, the above makes it sound pretty blatant, which I doubt would happen in a reasonably functional group.  However, there certainly may be a tendency to slide in this direction.  What I did in my Vinland game was that instead of having the players play one-off NPCs, they have "alternate PCs" who are continuing characters.  The alternate PCs have goals of their own which may clash with the PCs goals.  For example, Katrina (Jim's alternate PC) had designs on marrying Melnir, but he ended up proposing to Silksif (Heather's original PC).  The player thus has an investment in the alternate PC, and wants her to succeed.

[clehrich]

I tried to propose a social contract and play session structure for this in my little essay on Soap Operas.  Does that help at all?  Or is this not what you're looking for?  

Oops.  Chris -- I'm going away for a week shortly, and I don't have time for a full report.

Tease.  :)

I guess the short answer is, don't expect them to work as a team.  That was certainly my main motivation for going with the soap opera structure.  It was feeling increasingly contrived for all of the PCs to go together on an expedition.  They each started to have their own lives, which is a good thing in the sense that they were blossoming as characters, but a bad thing for plot devices to bring them all together.  It's not totally impossible for them to work as a team now, but it isn't required for the game to be fun.

Yes, I think this is the central point.  You either have everyone decide to do Party Line more or less at the Social Contract level, or you have to face the fact that they're not going to be a party all the time.  Then you either railroad them into being a party, beat your head against them not being a party, or intercut and have everyone have something to do while they're not on-screen, as it were.

Hey M.J., in Multiverser, what do the other players do when one player is alone in world X?

Chris

[Jason Lee]

ahem,... perhaps that was a bit of overstatement, but I had just been wrestling with this whole party mentality for a while now. "Don't split up the party." Why? and the only solid answer is combat considerations. Bah!

Well, I can think of a couple other non-combat reasons.

In an heavy Actor stance Open Play sort of mystery story the game can slow down in the middle clue-gathering phase.  Different groups of characters may collect different clues, and if they don't share all the details with each other connections can be missed.  Even if they do the absence of knowledge in one group (that the other group has) can lead to missed opportunities and back peddling to solve the mystery.  Of course, the pacing in the middle segement of a mystery story is one of my personal challenges.

There is also the problem of maintaining the interest level/Immersion of the entire group.  If you have four characters is one place, and one character in another you would expect that the party of one would receive one-fourth the playtime that the party of four does (if it doesn't then you most likely have a pacing or favoratism issue).  That can mean that if the party of one isn't interested in the events of the other party (and some people are only interested when it means they get to talk soon), the focus for the party of one can drop off - possibly leading to falling asleep, interrupting other people, or a confused 'huh, it's my turn what was happening, I wasn't paying attention' exchange when shifting groups.  Of course, you could speed up the scene switching between parties, but that can lead into cutting off all the players from being able to complete anything significant in their allowed time.

Not saying I think the party mentality is best (because definately don't, it has its problems too).  I'm just saying that there are a lot of pacing issues that can arise from a non-party format - there can be more concerns than combat concerns.

[Jeffrey Miller]

I, personally, am sick of the party mentality. "Keep the party together" "Never split up the party" It feels like a literal, rotting albatross around my neck.

With apologies, Jack, but your post is the first in a string of anti-party posts, tales of GM's ignoring players for hours at a time, and rehashed GM advice column fodder - all valuable, all important, but not exactly where I think Matt was headed with his post.

I think that the concept of "don't split up the party" for social contract reasons is an interesting one to examine to better understand the dynamics of the social contract, and what exactly drives people to the table.  Are you there to explore a setting?  Tell a story?  Compete?  These things all require, to a certain extent and in various qualities, social interaction on a player<->player basis, rather than a GM<->player basis.  Those two relationships imply vastly difference consequences and roles, even in the "hippie-pinko games" that float around here that play with stance and roles. ;)

Are there games that mechanically/systematically encourage player participation outside of what immediately impacts, involves, or otherwise effects their individual character?  

- Ars Magica, through its premise attempts this and comes close, but there's nothing in the rule-set that encourages or rewards such play.  

- Deadlands allows players to expend chips to give bonuses to other players, but at double the cost.  This has a net effect of actually discouraging involvement, by making you realize its possible but taxing you for it.

- Trollbabe - the ability to randomly enter a scene with little attention to continuity is intruiging and plays out well for the game, but doesn't allow for direct player level involvement, only character-level involvement.

anyone else?

-jeffrey-

[Bill_White]

Many years ago, I wrote an article for Dragon called "Divide and Conquer":  it was an "advice to the DM" sort of piece about how to run split-party adventures.  I was pretty pleased with the thing--it had whimsical James Holloway illustrations and each topical section was headed by a cute little vignette, like this one:

"Never split the party!" advised the wizened sage sternly, poking a gnarled finger at the youthful adventurers he'd taken in tutelage.  "You are stronger together than apart--if I had some sticks I could show you.  Besides, when separated, you make more work for the Dungeon Master."

The callow youths shivered at the mention of the cruel, cold-hearted deity's name.  They would follow their mentor's advice.

I want to re-read that article as a way of addressing Matt's question about what preferences for splitting the party or not "mean" in terms of game-design and game-running philosophy.  This will most likely serve only as raw material for a more rigorous rpg-theoretic account by someone else, but one does what one can.

An Outline of "Divide and Conquer" (Dragon #190)

After the cute vignette above, I offer up a boilerplate rationale of why keeping a party together is a good idea, for the characters (they can overcome tougher challenges and protect each other more easily), the players (more role-playing time and interaction), and the DM ("She can prepare a single storyline and be fairly confident she has options for all contingencies").  Despite this, I say, there are three advantages to "allowing" a split-party campaign.  First, the DM is able to "tailor" adventures to match PCs' abilities and players' interests.  Second, "each player will feel more involved and more in control of his character's destiny."  Third, splitting the party can add drama to the campaign.

The next section suggests that players strike off on their own either with a goal in mind, in which case the DM need only respond to the goal-oriented actions, or without one, in which case the DM should prepare minimal adventure outlines targeted toward those PCs.  I suggest that having a goal-less character stumble on a map marked with a tantalizing location is always a good idea.

A third section discusses why a DM might want to cause rather than just suffer split-party adventures.  These include dramatic effect, to challenge jaded players, as a consequence of player decisions, or "to shine the limelight on characters who are normally overshadowed by their more aggressive peers."

The remainder of the article is devoted to "DM hints."  One section discusses "the referee's major concern," that is, "what to do with the players whose adventures are not being resolved at present." I suggest that passive players be allowed to control NPCs (with sufficient supervision from the DM) or to serve as an appreciative audience.  I offer as a rule of thumb for dealing with off-screen players, "Include, include, include."

The next section offers more DM hints, including "keep track of time and space," "switch when play reaches a stable point," "try switching at cliffhanger moments," "switch several times a night," "give quick summaries of where each PC is," and "consider using blue-booking."

A long section discusses the types of adventures that might be suitable for lone adventurers:  quests, contests, mysteries, leadership, pursuit or escape, spying, or thieving.

The final sections discuss how to bring split-party campaigns back together.  I say that players "like to feel that there is some grand scheme that they can affect by their actions" and that the DM can "heighten their sense of accomplishment by leading them along separate paths to the same conclusion."  The way to do this is to (a) let them resolve the reasons for separating, (b) offer clues and portents that something isn't right, and (c) structure the outcome of their investigations so that they come closer and closer together in time and space "until two or more groups meet, compare notes, and decide on a combined plan of action."  The "epic quality" of such a campaign, I say, "appeals to most players."  I list a number of different sorts of "reunion" scenarios or hooks that a DM can prepare, and how to build in limits to how far apart characters can actually get.

Finally, I offer some concluding language about how well-run split-party campaigns can give players the feeling that "their characters live in a world of limitless options, where they can go anywhere and do anything."

Comments

The thing that I noticed in re-reading this old article of mine is how the issue of DM control of the plotline emerges as the fundamental problematic of splitting the party.  I gloss over the difficulties of managing the split both "on the map" (i.e., in prepping details of the game-world) and "at the table" (i.e., in terms of player-player interaction and "screen-time").  The whole article builds toward an argument that the split-party campaign enables a complex but coherent storyline to be built from the PC's actions, given a sufficiently skilled DM.

From the point of view of players, I can understand how reducing the range of on-the-map interactions would be problematic; I think this is why in my article I suggest letting off-screen players run NPCs as the primary tool for managing this difficulty.  But I also read the "party split" as a vote of confidence in the breadth and scope of the imaginary world that the DM has concocted.  I notice that this implies a highly asymmetric division of creative power between game-master and player, but it also obligates the game-master to a high degree of responsiveness to player desires.

Bill

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Jeffrey wrote,

- Trollbabe - the ability to randomly enter a scene with little attention to continuity is intruiging and plays out well for the game, but doesn't allow for direct player level involvement, only character-level involvement.

I can't understand a word of this. Part of the problem is that you're not referring to a rule in Trollbabe, but a particular agreement arrived at by a particular play group in what they felt comfortable doing. The other part is the business of direct player level vs. character level ... really, I don't get it. Makes no sense to me at all. Help?

Best,
Ron

[Jack Spencer Jr]

After the cute vignette above, I offer up a boilerplate rationale of why keeping a party together is a good idea, for the characters (they can overcome tougher challenges and protect each other more easily), the players (more role-playing time and interaction), and the DM ("She can prepare a single storyline and be fairly confident she has options for all contingencies").  

Yeah, it's getting pretty obvious that I have nothing to add to this discussion because I am coming at it from an entirely different angle.

"can overcome tougher challenges and protect each other more easily"

Such as? Besides the obvious combat situation. I think my issues with RPG have already been aired an no need to sully this thread with them any more.

"[The DM] can prepare a single storyline and be fairly confident she has options for all contingencies."

Hrms... there are two assumptions here that I simply do not agree with. The first is that the GM prepares, sets up or creates the story, which may be true in some styles of play but in others it is not. The other is that preparing options for all contigencies is A) possible and B) desirable. I don't believe so. I don't think it's possible to prepare for every contingency, so at some point you need to improvise. I'm of a mind that it's better to be ready to improvise all the time instead of feeling safe in the prewritten plot line and then to get that unpleasant naked feeling when the players drag the plot in a different direction and you must improvise.

[Jack Spencer Jr]

After the cute vignette above, I offer up a boilerplate rationale of why keeping a party together is a good idea, for the characters (they can overcome tougher challenges and protect each other more easily), the players (more role-playing time and interaction), and the DM ("She can prepare a single storyline and be fairly confident she has options for all contingencies").  

Yeah, it's getting pretty obvious that I have nothing to add to this discussion because I am coming at it from an entirely different angle.

"can overcome tougher challenges and protect each other more easily"

Such as? Besides the obvious combat situation. I think my issues with RPG combat have already been aired an no need to sully this thread with them any more.

"[The DM] can prepare a single storyline and be fairly confident she has options for all contingencies."

Hrms... there are two assumptions here that I simply do not agree with. The first is that the GM prepares, sets up or creates the story, which may be true in some styles of play but in others it is not. The other is that preparing options for all contigencies is A) possible and B) desirable. I don't believe so. I don't think it's possible to prepare for every contingency, so at some point you need to improvise. I'm of a mind that it's better to be ready to improvise all the time instead of feeling safe in the prewritten plot line and then to get that unpleasant naked feeling when the players drag the plot in a different direction and you must improvise.

[Bill_White]

Jack --

I'm not sure you take my point.  The paragraph you quote was my summary of the usual reasons offered for not splitting the party; the rest of the article outline talks about how to do it, and why (basically, because you have to or because you want to--as the DM, of course).  The assumptions of DM pre-planning and control are exactly at issue; dredging up this about 10 years old article lets me see that I made a huge number of such assumptions.  So my main point today was to suggest that, in terms of game-running philosophy, such issues are a major factor in shaping one's response to the whole issue of splitting the party, which I took to be Matt's question.

In other words, I'm pretty sure I agree with you.

-- Bill

[Jeffrey Miller]

Hello,

Jeffrey wrote,

- Trollbabe - the ability to randomly enter a scene with little attention to continuity is intruiging and plays out well for the game, but doesn't allow for direct player level involvement, only character-level involvement.

I can't understand a word of this. Part of the problem is that you're not referring to a rule in Trollbabe, but a particular agreement arrived at by a particular play group in what they felt comfortable doing. The other part is the business of direct player level vs. character level ... really, I don't get it. Makes no sense to me at all. Help?

Its off-topic to the thread, so let me try to answer quickly. I haven't had a chance to make it all the way through Trollbabe yet, and I should've qualified the above passage thusly, but my understanding was that there is an aspect of "starting whereever you desire" on a map of the world, and rules to the effect that characters may simply appear in a scene, out of nowhere, off the top of a thatched roof hut (hopefully not burninated), out of a large jar in the corner, etc.

I've seen/heard multiple people mention this as an enjoyable aspect of Trollbabe;  I don't have my copy handy to track down if this is indeed a feature or merely a common house rule.  If I am misattributing it to your game, Ron, I'm sorry.

However, if you're confused about how it promotes character interaction instead of player interaction, I can try to explain that further..

[Jack Spencer Jr]

In other words, I'm pretty sure I agree with you.

Oops. Appologies.

BTW, shoot me now for the double post.

[M. J. Young]

Hey M.J., in Multiverser, what do the other players do when one player is alone in world X?

Perhaps not surprisingly, there are a lot of aspects to this included in the rules, mostly in the referee shortcuts section; there are probably more that I've discovered that most referees do naturally that aren't in there. I think perhaps had I had a copy of Bill White's article back then I would have worked less at trying to think of things--but perhaps that's good.

The first thing you have to realize is that if you're running good solid campaigns, everyone is interested in everyone else's story. I've had people come to games just to watch the story unfold, and having more than one story unfold at a time makes it more interesting. To a degree, this seems to be like your Soap Opera idea--people will not merely hang around for the story they're playing to move forward, but will become involved with the other stories.

Also, I have to take issue with something

If you have four characters is one place, and one character in another you would expect that the party of one would receive one-fourth the playtime that the party of four does (if it doesn't then you most likely have a pacing or favoratism issue).

I disagree.

Generally, when I'm running Multiverser I'm jumping between characters and worlds pretty frequently; but I don't give people equal time; I give them attention commensurate with their needs. Tense and exciting scenes require more attention that routine ones. Certainly in other games, in the situation Jason suggests, I wouldn't divide my attention by number of players, but more by the needs of the groups. Let's suppose a party splits up into three groups, one of four, one of three, one of one. It might be that that one is doing the critical thing. Let's take Prisoner of Zenda: one guy, alone, has to get inside the castle, prevent them from killing the king, and open the gate for the rest to enter. More focus is going to be on that one guy than on the bunch waiting to be let inside. Seriously, can you see it?

O.K., Bill, what are you doing?

I'm climbing the rope which Johann lowered to me.

You hear a noise from the room at the top; someone has come in to the room.

I draw my dagger from my boot and hold it in my teeth so I'll have it ready if I need it.

O.K., everyone else, what are you doing?

We're standing here watching him.

Anything else?

No, just waiting.

O.K., back to Bill....[/list:u]
There is no reason to give "everyone else" equal time to stand and watch. Sure, come back to them sometimes, and let them 1) know that they're waiting in anticipation and 2) decide whether there's anything they can do that might help ("I string an arrow, and hold it at the window, in case someone notices Bill"). But put the focus on the interesting parts.

Because players are usually in different worlds, there's no problem with speeding up the clock for one--time in one world doesn't matter to that in another. I remember one game in which the player character decided to attend seminary. That was going to take a couple years. Every few minutes I came back to him. "It's September; are you doing anything different this month?" Usually the answer was, "No," and we marked off another month on the calendar. Sometimes he did something special, and we played out a few of the events of say a date with the princess or a bit of side research or a new addition to his training program, but overall I think over the course of maybe ninety minutes he finished a two-year degree, while other players burned up variously anything from a couple of hours to a couple of weeks of their game time. Speed up the dull times, focus on the excitement. The only reason to slow down during the dull times is to prevent the development of a "something's about to happen" factor every time you slow down (or the reverse, the "everything's safe because we didn't slow down for that last port" feeling). Get the players back to the active parts.

Also, please note that the player decided to have his character go to seminary; he thought (correctly) that it would improve his character abilities, and was worth the downtime in play. He improved his education level, his religion score, some of his "magical" abilities, and other things. Multiverser rewards study and training time, so players don't feel they're wasting time when they do it.

I do suggest giving players NPC's to handle, particularly in larger situations and settings. In truth, I don't do this often. Part of that is that I don't want someone's scenario to be derailed because someone else didn't show for the game (although that's minor). Part of it is that it's really rarely necessary. I've done it, though.

Bill mentioned cliffhangers; they're always good, particularly if they're the sort of cliffhangers that make the player want to go back and look at his resources. I've never been the sort of referee who demands players react with the same speed as their characters--I figure the character knows himself more intimately than the player does, even given the I game nature of Multiverser (because the character has learned a lot of stuff over the years that to the player is just notes on the sheet and memories of earlier game sessions). So giving a player five minutes to consider his options, look over his sheet, and decide how his character is going to instantly react to this event isn't a problem for me. "You see the dragon; he sees you. Let me go deal with Jim."

There's one thing that happens in a lot of games that never happens in mine: you don't get to explain to me your long-range plans. Whether it's a training program or a course of study, building a suit of armor or shopping for equipment or training your associate NPC's in some battle strategy, I don't want to sit and listen to it. At the moment you need to do that, you get a sheet of paper. Use all the paper you want. Write it, draw it, do the math--whatever it takes to express this idea goes on paper. While you're working on it, I'm dealing with other people. When you're done, I'll take a minute to look at it, ask questions or make comments. Maybe I'll give it back to you for clarification. In any event, when it's all finished, I've got a record of exactly what you intend in my notes, because you wrote it for me (so there's no mistake in me misunderstanding what you said), and we haven't spent everyone else's time on this. There are many, many things that can be handled this way more effectively than verbally.

Players also advise each other during play. I don't object to this; it makes it more interesting and more fun for everyone. Every player has different strengths in role playing. My eldest son Ryan is one of the best at visualizing the situation I've known. When he was in fourth grade, I think, there was this huge D&D battle in which a party of about fifteen player characters was attacked from three directions at an intersection of halls by about forty bugbears. They won, and proceeded to explore the now mostly vacated rooms--and he passed me a note indicating that as he was walking, he stumbled over the bodies of the slain. No one else in that room of teens through thirties recognized that they were stepping on and over the bodies of the bugbears as they moved out of that area. That kind of insight is valuable; and if someone else at the table can see the situation in which your character is currently standing better than you can, having that input can make your play more intelligent and more fun.

I limit myself to five players most of the time; if I've got more than four, I'll often see if I can bring some of them together so they're on the same page. That's mostly a personal preference on my part; I've noticed that I have more trouble juggling six stories, and give less attention to those whose stories aren't as challenging. So I recognize my limits in that regard. I can do six (I can do eight), but it requires a lot more focus on my part to make sure I'm getting everyone--particularly as I don't "go around the table" but rather grab people according to who feels like they have to move forward.

Oh, one other trick that I learned from a guy I never met. Richard Lutz created the Zygote Experience idea which I completed. He test-played with E. R. Jones years before I knew him (Jones), and a lot of things he did were fascinating. I'd hear stories of some of the games he ran. Several times ER found himself on the top of this mountain and started trying to get down out of the ice and snow to discover what was at the bottom, only to plunge to his death. Once he came in near a lake, met a bunch of blue people, and said "hello", only to have them become suddenly and irreconcilably enraged, attacking him violently until he versed out. I wondered about these things for months (ER wondered about them for years), until I came upon an answer: Lutz used stall scenarios. He knew how to put a player character into a situation that would hold the player's interest and keep him busy that didn't require any work or attention from the referee beyond simple next action interactions. You can't really spot a stall scenario when you're in it, and while you're there the referee can do stuff like think of where you're going next or focus on someone else's situation. These can be just as interesting to the player as anything else, and depending on how the player reacts can lead to new ideas for future play, but they free up the referee significantly.

That's some of the tricks of the trade. I use them in other games as well, sometimes, now that I've learned them. Hope they help.

--M. J. Young