My friend and I were tossing around ideas for a show the other week and came up with an idea for a show:

http://ameagaru.blogspot.com/2004/12/pta.html

It was mostly just so we could see how the system worked, how to throw a show together, create a character, etc. But it got me thinking. Say you have a game with just two players, a Producer and a Protagonist. How does the Protagonist get Fan Mail? The Producer can't award it, right?

I know that ideally a PTA game should have more players, but what if you just had one as a protag?

Well, there aren't many TV shows that truly have only one protagonist. But if you look at most of the TV shows that have, say, two, there are both a stable of recurring guests (for instance, X-Files has Skinner, the Lone Gunmen, Krycek, etc.).

But if you can only for sure scare up one player, here's how it works. Both of you are both player and producer, trading off the producer responsibility as it seems appropriate; PTA is written and designed such that it can easily be run without a "GM". Either bring in a second protagonist, or one of you plays the guest stars that pop up. (Or you both do both, each play a protagonist and guest stars.)

Hey Joe! Good to see ya round these parts.

I agree with Chris. Toss the Producer hat back and forth as needed. I know you and Ed can do this without any problem.

And your show is keen. Sphinx powers? Man, that's cool. I wonder how Talbot's issue is gonna work out in play, though. Running away from problems is not necessarily drama-inducing, unless you spend a good amount of time on the rest of the cast and the consequences of Talbot's issue in their lives. Maybe you can play it sort of like Doyle's issue in season one of Angel.

Thanks John. I lurk quite a bit, but pop up from time to time.

Well, Ed and I made the show mainly to see how it was done, but then the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to do something with it. We had just really skimmed the rules when we came up with it, and the character of Talbot.

I hadn't really considered his Issue much, but I can see your point. I'll have to give it more thought. Maybe we can re-tool it or refine it a bit.

It's funny you mentioned Doyle as I just picked up season 1 of Angel and watched all the Doyle episodes yesterday.

Chris Goodwin wrote: But if you can only for sure scare up one player, here's how it works. Both of you are both player and producer, trading off the producer responsibility as it seems appropriate; PTA is written and designed such that it can easily be run without a "GM". Either bring in a second protagonist, or one of you plays the guest stars that pop up. (Or you both do both, each play a protagonist and guest stars.)

If you only have one player - and that's a bummer - the trading producer thing is a good idea. I'd probably go with a communal budget, with each of you awarding fan mail from the pool as you would if you were another player, erring on the side of generosity.

Plus, your episodes are going to go pretty fast with only two people. If you want to play longer, it'd probably work better to wrap up an episode and then just start a new one, so you can replenish the budget.

Matt Wilson wrote: If you only have one player - and that's a bummer - the trading producer thing is a good idea. I'd probably go with a communal budget, with each of you awarding fan mail from the pool as you would if you were another player, erring on the side of generosity.