Mastering the Game: Metaplots

 Hello and welcome back to Mastering The Game, where I prattle on about how to run RPGs and the like.

Today, I’d like to take a minute to talk about metaplots and how to include them in your games. If you’re not familiar, a “meta plot” is an overarching plot in a game or setting. If you’ve played any sort of video game, you’ve experienced a metaplot. Hell, even watching a movie, reading a book, or what have you, is just watching a plot play out. As you might imagine, a lot of people starting out running a game is probably going to try to include one and it usually goes bad those first few times. When people talk about “railroading” this is something they’re talking about, because the plot wasn’t done right. So, let’s talk about how to do it right.

City of the Spider Queen is a great example of an epic adventure

When thinking about a metaplot in your setting (be it one that you’ve created or a setting you’re running your game in), I want you to understand that your adventures are going to have rails in them. However, unlike a railroad, where you’re passively watching things roll by, you should think of it as a roller coaster. Sure, they both have rails in them, but one is an experience. One that people will seek out. I have good experiences with metaplots in games I enjoy. In fact, the three games/settings I have enjoyed the most in my time with RPGs have had metaplots and each one of them has handled it differently. My first love in RPGs, Deadlands, has a massive metaplot that spans three different games and two different planets. Recently, I’ve been getting into the Wasted West and the Way Out West (you’ll be seeing a review of that last one soon, if not already) and that means studying the metaplot the creators mapped out from the start. Not to get into too much detail, this plot is entirely unstoppable. You can’t stop it from happening, but no matter what game you play in the setting, your characters will be involved and WILL make a difference in what happens. Sure, sometimes they can’t stop what’s happening, but they are there and they are involved in the events. The prime example is the second part of the Devil’s Tower Trilogy, the Bloody Sunday event. Before this part of the adventure, the posse has been involved in a tense rescue of someone and then arrive too late to stop demons from invading the cathedral in the center of Lost Angels. And while they don’t get to stop the Big Bad Demon, they can fight the smaller ones and help save people as they flee. They feel like their actions have an effect on the world, even if it’s mostly a small one in the grand scheme of things. In the case of Hunter: The Reckoning, there’s a whole lot going on that the players and their characters have no idea about. However, Hunter isn’t about the metplot, it’s about small, Pyrrhic victories on the street level. And while they’re not going to stop things on the large scale, that isn’t what the game is about. And it isn’t how you should run the game. The characters aren’t Buffy the Vampire Slayer (although it does make for a good analogy) nor are they the Winchester brothers. The problem with something like Supernatural is that as the show went on, they had to fight larger and larger threats. While Buffy did the same, they were still in Sunnyvale and that makes a world of difference. The final metaplot I liked was in the original or older versions of the Forgotten Realms. While the modern incarnation of FR seems to have gone way off the original rails that were there, the old ones were great because you didn’t need to be port of the solutions to the problems. That’s what the novels were for. If you wanted to be a part of the Time of Troubles, there were official adventures for that. If you didn’t, you just let it play out in the background. The players could have epic adventures without causing massive, continent wide changes in the setting. And with all of that out of the way, let’s talk about the two best ways I’ve found with including a metaplot in games:

Number One: The players and characters are directly involved

For this one, I strongly suggest you have a session zero and you be up front about the metaplot and how they’re going to be involved. Let them know, in general terms, what kind of campaign you want to run and what sort of things the characters are going to be involved in. If you’re running a published metaplot, let the players know that yes, there will be rails in this game, but remind them that they’re in for a roller coaster and not a railroad. If the adventure needs a certain type of class or character, be up front that this is required and someone needs to play it. You have to have a player play this character, because otherwise, you’re going to end up just having conversations with yourself and the players WILL be on a railroad. Instead, make sure that this is a player’s role and that they’re comfortable with it. And make sure that everyone else gets a moment to shine, too. If you’re coming up with everything on your own, make sure that each player’s character has a place in the plot, either from the character they are playing or by the type of character they’re playing. Some plot points shouldn’t be tied to the priest in particular, but a priest in general, and then will grow in importance as the campaign continues. That way you can be okay if someone drops out or switches characters. You always have to prepare for that. In my opinion, this is the best way to run a metaplot. Everyone should be aware of what is going on and can work together to make it happen. The best metaplots can also be developed cooperatively, so don’t feel like you need to have it all mapped out. Maybe you’re thinking that the good king is under threat from his evil uncle and you want the evil uncle to win. You explain this to your players and one them really wants to be a spy for the evil uncle or has an idea about how to prevent this from happening, because they really don’t want the evil uncle to take over. So, you talk with everyone about it. Maybe you agree that the evil uncle won’t win in the end, or that you’re willing to leave it open ended, but now the uncle has a backup plan of causing a rebellion against the king instead and he’s at the head of it. Don’t feel like you have to give everything away but be open to change based on what the players want. If they don’t want the political intrigue, then focus more on the action on the plot. If they want the political intrigue and you don’t, there’s got to be a way to meet in the middle. Remember, roller coaster, not railroad!

 Number Two: The players aren’t involved in the plot at all

Maybe you’ve got a group of players that will make Sherman Bowties (they’re a real thing from Sherman’s March to the Sea, look them up) out of any attempt by a GM to have a set idea for an adventure. While I personally feel like these are idiots and assholes, I suppose there’s different strokes for different folks. Of course, it could also be that you started with a solid crew of six players and characters that were all set for the campaign, and then players have dropped out, new ones have joined, and there’s been so many character deaths or changes that there’s no one left who’s invested in the plot. In that case, it’s okay. You know why? Because now they’re not going to be there to stop the demon lord from opening the portal to the underworld, they’re just going to have to live with the consequences of that happening. Now that they have to fight for their lives everyday, you can circle around to making an effort to close the portal or just have a campaign about the dying light of humanity and freedom. In less extreme examples, the good king is replaced by his evil uncle and now the party has to deal with living under his thumb. They can become freedom fighters, or smugglers, or just leave for another kingdom and let things get worse there. In that last situation, you can have a lot of fun creating and expanding an evil empire in the background that will slowly take over the world. The players should be heroes, to some degree and in most games, so just keep letting things get worse and worse until they have no choice but to tackle the problem. The players and characters have agency, just like we do in the real world. We all have the ability to vote, but if you don’t (or you did and the other person lost) and someone terrible gets in office, now you can take other actions to stop the spread of evil. It’s up to you to figure out what that is… 

 Now, with all of that said, I want you to remember that every published adventure has a metaplot or narrative in them. From the lowest of killing rats in the basement to the epic heights of killing gods, every adventure you run or make up has a plot to it. There’s no such thing as an RPG without a plot. You can’t just make everything up on the spot (unless you’re really good or you’re just one of those people), so you need something to hold everything together. Don’t be afraid of making your roller coaster.

Mastering the Game: The Right Tool For the Right Job

 

The imagination makes it worse...

Welcome back to Mastering The Game, where I ramble about how to run RPGs and hopefully you get something useful out of it.

Today, I want to talk about something that’s come up in some conversations recently, both online and in meat space, talking about how every system isn’t the best for every game. What do I mean? Well, one example that someone gave was people trying to use D&D 5e for science fiction or some kind of space epic. The point isn’t that D&D can’t do it, it’s that it doesn’t do it as well as something that’s designed from the ground up to handle space stuff. Related to this topic was a discussion of how old games (think 70s and 80s) didn’t have everything mapped out in the rules, so people could come up with stuff to fill in the blanks, that it was expected that Game Masters and their groups would come up with the rules they needed to play the game. Now, while I disagree that game designers intentionally left things out, as I believe that most of those old games weren’t as well play tested or developed as modern games (which doesn’t mean that they should be compared on a one to one basis, modern game design has tons of tools they didn’t have back in the day), there is a point that players and GMs will try to do something with the system that the designers didn’t even think of.

So, let’s use the example that came up in another conversation with a friend. She likes horror movies and was looking for a system that would help her create the look and feel of a horror movie, having found a game on Kickstarter. I let her know that there was already a game with a similar name and premise, and we found that it was super cheap on DriveThruRPG, plus I had played it once before. While we were discussing horror gaming, I brought up some of the classics, like Call of Cthulhu, White Wolf games, AFMBE, Deadlands, and some others. I also mentioned that there are some universal systems that do have horror mechanics (GURPS and Savage Worlds are the ones I had the most experience with), they aren’t designed to be horror games. Just because a game has the mechanics for something doesn’t necessarily mean that those mechanics are the best for that thing. Another part of this discussion was that the simpler the mechanics, the worse they’re going to be to handle the thing you want. Now, I will admit that my statement there is a very general one and there are exceptions to it, however, we must also admit that it’s probably more right than it is wrong.

Perhaps horror isn’t the best genre to cover with a rules discussion, as the real thing that determines the effectiveness of horror is the atmosphere created by the GM and maintained by the players, but there’s enough there for it to run with. But let’s take a closer look at horror and the various things it includes, mechanically speaking. Horror, at its core, is about fear and dread. Now, there’s a lot to unpack there, and I’m sure some might disagree, but we really can’t argue that it is the intent of horror to invoke dread and/or fear. 

Yeah. Nope.

 Of the two, dread is something that needs to be cultivated by the GM, by using all the tricks in your book. Randomly rolling dice and making nonsense notes, asking “are you sure you want to do that?” or by asking a player where their character is looking during a quiet period are all simple things that you can do to make the players uncomfortable. Keeping them on edge is the goal of it. Keeping their characters low on health and ammo is another thing that will make them stressed. Another thing is to play creepy or unsettling music, or maybe watching a scary movie together in the same genre while making characters. You want to be subtle over overt when making players, and their characters, feel dread. However, it’s not something that can be easily done with rules mechanics or dice rolls. Dread is something ethereal and fleeting. It can’t be done well with something written in a book. And it can be easily ruined with one well timed joke. Not that you shouldn’t let the tension break now and again but it the class clown is acting up, it’s going to spoil the mood. One of the best things I’ve found to keep players on their toes is to keep them guessing as to what they’re up against. A lack of detail in description can go a long way to making them afraid and tense. Fleeting glances, things in the shadows, unusual sounds, and being unable to get a good look at what’s there are great ways to do this. Because their imagination will always make it more frightening than the words you can say, as they will bring their own fears, insecurities, and emotional baggage to the fore when they have to picture it in their heads.

Fear, on the other hand, can be handled (to a degree) with mechanics and rules. For the characters, that is. When someone is afraid, they’re usually not as sharp as they are when they’re calm. So, most horror games, or games that can handle horror, will have some kind of effects for characters when they’re afraid. Of course, making the players afraid will also make the characters afraid, but you can’t always count on that happening. Fear mechanics are really what is going to make or break a horror game system. They need to translate the human Fight/Flight/Freeze mindset that appears when something jumps out at you in the night. And this is where you can see how well the game will work for what you want to do. A flat penalty to rolls is one of the weaker things. To use an example, the classic Deadlands system has a very detailed fear table, based on how badly the character failed the roll, plus how scary the thing is in the first place. And while it does repeat a lot of things, mostly just by adding things to the results, it also gives some varied reactions. You can soil yourself, run away in a panic, or even have a heart attack and die, assuming the thing is scary enough. It doesn’t have to be totally realistic, especially if you’re dealing with the supernatural, but it does have to feel reasonable. Fear is something we all feel, to some degree or another, through out our lives and our reactions to it changes over time, with our experiences. That means that your fear mechanics should take this into account. That doesn’t just mean that you have a system that varies by age, but that the system should have ways for characters to react differently to fear. To go back to our example of Deadlands, there’s Edge you can take which says that you don’t run away if you get that results. You suffer every other effect, but you stand your ground. Which is the Fight part of the list above. And the system you use needs to have those variations inside it, if you want it to do a good job.

Fear is relative

 Now, let’s jump back to some examples of popular games. While I’m not very experienced with D&D 5e, I do know that the system is very simple and streamlined, meaning that fear effects are probably going to be something like giving a character Disadvantage when they’re afraid or something similar. I’m sure I’m wrong, and I bet that D&D expands the mechanics when fear is much more important (like in Ravenloft) or when they want to introduce a bunch or optional rules. And to draw back to a point I touched on earlier: you could come up with some house rules of your own, if you feel like it. As a brief aside, I find that having rules in the books to be better than stuff people come up with on their own, as it leads to less arguments and has a better chance of being balanced. For the other popular game I mentioned, Call of Cthulhu, that game is based around Things Man Was Not Meant To Know, which always includes some kind of insanity or madness. But not every horrible thing is going to make you crazy and it’s not going to be some random insanity rolled from a table. For example, in a D&D 3.5 game, the DM got a hold of the CoC 3.5 port and used it for some stuff. When my cleric ran up against some terrible thing, do you know what insanity he got? He was unable to see the color yellow. It made it into a joke. The fact that RPGs don’t have the best history with handling mental health issues is a big one that I might have to tackle another time. Moving on, the problem with CoC isn’t just that it skews towards insanity, but that it has a more modern, real world premise. CoC is set either in the modern day or last century, and requires a book (if there are any for the current edition) to be taken into space, as an example.

So, what do we do if we want something that can make the exact game we want? Well, there’s always options and you can always modify stuff. Let’s say we want to run a horror game, but in space or on a moon colony. There’s a few options. The easiest one is to pick a universal system that handles horror and just plug the books in and play it. You could use GURPS or Hero System, both of which have rules for fear and science fiction stuff, and go from there. Of course, you could also try to find a game that’s based around a science fiction horror franchise, like the Alien RPG and run it as is, or slightly modify it to match the game you want (just re-skin the Xenomorphs into some other monster and run with it). Or, you can take a system that does the horror well, and find or make up stuff for the science fiction part. A prime example for me would be AFMBE, which does have a science fiction source book. It might not be exactly what I want, but there’s enough there to get it off the ground. If you have some genre that you really like, slasher films as mentioned earlier, there’s going to be a game out there for you. At least one that I know of. If it doesn’t work for you, that’s a problem.

The path of most resistance is going to be taking a system you like, the one that has the basic rules that you know really well, and forcing it into something it’s not designed to do. You can look around and see if someone else has already done it, as we live in an age where you can find that information online without too much of a hassle, which I bet someone already has. Once you find that information, make sure it works for you. If it doesn’t, drop it or work on it so it does match what you’re looking for. I find it a hell of a lot easier to modify something than just pull a whole thing out of my ass. (You know what I mean.) The thing is that it’s way easier to add in rules for radiation and surviving in the vacuum of space to a game then it is to come up with a system that reflects real horror and the tropes of horror movies in a game. Let someone else do the hard work for you, rather than doing the hard work yourself.

The real point of the matter is that you need to find the system that works the best for the core of the game. That’s the most important part of the game, which is why I’m saying this again. If the system can’t do what you want it to do, try something else. Find a set of quick play rules, you’re usually free or very affordable, and see if you can find something that works for you. Don’t try to make something do something it wasn’t designed to do. If you can’t find something that does everything exactly as you want it to, then try working on changing something into what you need it to be. But, just remember, it’s easier to fudge the small stuff, not the big stuff. What you need is the system that matches more with what you want than what you don’t want. If you want to do a thrilling space epic, it’ll be easier for you to find something that was designed to do that, rather than forcing D&D to try to handle something it wasn’t designed to do. 

Also, kids are goddamn creepy...

 I understand that people get afraid of trying new things or learning new rules. I know that you want to stick with what you know. However, the problem with something like D&D is that the simplicity that made it easier for you to learn in the first place will hold you back when you want to do something that has the complexity of what you want to do now. Most people start with D&D for a reason but you don’t have to stay there. Especially these days. There’s so many different games out there, some that you might like even more than D&D, so you need to spread those wings. You can’t be afraid of a harder system. The thing is that, as you play the game more, the easier it becomes to play. You’ll get the rules more as time goes on.

Okay, almost started a tangent there. Ahem. My point is that you need to find the game you want to play, not make what you’re currently playing into what you want to play. I hope that makes sense. And I hope you got something out of this ramble.

Mastering The Game: Literally Everyone Else In The World

 

Welcome back to Mastering The Game, where the carefully crafted adventure you’ve planned is going to be destroyed by the players and only the XP matters!

This week, I want to take some time to help those of you who are just getting started with making memorable, or at least consistent, NPCs and other people in the game. Because you’re literally everyone else in the world besides the players (and you all win an internet nickel if you get the reference I’m making).

Let’s start off with the basics, everyone who has played a RPG more than once has noticed that NPCs tend to come in a few varieties: Important, Annoying, and Disposable. Also, many a DM has found that there’s another type of NPC: The One The Party Has Adopted OR Suddenly Wants To Hang Out With. If it hasn’t happened to you, trust me, it will.

Some parties or players tend to look at all NPCs as one type, usually “Disposable.” Sometimes, that’s because they’re terrorists or shit stirrers, and sometimes it’s because they’ve had a really bad GM that’s taught them to trust no one. Personally, I tend not to use the whole “they were the bad guy all along!” trope very much, if at all. It’s okay for NPCs to have secret motivations but having people lie to the party and manipulate them for stupid reasons is not my favor of fun. However, that also means that when I do it, it will shock the party to the core. That’s why you should use stuff sparingly, to make their suffering that much sweeter. Wait, did I say that out loud?

Ahem. Anyway. The reason why NPCs are sorted into these broad groups is because there’s a lot of people in the world (usually) and the DM has to pretend to be all of them. And not all of us are drama nerds or fast thinkers. So, we tend to make similar NPCs when we’re put on the spot and have to think quickly because the party just burned the map for the adventure and would rather fuck with some random guard or tavern keeper. When something like this happens, I just ask myself “what does this person want?” and try to act it out. For the most part, people want two things: To do what they want (or have to do) and be left alone. If you’re in one of my games and you run into a lot of surly characters, it’s because you’re chasing the wrong lead or are annoying me. They’re probably not part of some secret conspiracy or plotting to kill you (yet), you’re just pissing them off. 

 But, what happens when you have time to prepare or you need to keep the players guessing about someone’s motivations or importance? What can you do to make the random people (or maybe not so random people) stand out? Well, as I’m sure you’ve probably seen, many guides for the GM have random tables for personality traits. Which are great, for completely random people on the street, but might not work so well for someone in a specific job. The guy who has to talk to people probably wouldn’t have lasted long if he had a terrible stutter. And the woman who runs the brothel probably wouldn’t have risen to a position of power if she had a problem with hygiene. I mean, yeah, there’s always exceptions, but you don’t want them to stand out like a sore thumb. Cyberpunk 2020 has a Lifepath system to use for generating events for players (some other games have stuff like this, too) and they can easily be used for NPCs as well. And don’t be afraid to steal characters from other media and redress them for your game. If you want the party to kill a pirate right away, just have a “closely resemble but legally distinct” Captain Jack Sparrow pop up? I mean, who hasn’t wanted to punch that character in the face at least once?

If you’re looking for making original characters, the best thing to do is to start at where the character is now and work your way backwards. You might want to go back to their early life, compare it to where you want them to be, and work towards the middle. Let’s say I need a town marshal to be an asshole but not a monster. Why is he an asshole? Well, maybe he’s been doing the job for too long and just wants things to be peaceful but can’t let himself retire because there’s no one else “good enough” to take over for him. Why would he think that? Let’s say that from an early age, he liked things neat and orderly. As he got older, his family also instilled a sense of responsibility in him and his parents told him that he couldn’t leave a job half finished. So, how does he end up being the marshal? Maybe he was drawn to it. Maybe he just needed work but those things he was taught made him stick with it. Perhaps there was something that happened that forced him into the job, like someone putting his name out there and he was too honorable to decline. There’s a lot of different reasons you can find. Just start connecting the dots along the way. You also want to figure out what you need for the NPC, so you can figure out how much needs to be fleshed out. If this is just the local tavern keeper the party needs to rent rooms from, don’t take too much time on him, but have a good sense of who he is and why he does the job. If he’s a pain in the ass, how could be stay in business? Maybe he’s the only one in a tiny town. Or maybe the players have been kicked out of anywhere remotely nice (it’ll happen, even to the best of parties, because your enemies don’t care about your preference for turn down service). Or maybe there’s a convention in town and he’s the only one with rooms left open and the attitude change is something recent. There’s a hook for an adventure right there, one you can leave hanging open for another time. The more realistic your NPCs, the more human (relatively speaking, of course), the more likely the players are to pay attention and the less likely the NPC is to end up flayed by the party crazy (there’s always one, mark my words).

Feel free to base NPCs on minor (or even major) characters from fiction. When you hear someone describe your crazy uncle Irving as “a character,” take note. Because your party might like an encounter with your Uncle Irving, except he’s the head of posse of survivalist nutbags that survived the apocalypse and now roam around looking for the aliens that they believe started everything. Trust me, I’ve known people like that. The only good part about encountering them is making your party having to do the same, but turned up to 11. Or combine them with people you’d like to kill, but can’t, because it’s illegal, immoral, and not nice. Like, Alex Jones. Who wouldn’t want to kill a version of him to let off some steam? And now I have a new idea for a mayor of a post apocalyptic town…

Moving on. The trick is to use a method that works best for you. Having a list of names is helpful for giving random characters some depth, along with a list of traits or accents or whatever. Use this for quick characters. If you’re going to be using a character over and over (or at least plan on it), try to have all this worked out, as well as some notes about their background or history. The more important the NPC is, be sure to give them as much detail as you can. There’s a lot of programs you can use for keeping track of character details, usually for writers. However, not everyone needs details and can make everything up on the fly, just make sure you write stuff down, as the players will probably remember even if you don’t. As I mentioned in an earlier entry, you should have a notebook handy and this is when you want to use it.

Now, let’s talk about how to keep important NPCs alive and interacting with the party. This is where things get tricky. What I suggest you do is know your party. If you know they like a particular character in a movie or video game, base your important character on them, without being an exact copy. Give them traits the party seems to respond well to. If you have a group of hard nosed private detectives, give them a mentor that has a similar sense of humor and looks out for them. Use that NPC to give them hints or clues or even the start of adventures. They’ll look out for them, and if they really start to like them, you can then have them kidnapped by a villain and watch the party go through hell to get them back. The downside to this is that they will ALWAYS go to this person for help. And they might not be able to do that every time. The NPC might be on vacation, dealing with something else, could be sick, or, if they have to find their mentor, they might not know anything that can help them. If you’ve mapped out what your NPC can and can’t do, they should be easy to explain to them. To keep other NPCs alive, like the ones you’re just going to need for just this adventure, try to make it clear the consequences will be dire if they attack or kill them. If the NPC is the king or lord of the local area, they’re going to protected by magic and guards. Even if they’re willing to meet directly with the adventuring types, they’re still going to have guards with them and/or a magic user of some kind hanging around. If the party makes some kind of dangerous move, have the guards react. If the party does end up killing or attacking an important NPC, make their lives a living nightmare from that point on. If you’re in the Old West and the party decided to kill the mayor for no good reason, have the sheriff round up a posse to chase them down. Even after they flee the town, make wanted posters turn up after a while. Maybe some bounty hunters or Federal Marshals start tracking them down. Most reasonable parties will only do that once. And only once. Note, none of this applies to killing corrupt members of government when that was what you wanted them to do. Just to clarify.

 Well, that’s just about all I have to say on this topic today. There’s a lot more I could get into but that mostly applies to how to do this in different genres. If that appeals to you, let me know and I might just put my thoughts down.

Mastering The Game: Session Zero

 Welcome back to “Mastering The Game” where the rules are only guidelines, unless you say so.

Today, I want to talk about having a “Session Zero” when you start your game? What's a Session Zero? Well, that's kind of pre-game session, before it starts proper, and you sit down and discuss the game, the characters, and all that good stuff. Make sense?

Now, I'm going to be up front and say I don't usually do a session zero, as you might have seen me mention elsewhere. Why? There's a few reasons for that. When I start preparing for a game, I usually make some notes, figure out what kind of game I'm looking to run, be it a pre-made adventure/setting or something totally original, and think about who I want to play. You see, not every player wants to play every game. I know some people who can't handle horror and some who love it to death. That means I think about who I want to play. Once I've figured out what kind of game I'm going to play, and who's going to be in it, I can usually figure out what kinds of characters to expect. Knowing your players is important. After all of that is done, then I sit each player down, talk about the game and what kind of character they want to play, and build their character with them, one on one. I find that this works best.

But what if you don't know your players all that well? That's why some people do a Session Zero. Someone I know will have a meeting with everyone and have the same conversation I do, but in a group setting. He also plays a few different card and board games to see what kind of players they are and how they work together.

 

While I respect this way of doing things, it isn't for me. I prefer to do things on that one on one setting. It really helps me figure out what kind of player they are and what kind of character they want to make. I also think it helps for new or shy players feel comfortable with me and the game. Sometimes, players want to have secrets from the rest of the party, so this allows them to do that without having to worry about someone overhearing it.

One reason I don’t want to do a Session Zero is because, we already have everyone together, and once the characters are done, why don’t we just play? Some people are up for that but some aren’t. They just expected to roll up and make their characters, not ready to play yet. That happened in a game I was in and it went sideways fast. I’ve also had the reverse happen, where I was ready to play but no one else was because they put off making characters until the last minute so I spend hours twirling my thumbs. You really should make sure to communicate exactly what you’re expecting, if you are or aren’t doing a Session Zero.

So, if I don’t do a Session Zero, what do I do instead? I usually pick a canned/pre-made adventure to kick things off. In Deadlands, I’ve used Comin’ Around The Mountain with almost every group I’ve run because it’s a perfect introduction to the world and gives the Marshal and players plenty of room to get adjusted to the game. For D&D and the like, there’s several adventures you can use to introduce everyone. When I played Pathfinder for a couple of games, we started in prison. It gave us a reason to be together and let us get to know each other, without having to start in an inn or tavern. Now, there’s a reason why so many games start in a tavern: it’s a place where lots of different people, but especially adventurers, end up at some point or another. It also gives the DM a lot of NPCs to have running around that can interact with the characters. Just… Don’t try to find a dark corner for your character to brood in. If you’re doing it, for irony or not, your character will die in my game. By falling rocks. Guess the tavern owner needs someone to fix the roof.

What are some alternatives to starting the characters off instead of a tavern? A guild hall, one for adventurers if possible, is a great place to start. Even if the characters aren’t part of the guild, they could be looking for people to do something for them, like transporting or escorting something. There’s also being on the road and seeking shelter from a storm together. That’s a good one if you have veteran players, as they’ll get the introductions done for you. There’s also working on a caravan, which can work for a variety of settings. A train, as I mentioned for Deadlands, also works for urban horror or cyberpunk, as a lot of people take subways in cities. Having characters on vacation can be used in a lot of things, allowing for people from a lot of different places and classes to meet. I was once in a Slasher Flick game that was set on a cruise ship and it was perfect. Think about movies and comics and video games, and don’t be afraid to steal shamelessly, because you don’t have to be completely original, just original enough.

 

One other thing I tend to do, having run a lot of games, is skipping over the character introduction parts with experienced players. They’ve done it quite a few times, and usually have a good sense of their characters, so I don’t need to do it. They’re here to play the game and that means they’ll know to work together (as I tend to weed out terrorists pretty quickly) so I can let them move a little faster. In a Rifts game I was running on Discord, I had them be a group of mercs on their way to Mexico. To gloss over the introductions, I started them when they were arriving, having them know each other from the journey there. Quick and easy. And since they know what they’re doing, they were able to get into character and start playing them in short order. Of course, it was still herding cats, but that’s the job you signed up for when you took the job of being a DM or GM.

Of course, you have to consider the genre and setting of the game you’re playing, as well as the themes you’re using, when kicking things off. If you use a typical “you all meet in a tavern” set-up, it tells players that you’re probably going to be doing a “murder hobo” campaign. The first session, the first REAL session, is the most important for setting the tone of the game and it’s another reason why I don’t do a Session Zero. If you spend time during Session Zero setting up your theme and tone, while trying to herd all of the cats, it might get through to them. If you do what I do, get your rough game concept ready, then work on helping people make their characters fit, you can get right to the good stuff. Momentum is critical in the first few sessions, so having them take time to do all the introductions and all that can slow it down. I do, however, suggest setting aside some time at the start of the first session for introductions and screwing around. As the game continues, I have someone go over what we’ve been up to, and still give them that time to do some smoking and joking. 

So, yeah. There’s my thoughts on Session Zero. I could probably go on more about it but I’m starting to ramble. If you want me to talk more about it, let me know.

Mastering The Game: Character Balance VS Party Balance

Once again, we're talking about running RPGs and how to get started. Today, we're going to talk about party balance versus character balance.

 So, what's party balance and character balance? Glad you asked. What it really boils down to is focus. To start off, we're going to start with character balance.

What is character balance?

There's a few different definitions for this but, I subscribe to the philosophy that it's about making a well balanced characters. That means giving up on min/maxing. What's that? Sorry to keep throwing all of these terms at you, if you’ve never heard them before. Min/maxing is about making a character so powerful in ONE THING to the exclusion of all else. I've also seen Min/maxing called power gaming, but that might be a matter of opinion. When I think of power gaming, I think of people who aren’t coming up with a character so much as a bunch of numbers and stats that have been pushed to the limit just to get the most possible, usually with a focus around combat.

When you maximize one thing, it leaves you off balance or useless when things don't go your way. For example, most games have ranged combat and close combat. If you're maxed out on close combat, that usually means you're the worst in ranged combat. And then you have a battle when you get pinned down by long range weapons and can't do anything. Now, you're useless. You could be even worse than useless, by getting wounded and then someone has to move off the firing line to make sure you don't bleed out. You see what I mean?

Now, I'm not saying you can't good at one thing. You totally can, and should, have something your character is focused on. Ranged combat, melee combat, magic, healing, piloting, and the like, depending on the game. However, just because you're good at shooting doesn't mean that you have exclude all sorts of other stuff. Think of it like having a Major and several Minors in college/university. If you've read the Ferner Five stuff, you've seen that Dr. Penwood is, well, a doctor. But, he's also a fair gunman and knows a bit about the occult. However, he's terrible in a fist fight. Seriously. That does make sense for a refined Englishman to not be great at the fisticuffs. And he does make for a balanced character but his defects make sense for the character, and the setting, because it’s not just a matter of numbers.

The long and the short of it is don't make a character focused on one thing to the exclusion of everything else. Make a real character and have a reason for why they are and aren’t good at something.

We've all been there...

 What is party balance?

This is where it's a good idea to have a conversation with the group before everyone makes characters. Some people do “Session Zero” to do this, but I prefer to have one on one conversations with everyone instead (yes, a “Session Zero” article is on my list).

As I discussed above, you don't want to have a character focused on something too much. However, in a balanced party, everyone needs to have a focus or a role to play in the party. For example, if you're playing D&D, you have the classic line up of Healer, Tank, Caster, Rogue/skill monkey, with one of these doubling as the “Party Face.” And that pattern is there for a reason. You need to have a character who can take damage, someone who can heal damage, someone who can deal damage, and someone who can deal with traps. How you fill these roles is entirely up to the party. Your caster could be a wizard, warlock, or sorcerer. Your tank could be a barbarian, fighter, or paladin. And so on and so forth.

In a modern or sci-fi setting, you have to adjust that template up a little bit. Personally, I use the A-Team. You need your mechanic, your charismatic type, your pilot, and your shooter (or leader).

Of course neither of these examples are perfect. You need to have to have some other things. Your D&D party needs a “face” as well, as I mentioned. Your sci-fi team needs a “medic,” too. What usually happens is someone doubles up on a role or the skills/requirements are spread through out the party. Of course, if you have more players than the standard four, you can have everyone be focused on something and double up on important things, like healing and blasting.

When you're sitting down to look over your game, before you run it, take a look at the rules. If they spend a lot of time talking about magic, it's going to be a big part of it. If they spend a lot of time talking about healing, that means it's not quick and easy. If you're looking at a sci-fi game with space ships and lasers and loads of rules for surviving in the vacuum of space, you know you're going to need a pilot and a medic and someone who knows their way around a blaster. If they have any example characters, pay attention to them. Their example party is based around what the designers want the game to be about. However, you can skip to the parts of the game you, or your party, wants to be about. If they, or you, don't want to deal with piloting and ship to ship combat, don't force someone into the role. I'll talk more about this in my Session Zero article.

So, what is all this about? When you get into party balance, you want to make sure that each character has a place to shine and supports the rest of the party. The party needs to be able to handle each challenge that comes up. And that means it has to be balanced. In short, everyone needs to have that role to fill, so the party can survive and thrive.

Let's take the Ferner Five as an example of party balance:

Dr. Penwood was a healer (a very critical thing in that game) and had money. He was a good shot, because a lot of combat in Deadlands is shooting.
Dr. Heinrich was a real “skill monkey” with a load of skills relating to knowledge, science, and even artillery (which the player gripped about and we never did it to use it). He was also a decent shot and had some medical knowledge. He also had gobs of cash.
Deiter was a real gunman and could intimidate anything. While he didn't have much more going beyond that, he did a lot of the heavy lifting in gunfights, which was very important.
Ming was the close combat fighter, but even he had a few ranks in shooting shotguns. After leveling, he ended up being a bit of a ninja with some stealth. Even with the minimal character stuff he had, he always had something to do, even if it was carrying Penwood’s bags or being a bodyguard for Heinrich when the group split up.
Now, as great as this party was, they did have some gaps. No real Arcane Backgrounds (just Mad Scientist and Martial Artist, which don't really count in my book) and no Tracking skills. This is why, when I was going to start being a player, I made Nona “Cookie” Calhoon. She was a Huckster, a Shootist (magical gun stuff), and had ranks in Tracking and some social skills. It was about filling gaps. When I made Phil, I had him be a close combat monster because of a line in the Deadlands Player's Guide: “You don't bring a knife to a gun fight, but bringing a gun to a knife fight isn't much better.” Or something to that effect.

So, when you're getting ready to get a group together, look at what you need to make a balanced party. Look at any adventures you want to run, enemies you're going to set against the party, and etc. If you're seeing a lot of stuff that requires spells or is immune to physical damage, make sure that you let the party know what they might want.

Don't ever try to make a player make a character they don't want to play. If you have someone who wants to play D&D for the first time, and they're dead set on playing a Warlock, don't force them to play a cleric because you're short on the divine smack-down. Talk to them and explain to them what the group needs. If they still want to play the warlock, let them. Maybe talk with the rest of the party and see if anyone else is willing to take up the holy roller. If that doesn't work, change things. Switch monsters around, maybe give them more healing items, or create a DMPC cleric to keep everyone alive. You get ready to run a deep political thriller in Cyberpunk 2020 and everyone ends up making a Solo? Well, looks like you've got a perfect special forces team. Role-Playing is a cooperative game and you need to be able to adapt to what's going on. If the players want to play a game that you don't want to run, talk with them about it. However, I don't think that it's really going to happen.

And that, folks, is how you make a balanced party. At least in my opinion. What do you think?

Mastering The Game: Are Your Players Mushrooms?

Welcome to Mastering The Game, where I try to shed some light on issues related to running RPGs.

Today, I want to ask you: Are your players mushrooms? As in, do you keep them in the dark and feed them shit? Because you might be doing it.

To put it another way, how much do your players know about the world in which their characters live in?

I was thinking about my old Deadlands posse, the Ferner Five, and then started watching something about metagaming. I'll talk more about metagaming in another post, but there's one part about it I got to thinking about.

You see, when I was running it, only one player was really into the lore. I did give everyone an overview of the setting and then let them make their characters. While we were making their characters, we would talk more about the lore and how they fit into it. For example, while we were making Deiter, he ended up with Ugly As Sin from his Veteran O' The Weird West card draw. So, we talked about it. I gave him some ideas, a few monsters, and we worked out that the reason why he was so ugly was because he pulled a Prairie Tick out of his throat. That gave us some history to the character (having him in Kansas), showed just how much of a tough hombre he was (technically, he shouldn't have been able to do this), and helped both of us know more about the character. I did this with every character and each got at least one moment like this in their backstory.

However, as the game progressed, I found that I had to fill the players in more and more about the background of the game. What the City O' Gloom was like. How the Maze worked. I also made sure to have any maps laid out for all to see. And so on. I'd always brought the main information book for people to read, as well as loaning out the setting books for the locations they were traveling to or from. But, people never really read them. And, I have to be honest, it was a little disappointing. That said, even though I had to stop and explain things, they were still very much in character and wouldn't need me to tell them background twice.

 

But, there's another side to this. Back in the day, I tried to play Paranoia. And had a clone die after asking a rules question. Which is why I never played that version again and didn't even try for many, many years. I get that was part of the “fun” of the game, but that's not my kind of fun.

However, there seems to be that sort of thinking running around out there. That players shouldn't need to know basic information about the setting. I remember listening to an RPG horror story about these weird infectious goblins that weren't really goblins, but the characters didn't know they were infectious, and... Well, let's just say it was messy. The point was, if I'm from this world, shouldn't I know the basics about it? Why should players and/or characters be kept in the dark?

I don't understand this way of thinking. That said, I do understand that DMs and GMs might want to keep some things secret. Not only did I keep a lot of critters and monsters under my hat in my Deadlands game, I also kept some very important secrets about the major players in the setting. And I feel that's fair. It was a great reveal (for the one player that way paying attention) when I dropped Reverend Grimme's “Dark Secret.”

But, I never tried to hide basic information about the world. I actively encouraged it and do in every game. Sadly, most people who play games with me don't seem to care as much I do about “fluff” or setting information. Which I feel is a shame and, to be blunt, I will punish players for not knowing it. I spent a lot of time to come up with it and then had to print it out. If you don't care about the time I spent, I'm not going to be happy. I do try to cut them as much slack as I can, give them plenty of time to read everything and I'm always available to answer questions or provide summaries of stuff. I just get ticked off when people don't even try.

But, one thing I don't do is intentionally keep the characters ignorant. If a characters should know something, I tell them. If they might know something, I let them roll. For example, if a character in D&D is level 10, they've probably fought a lot of different monsters, so I'll tell the players what it is. Now, if it's something unique, I'm going to let them roll for it. And to keep them guessing, I'll describe the creature rather than telling them what it is. I find this is much more fun for everyone involved. You get the fun of listening to them make guesses and they get the enjoyment of coming across something they've never seen before.

What I don't do is keep them in the dark or lie to them about things. Let's say you're doing a game of D&D that involves a lot of undead. A foul necromancer has been attacking the kingdom for months and unleashed all kinds of undead against the area. While characters might not have encountered every monster out there, they would be familiar with the lower level ones. Zombies, skeletons, and the like they're going to be able to recognize right off the bat. Something much more threatening and still not unheard of, they're going to get a description and a chance to roll. Something like a Devourer. It's possible that someone fought one and told tales of it in a tavern or something. Okay, I'll allow it. But, let's say something is so new, mean, and nasty, that it's been able to kill everyone that's ever faced it. It's reasonable that the characters are going to have no idea what this thing is. So, just a description, and a very hard roll. I think that's fair. Some people might argue that it's not fair, but my game, my rules.

 

What I don't think is fair is when you keep something hidden from the players that their characters would know. Let's take our undead example. The characters have been fighting these things for months. Suddenly, their in a fight and the zombie bites someone. In this world, the bite is infectious, like in our zombie films. But, since the players weren't told, they're probably not going to be worried about the bite. Until they have to make rolls or their friend turns. If the DM says something like “Well, I thought your characters wouldn't know because these are different zombies.” Unless this is the very first encounter with them, they would know. Don't do this. Seriously. This is bullshit. It's been months. They know.

This sort of thing is bad. Why? Because it breaks the trust between the GM and the players. And that trust is important. Mistakes happen and there's an easy way to deal with it: Apologize and make sure that if you make a mistake again, they can call you on it. We're only human and we'll never improve as people, much less GMs, without some help.

You don't want to punish players or make the game much harder than it should be just to get your rocks off. No one else is going to find that fun. If you're a player and you run across a GM like this, walk away. No D&D is better than bad D&D (or World of Darkness, FATE, or whatever you kids play these days). The game should be enjoyable for everyone at the table, GMs included. If this is your style of fun, it sounds like you might have some problems. If you want to run a game like this, be up front and don't piss and moan when no one wants to play with you.

Let's talk about what information you NEED to give out. You might be thinking “well, what do I do when a character fails a roll when they're looking for information?” That's a tough one. I usually try to make the roll for the character behind the screen, that way they don't know if they failed or not. And I don't lie about it. One thing I do for rolling for things like checking for traps is to have them make a series of rolls for each section of the corridor they're checking. That way they don't know if the area they're checking has a trap or not and they won't know until they hit that area. It can create a bit of tension as they're not sure what is going to happen. Maybe they got lucky and the natural 1 they rolled was for an area that has no traps. Or it might be a TPK trap that they just triggered. You roll the dice and take your chances...

But, what about information rolls? This is where you want to roll behind a screen, as that limits the chance for metagaming. They only know what the character knows, right or wrong. And this is where you need to make sure that you have a good poker face and can provide good descriptions. They need to believe what you're saying. You're not lying, you're telling them what their characters know. And that's not being unfair or deceitful. There's always a difference between character knowledge and player knowledge. Make sure the players remember that. Because, I don't know about you, but I'm not an expert martial artist. Doesn't mean I can't play one in a game.

That said, there's some other stuff you can tell players freely. I generally assume that if it's in the player's part of a book, or otherwise common knowledge for your setting, they don't have to roll for it. It's like things are today. You might not know a whole lot about the Electoral College in the USA but you know it exists and that it's part of our elections. If you want to know more, you can look it up. And so can characters. You should reserve rolls for things like detailed knowledge that they have to remember on the fly. Think about being on a trivia show and having to remember how many votes in the Electoral College are need to win the White House. I challenge you to do that right now without looking it up. That's what you save rolls for. Either trying to remember or looking it up or asking around for information. It's not for basic information that anyone would know, information that's old or lost or hidden. If there's any sort of disagreement about it, roll off.

As I mentioned above, I'm willing to answer questions about the world freely and I try to make sure my players know that. If it's going to slow down game play, I try to have everyone take a break (unless it's something everyone else needs to know RIGHT NOW) and I'll fill the player in.

(Note: As I was editing this, I watched a video from the DM of the Oxventurers Guild, Johnny, and he said something very important “If you don't want them to fail, don't make them roll for it.” And I think that's a very important thing to think about.)

 

At the end of the day, it's about making sure everyone is having fun. Most players I know don't like being kept in the dark and being fed shit. I don't you do, either. So, don't do it. D&D and other RPGs are cooperative. They're about having fun. It is not a “you against them” type game, usually. Don't be an asshole. You don't have to give away the deep, dark secrets of your settings and games because of lucky rolls and you don't have to make everything a challenge. If you honestly don't know what you need to tell your players, get opinions. Notice the “S” there. I will say that I have the opposite problem of what I've been talking about today, I give away too much information sometimes. I can also accidentally forget to mention critical information. Mistakes happen.

Well, this has gone on long enough. If you want me to explore more about making your own game worlds, let me know.

Until next time!

Mastering The Game: Making your own adventures

And we're back here at “Mastering The Game.” Today's topic is how to make your own adventures.

So, I've already talked about how to run prepared, or “canned,” adventures, and I mentioned that you can use prepared adventures to make your own. So, we're going to start with that.

Let's take an adventure for an example. Some time ago, a friend discovered a treasure trove of used gaming books for super cheap (we're talking $1 a paperback book) and clued me in. I found two supplements for a game called Dark Conspiracy, but not the core books. That's fine. One was an adventure called “Heart of Darkness.” You can't see my face, but it's currently covered by my palm and my eyes are rolling. That name has been over used. It's done. No more, please. (Note: A full rundown of this book will eventually pop up in Sources Say in the future.)

Ahem. Anyway. So, I don't have the books, but the module itself looks promising. I read the whole thing, cover to cover, twice and looked at how the story goes. It looks good and I like it, so this is a solid choice. Now, first I have to figure out what I'm going to use it for. The game seemed to be about aliens and stuff, but with a strong element of horror. There's psychic powers and magic, maybe? Plus, horrible monsters from other dimensions. Looking at that, I'm going to choose Conspiracy X for this one.

Now that I know what I'm going to use, I start changing the monster stats to the new system. I look at what it's suppose to do in the original game and then try to replicate it in Conspiracy X. Not too hard. And if I can't get close, I just change it to something else I think works. For the background, everything looks pretty good. I might need to make some changes here and there, mostly having to do with the change in setting, and make my notes about what's different. After that, we have to deal with the set up. In the original game, it looks like the characters would have been hired by some corporation to solve the mystery, so that doesn't work for Conspiracy X. Instead, we'll make it a mission from the higher ups and give them roughly the same information. The adventure did give the players a device that would allow them to get more info on things, which I don't have to change. There are some setting issues that I'll have to change (the book was done around the original Gulf War in Iraq and things were different then), so more notes there. The encounters should go the same, but can't forget to make the NPCs in the new system, too. And that's about all I need to do. Recreate the monsters and NPCs in the new system, make sure the setting stuff all matches the new one, and make sure everything is consistent. Not too hard, but I do have some experience. I think this is a good stepping stone to designing your own completely new adventures.

 

 

But, you say you're ready, you want to start completely fresh and make a whole new adventure, without using anything that's been put out. Alright, buckle up, this might take a while.

The first thing you need to do is come up with what's going on. Let's say you're playing D&D and you want to do something involving a haunted forest in the lands of a lord the players like. Maybe the lord is from an adventure you just ran and the players liked him a lot. Okay, great, we'll roll with this.

So we've got an outline of the situation. Local lord has a forest in his domain that's being called “haunted.” That means that people go in, but don't come out. This isn't a bad idea, to be honest, lot's of different ways you can take this. So, it's a solid choice.

The next thing we have to figure out is how long this has been going on. Maybe there's always been legends of a ghost or something in the woods, but it's been safe for a long, long time. Our first question is what's changed? That means we have to come up with the threat. You'll want to dig through your monster books and look at what offers a matched threat that the party can handle. For the sake of this adventure, I'm going to pick Drow. Probably because I'm a fan of dark elves, but also because I'm still wanting to run City of the Spider Queen. Okay, got my threat, but why are they here? We'll say that it's because the Drow were able to break a seal that had been put in place ages ago by some elves, keeping the Drow from getting out. With the seal broken, the Drow have begun to investigate the area. Since they're masters of ambushes and use a sleeping poison, they'd be a serious threat at night. That's why people are disappearing. They're being killed or kidnapped and taken as slaves into the Underdark.

Now, we have to figure out what the lord has been doing. After people vanished, he would probably send out some knights or something to investigate the vanishings. We'll assume he actually gives a damn about his people, so he does the right thing. Of course, the knights are outclassed and vanish as well. So he sends some more. None return. Maybe he sent out some lower level adventurers, who also never returned. Ever since, the people have been avoiding the area as much as they can. But, maybe they still need firewood, so while disappearances have slowed, they haven't stopped completely. We'll also say that some people who have gotten to close to the forest have also vanished. Now, we've got a good idea of the Who and the What, as well as the Why.

Now, we need to tackle the most important part of getting the party involved in the situation, the party's motivation. Most parties, even the more noble, are usually motivated by money. You'll have to figure out how much the lord CAN pay and how much he's WILLING to pay. There's always someone who wants to negotiate for more money, so make a note of how far the lord is willing to shell out. Hopefully, if you reach the cap, the others will force him to accept the offer. Don't be afraid to metagame a little bit. As for how the party hears about the situation, you can have the lord reach out to them directly if they're on good terms. Otherwise, the lord can offer a reward that the part can hear about in the tavern, the church, or other places they hang out. If you have a more... Murderhobo party, maybe they get tossed in jail and only get released if they agree to clear out the woods.

Once we have the motivation and reward done, we have to go back to our threat. First thing is making sure you have some facts and rumors characters can pick up before they leave. Come up with the original legend of the forest, which could be totally unrelated to the current threat. I'm a big fan of throwing out a red herring or two to keep the party off balance. And you don't want to reveal the real threat quite yet. But, give them some hints so they're not caught completely off guard.

Now, we have to come up with what the Drow have been up to. We have a rough idea of what they're doing, but let's dig a bit deeper. Who's in charge of this expedition? Given how Drow society works, there's a strong chance a female cleric in charge of everything. What's she like? Is this a chance for her to gain power and standing back home? Or is this a punishment for something and she's trying to make the best of a bad situation? Is she competent? Or is she an idiot who doesn't really care about this mission? Once you have your Big Bad Evil Girl (BBEG) worked out, you can work on the underlings, the trusted mages, scouts, and the like. You'll want to know how strong the force is wandering around the woods. What their main goal is. Based on what we have, I'm going to assume that the Priestess is competent and looking to make this into her little kingdom, controlling the flow of surface race slaves and goods. She's not stupid, but doesn't know too much about the surface world. Thanks to the element of surprise, and a fair amount of luck, no one has survived to tell everyone what's going on. As for her forces, she's got a few wizards to give her some power and a lot of rangers and fighters to do the dirty work. Of course, one of the wizards belongs to a rival house and might be willing to do something to cause the priestess to fall out of favor back home. This is what I call “leaving an out” should the party be captured. The wizard will free them, on the condition that they mess up the priestess.

The major threats will be the groups of Drow wandering the woods, who will stalk the party until they're ready to ambush them. But, that's not all there should be. In addition to the increase in spiders that should be stumbled across (damn those spider kissers), you'll want to come up with a few other threats that make sense for the area. Not only to throw the party off the trail of what's really going on, but it's really important to have a variety of threats, so the party doesn't get bored. Or something to throw at them so they don't get overconfident. Maybe some undead created by the Drow, or just by their acts of murder. A few wild beasts, like dire animals. Maybe they have some druids or rangers that can prevent a fight or maybe not. Remember, variety is the spice of life.

We've got the basics worked out. The hook, the background, and probably a lot of encounters ready to go. So, what else do we need? Of course we're going to need some maps. Those are important. I'd also suggest rolling for the treasure and rewards now, while you'll putting together the encounters, so things don't slow down after the fights. You'll want to work on tactics for the enemies, make notes so you know how they're going to fight. Drow aren't stupid and will probably start to withdraw as they start to lose. After we've got all that, make sure to work on that priestess and who's usually in her camp. I strongly suggest making notes on the camp being Prepared and Unprepared for a fight. Trust me, it'll save you time when the dice start rolling.

It's time for a final part you need to plan for: What to do after the players win. Does the priestess seal the opening, so the party can't invade the Underdark? Or is she unable to do so, leaving it open? You'll want some idea of that could happen next. Of course, even if you leave it open, the players might decide that they'd rather just seal it again and stay the hell out of the Underdark. If they do this, give them a cookie, because only fools go down there. If they do decide to go down into the land of dark and murder, you'll want to have a few notes ready to get started. After you know you're going down there, best to break out those books and look up what sorts of threats you can throw at them. I strongly suggest Mind Flayers. Those give people nightmares. And, besides, they did ask for it...

Now, let's say you're playing something else, maybe something modern or futuristic, where you can't just do a dungeon crawl. So, what do you do? There's a few options. You can do investigations, which is what a lot of horror games do. I could probably write up a whole other article about running those kind of adventures, but the best thing is to make sure there's multiple ways to figure out the answer.

That's the most important thing you have to keep in mind when designing your own adventures: Make sure you have multiple paths to find the end. While you want to plan for every possibility, don't. That way leads to madness. And the adventure never getting finished. What I do is figure out what my players are most likely to do, having played with them in a few adventures first, and then make some notes about some other things they could do. Since you can't plan for everything, look at the most likely and go from there. They not to prevent the players from doing anything, just know what they might do and give them some clues or hints based on what they do. For example, if you have someone who can read minds, make sure that the killer doesn't get close to them or is able to deflect the mind reading. Don't make it too obvious, like completely blocking it, but instead they get a hint that something is wrong, but they don't find out the truth right away.

Also, outside of dungeons and ruins, you'll really need to figure out the enemy's motivations and plans. And what they'll do to react when those plans go awry. Remember that most villains should be smart and you should play them that way. Have Plan A, Plan B, Plan C, and all the way to Plan O. Don't go all the way to Plan Z, that's going to take too damn long. Make sure you know what they want and what they're willing to do to get it. And what they'll do when they don't get it.

Another option for modern and futuristic games is the social interaction. This is good for letting players roleplay and gives you a break from having to memorize the game's combat rules. While these are usually part of investigations, you can also use them to build a much needed alliance. Or maybe you need to get that information that you've gathered into the right ears. Most games also have rules for social interaction, or even social combat, and it's always fun to try something new. Don't be afraid to throw these in to any sort of settings.

One thing I haven't tried too much is the heist game. But, I do have some adventures that focus on pulling off one of them. I have very mixed feelings about this sort of adventure, because these sorts of things can go sideways fast. When I played video games, I always hated stealth missions, that might have something to do with it... But, I seem to always have a group that seems to think that “subtlety” happens to other people. Running a heist is a lot like running a dungeon, you need detailed maps, a list of threats and where they are, and how the the players could circumvent things. The difference between the two is that when you're pulling a heist, you don't want to fight everything. In fact, if you are fighting everything, you've probably already failed. That's what makes heists so hard, what do you do when the party has fumbled so bad and now they're debating about blowing up the building to cover their tracts? All I can say is good luck!

When you get down to it, making your own adventures is both freeing and daunting. When you run a premade adventure, you can just use it as an outline if you want to. When you're making it up from scratch, you have to think a lot more about how things could go. And don't just make it up as you go along. I've only known one person that can do that. Most of us can't. It's okay if you have an outline and a list of things they could encounter, but don't just make it up. Only if you get seriously off track should you need to do this. I usually keep a note of the average stats for a normal person handy, as well as common weapons and equipment, just in case. The players decide to start a fight in the tavern rather than talk to the bartender? Okay, we can roll with it. It might not be as cool or go as smoothly as if you'd done all the work on everyone inside the tavern, but if you do it right, they'll never know...

 

Okay, this has gone on way longer than I was planning, so I'm just going to end it here. If you want me to talk more about making your own adventures, let me know and I'll come back to this one.

Mastering The Game: Gatekeeping and your game

NOTE: I wrote this a while back and wasn't sure if I should post it or not. Given the events of the last few weeks, I thought it was even more relevant. So, here we go...

Today, I'm going to go on a bit of a rant. I apologize in advance.

Lately, I've been watching some videos about gatekeeping in table top gaming. And I'm a little bit angry. Okay, more than a little bit angry. But, I'm going to tell you about my gaming experience through the years before I get to the topic at hand.

When I first started gaming, way back in the mid-90's in middle school, I played with a bunch of white guys. Now, part of that is because I'm from the whitest city. No joke. Of course, that's because of racism in the past. Something that I have no control over. As I grew older, I came to understand that and I understood what it was and what it meant. There was institutionalized racism in the city. Make no mistake about that. There's no getting around that and that shaped my world view when I was younger, but I've tried to understand that's not right and to be better than those who came before me.

Ahem. Back to my point. I was a nerd in school. I was one of those fat, white kids. I even had braces and glasses. Thankfully, I didn't have bad acne. Just imagine being that in school in the 90's. It wasn't fun. I've got stories that would curl your toes. So, for me, RPGs were kind of a safe haven. I could be strong and powerful, I could save the day, I could get the girl and live happily ever after. It was a place to escape the harshness of my reality. And, for many of the people I gamed with, they were in the same boat. We were nerds. We were outcasts. We were the people that nobody liked. Hell, I didn't even like some of them and they felt the same way about me.

When I entered high school, which was a much different environment than middle school, and probably saved my life, I linked up with a new group of nerds. We had fun and played games. And we weren't total social outcasts. In fact, our group started to grow over the years. The more interesting thing was that we weren't all dudes. Sure, we were mostly dudes, but we had some girls in our group, too. The big game, which I didn't join until the last year or two of high school, was run by one of our teachers. When I started, we had only a few of us who played, maybe five total. As the group started to expand (I think we had a dozen players by the end), we ended up with a fair share of female players. I want to say that a third of the group was female. Some of those were girlfriends of players. But, and my memory might be rose tinted, we didn't make a big deal out of it. They were part of the group. They might have been teased a bit for not knowing the rules at first, but I don't think it was because they were female. It was something all newbies had to deal with. I do admit that at that time, I did have a bit of a problem with girl gamers. Because I was bitter and angry and not in the right place mentally. However, I did know these girls and had to take a step back. I realized that I was wrong and corrected my behavior. I was by no means perfect, but I did change.

After high school, some of us kept playing as that DM went back to school had had some life changes. Our group was the DM and six players. Two of which were female. One I had known since high school and another I didn't know too well. I believe the her and her boyfriend were coworkers of the DM. Anyway, it wasn't that big of a deal that we had ladies in the group. They played and we all had fun. I do have to say that one of them (who was a friend for many years) was, for several years, wasn't that good at the game and only really played one character. But, she had a chance to grow and develop, and became a solid player. And you know what? We all started out like that. I had a type for many years (usually an anti-hero) that I would play in every game. And most of the people I started playing with had their own character they would play, just with a different face. It's how most people start out, doing the one thing they know or seem to enjoy the most.

Which brings me to my point today: Gatekeeping (don't ask me why, I just needed to get to the topic at hand). Don't bullshit yourself, it does exist. It might not exist in your game, with your group, but it does exist. I've seen it. Anything that's insular or not popular develops a “group think” and tends towards the homogeneous. For many nerds of my vintage, and older, we were told we were going to hell, we were bullied, we weren't allowed in polite society. So, we retreated to our little worlds. Not just role playing games, but video games, card games, and miniature games (to name just gaming things) became our fortresses. These were we found safety and comfort. Where we could have fun and live out our fantasies. And, when you're an “Other” it's easy to be turned against “Others” that aren't you. Toxic masculinity develops because when you can't get a date, it's easier to blame the girls rather than looking at your own faults. Plus, you can't avoid the culture you're living in, even if you're not truly part of it, so you manifest it in different ways. You might not be a six foot tall blonde, blue eyed barbarian, but you can play one in a game. I could go on, but I'll spare you.

I can understand, for some younger gamer that might be stumbling across this, they might not be able to relate. The world has changed over the last 30 years. Nerds are popular and big money (these two things are linked, in case you didn't notice) these days. Nerd things, once the haven of straight white male outcasts, is now very popular with people of every race, religion, color, nation, sexuality, gender, and so on. There are groups composed of all different folks, no matter where you go.

And there's going to be people who can't accept that. There's things that go around about how “girls weren't interest in D&D until it became popular, fucking hipster bitches.” Yeah, I've seen that. And I can understand why people say that. I don't agree with it, but I do understand it. There's a difference. When I see that or hear someone say it, I respond with something like “Are you sure? Did you ever ask the girls if they wanted to play?” And there's usually silence in response. I think many people would have played D&D and the like had they been offered the chance. And, thanks to the massive upswing in popularity of RPGs, they now feel like they have the chance.

How does this relate to running the game? Simple: If someone asks if they can play, don't disqualify them just because they're female. Or non-white. Or look like the guys who used to beat you up in high school. Now, I'm not saying that you have to let anyone and everyone join your game. Ask them questions, get a feel for them as a person. If they're totally new to RPGs, let them in if you're up for that. Personally, I can't play in games with newbies. I end up stomping all over them, verbally, and trying to take charge. Because I know what I'm doing. And that isn't fair to them, so I don't play with newbies. However, as a DM or GM, I'm much more forgiving. I can help them with stuff without being overbearing. I can sometimes jump in and be like “I don't think that's a good idea because...” And the dynamic is different. As a player, you're there for YOUR fun. When you're running the game, you're there for EVERYONE'S fun, not just your own. Does that make sense?

I don't say no to people who don't look like me. I've played with, and run games for, a whole bunch of different people over the years. Men, women, gay, straight, bi, white, brown, whatever. It doesn't make a difference to me. And it shouldn't matter to you, either. If role playing is important and fun for you, you should do your best to share that experience with others, especially those who haven't had the chance before. Don't call people “normies.” Just stop that shit. People are people. Players are players. New, old, long in the tooth, it shouldn't matter. If your players are saying stuff because someone is different, you shut that shit down hard and fast. If your players don't want to play with newbies, ask them to give them a chance. Don't let your older, more experienced players rag on the new ones. Try to get them to help them along. Nicely.

Pretty much, I don't care who you love, what you look like, what your sex is nor what your gender is, or who or what you worship. I just want to have a good time. If what I think is a good time and what you think a good time is, then you're welcome to join my table. It's that simple.