Saturday 16 March 2013

Incholate noise, take 2

Print Friendly Version of this pagePrint Get a PDF version of this webpagePDF Imma in Wellington and making stuff , but felt like attempting to do a blog post. On this I pad thing that a friend owns. I am bamboozled by its "user friendly ness". I feel like a freaking ape tapping at the screen like this. Baaaaah. Anyway I am reading about ww2 and procastinating drawing a map of sigil and now I am thinking about what the hell I should post.


EDIT IT WENT WRONG AND NOW I AM USING A PROPER COMPUTER NOT ONE OF THOSE IPAD THINGS BAH

Coz I have been making extensive notes while couch hopping here in the capital. Big sprawling notes and lists and sundry. Things that I no doubt will go back and prune down to something more managable.
Not sure what I should post now that is interesting in stand alone fashion.

One of the tables has 6 different kinds of goats. And it's a sub table of a sub table of a sub table that started from thinking about skills.
Like having three or four options, the quickest one you don't bother with skills until you are trying to do something and it's something that would require training, and you go "oh yup I would know that" and that is one of skill choices. Which is how neoclassical geek revival does it.

The more time consuming option is you pick your skills in character generation with much care and blah blah.

The middle ground is you roll on this table and that gives your background profession and what skills you would know. Also can give you more or less equipment options. Hence the goats.

The cool thing about doing this is having  different percentile columns so that if you  an outsider you have far more chance of being a buffoon, beggar, or vagabond.
The other percentile colomns are for members of the hegemony, not trusted , and tolerated groups.

I found it hard thinking up higher class professions than the fringe elements. This makes sense I guess because they are dirty parasites and don't actually do anything.

It's also a fun piece of campaign building because you will get bored instantly by writing things like farmer or baker and then try and think of bizarre professions that will exist instead. Or you could do what Jez did and just come up with a totally sweet list of profession names and leave it up to the p.cs to decide what exactly a moon-slicker did.

So that's a thing anyway. But I want to solidify it more before I put anything up here.

The other thing i have been thinking about is dungeons and if I am suited to running them and if not, what is a good alternative.

The problem I have is pacing. Dungeons pacing is unpredictable, and this how it should be. They are not narratives, they are unknown environments, and the temperament of which is highly dependent on your current resources, luck, and planning.

THIS IS WHERE IT GOT EATEN BY MYSTERY

basically I don't have the patience  or the game drags on , and  I vague out , and find myself not switched on when I really should be and I feel bad for the players because now that they are where the danger/treasure is and I'm not giving it as much as I should.


So my idea for my own game prep:

BAIT:
 I write down a list of shiney things that might attract p.cs

ESCALATION:
I write down some of  the things that would make the situation explode

FALLOUT:
I write down some of consequences of these shenanigans

ANd also what happens if the p.cs do not interact with this at all.

EXAMPLE:
Bait:
Bandit bounty

Escalation:
<bandit tactics>
<bandit traps and scouts>
<other creatures in the woods and chance of being attracted to the fighting or bodies>



Fall Out:
Surviving bandits , where would they go for reinforcements? If anywhere? Is anyone sponsoring them? DOes their removal create the option for more bandits? More travellers? Will the p.cs get a sweeter job offer?

In the event of Apathy:
chance of interrupted supplies, bandits might strengthen position ,other mercenaries move into area to collect bounty.



7 comments:

  1. I've recently realized I'm not very good at running dungeons either. Instead I think my GM skills shine through event-based games. I don't really think of it as a narrative, but often times one naturally arises from play.

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    Replies
    1. I think "event-based" summarizes it nicely.

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  2. Is the weird break in the second to last sentence a cool deliberate error to make an ironic point or just an error. What does the dungeon suddenly get?

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  3. I'm shit at dungeons too! We should start a support group.

    I'm going to try the whole hog tomorrow, wandering monsters and light sources and hirelings and a megadungeon. Just because I've never really put all the pieces together like that before, and this is what the game was made for, right?

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    Replies
    1. I'm understanding I'm better at having "this one thing" to get all excited about , and dungeons you never know what is going to be the "one thing"

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    2. I think the real life/ g+ difference influences it strongly. I can't really explain why, just seems easier to have the more drawn out pacing in real life

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