Why Saying Yes is the Secret to Great Games Mastery

Possibly the hardest lesson for a new Games Master to learn is how to say Yes.

The temptation to keep your players on the path of destiny you have spent many hours writing for them is very strong but belies a fundamental failing in your thinking.  RPGs are not books, they are not linear plotlines where you control every aspect of the story.  

Remember that RPGs are collaborative stories where the agency and actions of players help to create the storyline.  Once you say No to a player, once you remove player choice you remove player engagement and the fun goes out of the window.  This is commonly referred to as Railroading and will lead to far bigger problems further down the track.

The GM must always consider what the essential elements of your overarching plot are and ensure that you spend all your energy preparing multiple ways that the players might achieve them.

Essential elements of plots

I have written previously that my favourite way of writing plots is by using Nodal Design.  This approach is most commonly found in the Choose Your Own Adventure gamebooks such as Fighting Fantasy or the Tunnels & Trolls solo games made popular in the 80s.

My approach is to break a plot line down into a series of encounters.  The most important of these are going to be the Must Happen encounters.  These are the events that have to happen to further the plot and the ones which you should spend the most time considering all the possible eventualities.  

You should always consider that: 

• the players might fight their way in and out of an encounter even against impossible odds.
• the players may run away
• the players may never find this encounter in the first place.

The rule of three

When considering these Must Happen encounters you should always have at least 3 ways that players can find or enter the encounter and 3 ways that they can exit it whilst furthering the plot.

Finding the encounter in Nodal Design is easy.  You just have to make sure that there are 3 connections to the encounter from three other encounters.  

Exiting the encounter is a little bit harder but not impossible.  In a typical conflict encounter there are the usual outcomes:

1. PCs win the fight - this is your everything goes according to plan exit
   
2. PCs lose and get captured 
3. PCs lose and escape or run away 
4. PCs stealthily go around or avoid the encounter

However, if the PCs need to acquire some object or information then outcomes 2,3 and 4 are going to pose you with a problem.  Careful consideration of the potential outcomes of your Must Happen encounter will lead you to preparing plausible solutions.

PCs lose and get captured

Getting captured can often be a blessing in disguise as the PCs might be taken inside the enemy stronghold.  Here they will learn much more about their enemies strengths and weaknesses, the location of the big bad guy, location of an uber artifact or they might meet other prisoners who can join them in their quest or help them escape.

You also get the additional free bonus breakout encounter which are always fun and stressfull for PCs.

PCs lose and escape or run away 

This outcome presents the greatest challenge in that they may not learn or aquire what they need to progress.  This is where the rule of 3 comes in.  For something to be an essential Must Happen there must be at least 3 ways of achieving it.  If it's information the players are after then this can be heard during scouting or in combat.  If it's an object then it might get lost by the enemy or found by the players during the confusion of melee.  Perhaps it gets dropped into the river and the players find it later whilst licking their wounds.

PCs stealthily go around or avoid the encounter 

Whilst this sounds like a worse case scenario from an encounter preparation perspective, it is often the easiest to compensate for in the planning stage.  Whilst going around the encounter they might overhear the vital piece of info they need, they might see or find the item they need unguarded.  

Evil minions tend to be left out out of the loop on the overarching plot, they get told the bare minimum to get by.  Guard that door, go get that box rather than what's behind the door or what's in the box.  Use this to your advantage and convey some info which is meaningless to minions but useful to your PCs.

Insurmountable odds and revealling the big bad guy too early

One of the fatal mistakes I have seen new GMs make is to introduce an encounter with the Big Bad Guy too early.  Big Bad Guys are usually way too powerful for the PCs to handle early on in the game and a critical element of RPGs is that PCs need to gain experience and become more powerful in order to defeat the Big Bad Guy.  

Pitching your heroes into a battle with the Big Bad Guy too early risks them getting killed or worse that they might damage your Big Bad Guy.  The temptation to say "No you can't do that" is great and leaves you needing to construct a plausible explanation as to why the PCs wouldn't be slaughtered in an instant.  This is just poor storytelling from an RPG standpoint and means you have unnecessarily backed yourself into a corner.  Time to look at other ways to let your players know about the Big Bad without them confronting him early on.

The third party reveal

In other types of fiction the power of the Big Bad Guy is often witnessed by third parties who get killed early on and their only role in life is to illustrate that power.  For example a Big Bad Guy might attack a village or sack a town and in a film or a book you might witness this encounter from the eyes of an NPC.  

The fate of the NPC is irrelevant as the object of the scene is to convey this information to you the viewer.  However, in RPGs it is more than acceptable for that NPC to live just long enough to share what they saw to the players before they die.  

Rumours are another great way to seed knowledge of some power sweeping across the land.  The PCs may encounter refugees fleeing a besieged city, a trader who just got through a checkpoint or left a neighbouring town before the horde arrived.

How you achieve the reveal is entirely down to you but my advice is to dribble the information out a little bit at a time.  Give your PCs enough time to grow as a party and as individual characters so that they are ready to face off against the big bad guy in the finale.   

Don't forget the backstory

The PCs might also have acquired first hand knowledge of the Big Bad Guy through their backstory.  For example in the classic fantasy movie Conan The Barbarian (1982), the young Conan witnesses his tribe slaughtered and he is enslaved by the forces of Thulsa Doom.  It is only many years later once he has gained his freedom and become a mighty warrior that he faces off against the evil sorceror and avenges his family.

PCs need time to become a thorn in the big bad guy's side

A common trope among big bad guys is that they often overestimate their own power and underestimate their foe.  Many of the best fictional showdowns come after a long protracted series of small skirmishes and defeats for the big bad guy until he really does have to deal with the threat personally.  How many times have you heard them say...

"Do I have to do everything myself?"

Take Darth Vader for example, in Star Wars.  He takes charge and jumps in his TIE Fighter to personally see off the threat of the X-Wing attack on the Death Star.  Perhaps he senses the presence of Luke or perhaps he recognises that although the chance of success is remote in the face of overwhelming odds, the chance still exists.

Flipping this encounter on its head, the Death Star exploding is a Must Happen event and only a bad storyteller would have the bad guy he has spent the last hour and a half setting up die.  That happens to Snoke in Star Wars: The Last Jedi and we all know what we think of that movie.

Embrace Player Agency

One of the most frustrating but fun things in RPGs is that players often come up with creative solutions to the problems that you set them.  This is a fundamental aspect of RPGs and will necessitate that you change and modify your story to accomodate the players.  

Embrace this.  Learn to be fluid and to react to your players.  Be the Leaf on the Wind.  Let go and enjoy the unbridled chaos...

The Encounter Ramp Goes Both Ways

The Encounter Ramp is a concept from scenario design which tries to match your parties experience with the strength of the monsters they are facing.  In D&D this is often referred to as the Challenge Rating.  As PCs gain more experience and become more powerful the strength of their opponents must increase to maintain the feeling of challenge.

Sometimes the stars align but more often than not they are never in the right bloody place at the right bloody time.  As a GM it is your job to make the adventure a heroic challenge.

I thought I had unwittingly led my players into an encounter that was going to result in a Total Party Kill (TPK) and an early bath for the GM. In my current campaign the party is relatively low level comprising of  

• 3 x Level 1, 
• 1 x Level 2, 
• 1 x Level 3 and 
• 1 x Level 4 PC

That's a total of 12 levels of experience between them but the scenario is designed for 5 to 8 Characters of Levels 7 to 9 (between 45 and 56 Levels). 

OK, I admit it, I fell in love with the scenario and didn't really worry too much about how the PCs were going to fare. I mean it's never supposed to be easy right?

To cut a long story short, their first big battle finds them fighting some pretty big guys, a Troll and 3 Bugbears, with a second wave in the room above being 1 Ogre and 5 Gnolls. As individual encounters these would be manageable, difficult but manageable. However, as a second wave these are not one hit minions, they are going to descend on the PCs like a hammer.

Oh and did I forget to mention that this is just the start. If I were playing this by the book they will still have to fight their way past 12 bugbears, 1 giant 2 headed troll, 2 hill giants, 2 giant trolls, 4 trolls, 8 ogres, 11 gnolls. That's a lot of hit dice they have to overcome.

The Solution?

Ramp it down a little. I always knew I was going to have to reduce the number of monsters to make it manageable for them.

Hit Point Reduction - make a few of them one hit wonders.  Give your PCs a free perception check to spot the ones that are limping or carrying a few fresh wounds from some recent war band pissing match.

The Call of Nature - There's always one bad guy who is in the middle of something else when they hear the battle cry or the bugle.  Having a Bugbear otherwise detained sitting on the khazi, asleep or drunk is perfectly legitimate and offers that added advantage of potential information gathering once the battle has ended.

Morale Fail - Often overlooked, but a perfectly legitimate excuse for a GM is to make the monsters flee rather than fight it out to the death. 

Take Two Bites - PCs often overlook the adage "Run away and live to fight another day" or in otherwords run away and have a short rest, drink some healing potions and try again.  Dead bad guys are still going to be dead whereas PCs often have heroic recoveries.  Tactics can be re-evaluated, strategies can be re-examined and knowledge gained during the fight can be exploited.

Zach Kanin (The New Yorker)

 

RPGs and Inclusivity

First post of the New Year and it's time to say that I'm glad to see the back of 2014.

For a while I've been worried that the hobby (and to some degree popular media) was descending  into a a pit of bile and hatred. 

So I'm going to start off this year by reminding everyone that:

By this I mean that they are a framework around which you hang your shared experience with your friends.  They don't tell you:

Who can or can't play the game - Yes, the artwork contained inside the books may give off the same sort of vibe as 1980s Heavy Metal albums, but to be honest they're just visualisations to give you ideas of what one possible world may look like.  Frankly, I don't care if you're female, black or transgendered, I want to give you the opportunity to be part of my world and through the various challenges I set, collectively explore and change it.

What characters they can play or how they play them - Yes there are classes and races, but these are just framework suggestions.  As a DM with 30+ years of experience I don't want you to slavishly follow those, I've seen them a thousand times already.  I want you to choose what you want to be and add flavour to my world.

How to play the game - Yes, every rulebook contains an example of play demonstrating a game in progress, but you only learn how to play by interacting with the other players and DM.  There is no right or wrong way to play an RPG, but there are plenty of player behaviours which can make playing a game a horrible experience.  If you're a new player you might want to consider "rules" but the DM and players ultimately choose which ones to follow and which to ignore.  I've yet to play in a group that hasn't had at least a handful of house rules.  My own preference is that as long as things appear consistent then any rule can be chopped in favour of cinematic style.  

When the Bad Guys Win

When the Bad Guys Win is the December 2020 RPG Blog Carnival theme kindly hosted by Rising Phoenix Games.

Losing is a quintessential part of Joseph Campbell's The Hero's Journey in fiction. 

It's right there at the bottom of the circle.  Our hero must enter the Abyss or face a challenge in which he metaphorically is destroyed and reborn a hero.  It's something that every hero must go through. 

Some Cinematic Bad Guy Wins Scenarios

Judge Dredd (1995) - The bad guys win when Dredd is framed for the murder of journalist Vartis Hammond and his wife Lilly.  Incontravercial forensic evidence in the form of DNA encoded bullets is presented giving Dredd the death penalty.  Judge Fargo steps down and in his final act as Chief Justice commutes the sentence to life imprisonment in the Aspen Penal Colony.  He is on his way to the Abyss before a chain of events is set in motion by the notorious cursed earth cannibals the Angel Gang.  

The Lord of The Rings - There are quite a few moments during LoTR that are bad guy win scenarios but the one that always springs to mind is when Boromir falls to the

The Empire Strikes Back (1982) - Things look pretty bleak at the end of Empire.  Han is frozen in carbonite and on his way to Jabba the Hutt.  Luke has lost a hand and found out that his father is Darth Vader.  Lando has lost Cloud City and the rebel fleet are on the run.  Does it get any worse?

Rookie GM Mistakes

One of the worst mistakes you can make as a GM is to reveal your bad guy too soon.  Your heroes need to get a few wins under their belts against minions, they need to foil some minor schemes to bring them to the attention of the big bad.  They need to be filled with a false sense of their own abilities and greatness before you drop the hammer on them.

The hero's journey circle above is divided into two halves, the upper being the known world, the world that the heroes have familiarity and can exert some control over.  The second half is the unknown representing the world that the big bad has demense over.  The conflict with the threshold guardians is a pivotal moment in this crossing over to the unknown world where things are not in their control.

But hold on we aren't ready just yet.  You need to put their backs up against the wall, you need to take them to the edge.

NPCs are Destined to Die for a Reason

I always recommend having at least one NPC in a party for a number of reasons such as channeling DM hints, filling skills gaps or for introducing plot or story knowledge.  I particularly like using the NPC as a patron or leader who joins the party on their quest. 

However, one of their greatest uses is to be a casualty of war.  Having a beloved NPC die can be a pivotal moment in a story which makes it real for the players.  This is particularly effective if the NPC performed a vital function in the group, such as the healer or their guide.  Making the players genuinely feel a sense of loss is just one of the ways you can ramp up their stress levels and make their futures seem genuinely uncertain and perilous.

Death and Rebirth 

We've all been there rolling our death saves whilst the rest of the party finish off the ork horde.  How many times have you been healed from near death and just carried on as normal?

This is a great opportunity for the GM to impart some wisdom or knowledge to the "dead" player which will give them an advantage in the final battle.  How many times have you watched a death dream sequence?  It's a popular trope for a reason.  

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Thanks of course go to Of Dice and Dragons for continuing to promote the RPG Blog Carnival.  This is my 6th entry and you can read the rest by clicking the RPG Blog Carnival tag below.

 

 

       

Coping with COVID-19: Online Gaming - How Low (Fi) Can I Go?

Some people call it a "Shelter in Place" others " Self Isolation" but we all know it as "Lockdown".

Whilst many might accuse us roleplayers as being sad loners, nothing could be further from the truth.  The vast majority of games need to be played with at least 2 people and most RPGs don't function without 3 or more.  That puts us roleplayers in a dangerous position.

Alternatives to Illegal Assemby

So you want to continue your normal (insert day of the week) roleplay session and still want to stay safe and legal?  What are your options?

You could sign up to the usual suspects, the Benicio del Toro of Roll20 or the Gabriel Byrne that is Fantasy Grounds.  Playing D&D? Then you probably already use D&D Beyond.  There are other smaller players such as Astral Tabletop, Beyond Tabletop, Tabletopia or Tabletop Simulator.  All of these services are more than up to the task, but the question is are you?

In my experience these offerings don't replicate the sitting around the table experience and come with an Everest of a learning curve.  Pre-game setup is also arduous just for simple encounters and the nice things typically sit behind a subscription paywall.

Do it for Free

The thing is most of us, thanks to corporate homeworking,  already have the necessary kit at our fingertips.  Video calling software such as Whattsapp, Google Hangouts, Facetime and Skype can all manage group video calls. The chat and game streaming services such as Discord and Twitch are probably two of the easiest services to use and are available across the spectrum of devices from iphone to laptop.

You will need to do some initial trials to see what works best for you in your situation but the last three weeks has seen my group using a combination of Twitch / Discord for the video & chat and a second service such as skype for the audio.

Virtual Game Setup for Games Masters

The setup for a GM is trivial.  You already have all the maps, minis, rulebooks and handouts that you use in your regular game all you need is:

1. A mobile device (or preferably 2) - capable of being used as a video camera and don't forget the charger(s), you are going to be on a video call for a couple of hours.  If you are using a second device make sure that you mute the microphone on this one so it is only capturing the video.
   
   
2. Wi-fi - don't blame me if you rack up a huge data bill hosting your game.  Make sure that you connect your device(s) to your wi-fi.
   
   
3. A tripod or selfie stick - to get that high level over head view of the battlemap.  If your location allows position it on a hig shelf with a good view of the map.
   
   
4. A headset on a second device - a headset is essential to cut down on any unwanted noise from appliances and feedback from speakers.  Using a second device logged into a different account or a different service to handle the audio is ideal.
   
   
5. An arms length indication device - AKA a stick!! The more tech obsessed (and cat lovers) will no doubt possess a laser pointer which is a suitable alternative.
   

Set Up For Players 

The setup for players is even more trivial and just requires you to have a mobile device and a headset.

Add-Ons and Resources

Here is a list of services which you might find useful to enhance your sessions.

• Dice Logger - free dice roller service which creates a read only log of every roll you can share with your DM or vice versa.
   
• Sketchup - you can quickly create 3d illustrations of rooms in your scenario using the warehouse of free 3d objects.

Making Judge Dredd fit the Starblazer Rules

I make no apologies I love Starblazer Adventures (SBA) because its Fate 3.0 is so simple and lends itself to fast cinematic play. I had long fallen out of love with the clunky GW rules for Judge Dredd and never bought into the Mongoose era so I naturally turned to SBA when it came to choosing a new system for my Judge Dredd Campaign.  

Starblazer Adventures
(sadly out of print)

My concept for the PC Judges is that the Justice Department mercilessly churns them out through the Cadet system removing any personality weaknesses and indoctrinating them with a core set of skills and knowledge which will serve them well on the streets of Mega City One.  SBA has no physical stats system and relies on a system of Skills, Stunts and Aspects to allow for a huge amount of character variety with little recourse for complex game grinding math.

Skills

Looking through the list of 31 skills, it was obvious that some of them would be innapropriate for Judges and I narrowed this down to a subset of 16

• Alertness - perception based stunts
• Athletics - agility and speed based stunts
• Contacting - access to friends, connections and personal reputation stunts
• Drive - vehicle stunts
• Empathy - insight and intuition based stunts
• Endurance - physical stunts
• Engineering - technical stunts
• Fists - unarmed combat stunts
• Guns - missile combat stunts
• Intimidation - human interaction stunts
• Investigation - detective stunts
• Leadership - command and legal knowledge stunts
• Might - physical strength stunts
• Mysteries - psychic powers (Psi Judges only)
• Resolve - determination and will power stunts
• Weapons - Melee combat stunts

The Skills Pyramid

Standard SBA allows players to allocate PC skills in a pyramid of 5 levels from Average (5 skill slots at +1 dice) to Superb (1 skill slot at +5) totalling 15 skills.  Given that there were only 16 skills to choose from and I wanted this to be a gritty game I reduced every level except superb by 1 slot giving players a choice of 11 skills for their character.

• Superb (+5) - 1 skill slot
• Great (+4) - 1 skill slot
• Good (+3) - 2 skill slots
• Fair (+2) - 3 skill slots 
• Average (+1) - 4 skill slots

Stunts

Pretty much all the stunts for all the above skills are available to players with the exception of some of the unique / special / magical objects or tech which aren't standard issue.

Aspects

Remain unchanged from the standard SBA although these are dependant largely on how each PC is going to be played.  For exmple Dredd himself might have the aspect "I am the Law" and Walter the Wobot might have "Live to serve".  As long as it doesn't provoke an immediate psyche evaluation by the Justice Dept, I am fairly easy going.  

Using Node Maps to Figure out your Criminal Network

Yesterday caught me reading Reality Refracted, and thinking about his observation that games which focus on the criminal underground always rely on the interconnectedness of people and locations.

I'd also come to this conclusion from watching movies like Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and TV shows like Sons of Anarchy.

If you're going to run a crime/cyberpunk style scenarioyou might like to try mapping these relationships out as a node network to help you visualise where your plot might end up.  Fans of the indie RPG FIASCO will be familiar with this concept as the basis for character generation albeit on a much simpler level.  Taking my favourite crime TV show "Sons of Anarchy" as my inspiration I made this relationship map to illustrate my point.

Sons of Anarchy Relationships Map
(Click to embiggen)

Whilst far from accurate, it demonstrates that often overlooked minor characters can have unexpected or glossed over connections with otherwise unconnected groups.

For example in the Sons of Anarchy universe:

Chuckie Marstein is an often overlooked minor character often seen hanging around TM, working behind the scenes at TM, in the bar at the clubhouse, serving at the ice-cream parlor or running errands for Gemma.  However, his backstory also reveals he was Otto's cellmate and friend in Stockton County Jail, and that he was the Bookkeeper for the Lin Triad who'd stolen two of their counterfeit money printing plates.  He's also done his fair share of work for SAMCRO such as wanting to be an amputee porn star so the gang could gain access to Georgie Caruso's porn studio when he was working for Otto's wife Duanne Laney as the Cara Cara bookkeeper. There's also the unrequited love angle, as he holds a torch for Gemma after she bought him new prostethic hands.

Brooke Putner is another minor character who joined the show as a crazy teenager who blamed SAMCRO for her mother's death.  In fact it was Jax's father John Teller who collided with their car killing both himself and Brooke's mother Emily, although the show hints heavily that her mother is in fact alive and living on the streets as we see her picking through dumpsters every now and then.  Brooke has since fallen in love with Ratboy, helped out at the clubhouse and now works for Gemma as Abel and Thomas' nanny.  This close proximity to the centre of the SAMCRO empire means that it's only a matter of time before she gets hit by some of the club crossfire.

Visualising your crime network in this way makes it easier for you to write convincing plots.  You can see what the effect of an NPC death might be.  If Gemma were to be killed would Chuckie take out his own type of vengence on her killer or if Ratboy were killed in some accident would Brooke hire Happy to hunt them down?  The consequences for larger characters tend to be more obvious, say if August Marks is taken out of the game someone will fill the vacuum, but who?

One of the things I love about the show is that when SAMCRO try to get themselves out of a bad situation, their actions always have unforseen consequences which almost end up burying them.  Your game should be no different the PCs should always be making a hobson's choice with the information they have at their disposal, it's not their fault that the guy they killed in revenge is actually a key player in an even bigger, more powerful crime syndicate.  It doesn't rain.... it pours!

5 Things I'd Love to do with RPG Props

Here's a bucket list of things I'd like to do with props have effects in a game world. 

Fortune Cookie (may include game content) 

1.  Fortune Cookies - Imagine a game where the PCs have just polished off a nice celebratory chinese meal, when the DM/waiter hands out a plate of fortune cookies.  Each of the players takes one and discovers a clue or instruction to their next adventure inside.

2.  Defuse the Bomb - Make a prop bomb complete with digital timer and hand the players a screwdriver and a set of wire cutters.  I'm going to need to trap them in a locked room so they have no choice but to defuse it.  This is probably the trickiest of the lot as I'd have to find a good timer circuit which I can use. 

3.  SMS Patron - Have a game where all the instructions coming from the patron are delivered to the characters via SMS text to the players mobile phones.

4.  Amaretti Scroll of Raise Dead - This is something I'd like to do when playing a magic user.  When a party member dies, I'd like to pull out a piece of amaretti paper covered in symbols claiming it's a Raise Dead scroll.  Read out some incantation and then roll it up into a tube and set fire to it.  At the last moment the paper will fly into the air (just like in the video) and the character is back from the dead.



5.  Crossword from Beyond the Grave.  Give one or more PCs a half finished crossword puzzle as a clue, preferable found near the body of someone they wanted to interrogate.  The players must complete the crossword to reveal a message from the victim.

More uses for those pesky Loom Bands?

If you've got a child aged between 10 and 15 you will have probably been unable to avoid the current craze of "Loom Bands".  These tiny multicoloured rubber bands are intended to be woven together, in a form of phsychedelic macrame, to make friendship bracelets and other strap like objects.

But they have a far more useful use...  as wound markers for your tabletop miniature games!!

Loom Bands make great wound markers

They're stupidly cheap (1000 for about £3), you can find them just about everywhere at the moment and come in an astonishing array of colours. 

I'm going to throw down the gauntlet and challenge you crafty readers to weave up a set of spell effect templates.  Post links to your achievements in the comments below.

Everyone is John

This Friday's game was postponed and a new GM, Thora, stepped up to the plate and offered to run a a one session game called Everyone is John.  I'd never heard of this game but as it was described as a rules light freeform competitive game, it was just up my alley.

John Cleese

The set-up for the game is simple, John is a normal bloke going about his day-to-day existence when he has a schitzophrenic episode and begins to listen to The Voice in his head.  Each player becomes a voice, with their own unique set of skills and obsessions.  However, John can only listen to one voice at a time so the players must bid using willpower to control The Voice and thereby influence what John does.  It's handy if you represent willpower with a bunch of tokens as players can simply reveal how many tokens they have in their hand.  The winning bidder then loses those tokens for the rest of the game.  

John is quite fickle and so control of The Voice only lasts for about 10 minutes or until a player fails a roll, at which time the bidding process starts again. 

SKILLS AND OBSESSIONS

Jon Bon Jovi

Each player is then issued with 6 blank cards upon which they have to write 3 skills and 3 obsessions.  These are then randomly distributed to each player making sure nobody picked their own skills or obsessions.

Skills are used to reduce the difficulty of completing an action and can be actual skills (Boxing, PC Repair, Knowledge: Thermonuclear Devices), special abilities (Hail a cab first time everytime, ) or equipment (Letter Opener, Mobile Phone, Sonic Screwdriver).  Remember, the game is competitive and what you write down goes to your opponents so picking really usefull or powerful skills will most likely work against you.

Obsessions are your victory conditions and are ranked in 3 levels:

Jeanne D'Arc

Level 1 - Easy (pig out on candy, pick your nose on live TV)
Level 2 - Medium (steal a fast car, kiss a celebrity)
Level 3 - Hard (become President of the United States, Go to the Moon)

Each time you complete an obsession you score its Level, the more times you complete them the more points you score.  At the end of the game, the player with the most points is declared the winner.

HOW IT PLAYED FOR US

Our Skills

Can Touch their Nose with Their Tongue	Tune a Guitar	Eat Fire	Can Communicate with a Single Ant
Sonic Screwdriver	Bricklaying	Kung Fu	Summon a mode of Transport by Smoking his Last Cigarette
Can hail a cab first time, every time	Fly a plane	Literary Criticism	Become the Master of the Universe by wearing a traffic cone  on his head and singing "I've got the Power, To Pick up a flower"

Our Obsessions

LVL 1	Cook an Ostrich	Become a Buddhist Monk	Pick Nose on Live TV	Kick an Authority Figure up the Bum and run away like Charlie Chaplin
LVL 2	Steal an Atom Bomb	Stop a Terrorist Bomb from destroying the Eiffel Tower	Steal a Waxwork of Maggie Thatcher from Madame Tussauds	Draw a moustache on a Traffic Warden
LVL 3	Capture a Dinosaur	Discover Australia	Find Evidence that Aliens Exist in Area 51	Make a dog have a white poo

What John Did

John Shuttleworth

John began the game walking through Victoria Station, London when he had his first episode.  He then ran outside the station and hailed a cab telling the driver to head for Madame Tussauds Waxwork Museum.  (BID)  He asked the driver to head instead for London Zoo and if he could stop by some road works on the way.  The taxi driver pulled over to the side of the road and John leap out and grabbed a traffic cone, stuck it on his head and started singing "Ive got the Power... To Pick up a Flower".  He then summoned forth all traffic wardens and got back in the taxi. 

As the taxi sped towards London Zoo, traffic wardens were walking out of side roads in a zombie-like trance.  The taxi driver swerved around them and John opened the window and tried to grab one as they passed but failed.  (BID)  John immediately demanded the taxi head to Madame Tussauds and he tried to use his sonic screwdriver to make the taxi go faster, but unfortunately failed.  (BID)  John abandoned the taxi and whilst smoking his last cigarette, summoned the TARDIS.  As it began to materialise he spotted a nearby Lollipop Woman and kicked her up the bum and ran towards the TARDIS (but unfortunately not like Charlie Chaplin).  The Doctor was suprised that the TARDIS had been so easily summoned but when John asked to go back in time to the Jurrasic era to capture a dinosaur, his curiosity got the better of him.

John Belushi

Arriving in the Jurrasic era, The Doctor agreed to wait in the TARDIS for John to return and watched him walk off into the swamp.  (BID)  John used his Literary Criticism to argue with himself that the Doctor was a fictional character and that the TARDIS was a poorly executed plot device and so could not possibly have transported him back through time.  This clearly meant that the swamp he was in was simply a Jurrasic era exhibit in a Natural History Museum somewhere like Sydney, Australia.  He promptly tore the shirt off his back and waved it around in the air and shouted "I claim this land in the name of Queen and Country and hereby name her Australia!!"...

Conclusion

The players got into the swing of things pretty quickly and it was definitely the most hilariously anarchic and inventive game I've played in a long time.  Most RPGs are not wild fights of fantasy for obvious reasons, but it is good to let your hair down every now and then to play something which demands unbridled creativity.  This game would be great in an after convention/party situation or as we found as a filler game if your regular DM hasn't turned up.

John McEnroe

With slight modification to the pre-amble (Mental Health is a serious issue) and possibly pre-defined skills/goals (to keep the action a little more grounded) this concept could be used quite successfully as an introduction to RPGs for non-gamers.  It encourages problem solving through creativity and imagination and the action is fast paced with only a modicum of dice rolling so should be able to hold most people's attention.

This is definitely going into my GMs Survival Kit and may well get another play quite soon.

Scenario Writing: Non-Linear Plots and Node-Based Design

A fine post from Justin (The Alexandrian) about Advanced Node-Based Design with respect to scenarios made me realise that I'd been been doing this for years without realising that there was a formal theory surrounding it.  In an earlier article I described some of the techniques I've used to write linear plots, which can also be described in this node-based design approach like this:

Although the example is deliberately simple it demonstrates how taking this approach can and does prepare you for almost any eventuality and may even reap rewards in the design stage by focusing your writing (in a similar way to a mind map) and offer other plot possibilities that you hadn't thought of initially.  Why does the patron want the artifact? Can it be used to control the Evil?  Was the patron behind the event which threatened the PCs life?

However, this node-based design approach works best with non-linear adventures, particularly those where investigation is required and the DM has left clues which send the PCs off in one direction or the other as in this example:

Again the deliberately simple diagram above only details Two Clues per node and I cannot reccomend enough the importance of following The Three Clue Rule lest your scenario grind to a halt in a choke point.  However, as you can see, the PCs may take any route through the scenario they choose and you will have already done the hard work of designing each node in advance and be prepared for most eventualities.

As Justin quite rightly points out these do not have to necessarily be clues, they can be events, objects or rumours which PUSH players into moving to the the next node or equally their desires can PULL them in a particular direction.  It's quite fun to watch your players sweat over equally enticing possibilities or for them to choose what they think is the easy option only for it to turn nasty.

Scenario Writing: Linear Plots

First off, what's the difference between a linear and a non-linear plot?  

Characteristically, linear plots will feature a single timeline of events or scenes which the PCs need to resolve one after another in a specific order (e.g scene 1, scene 2, scene 3, etc...).  This is the formula used by most theatrical productions which use the Three-Act Structure. 

Linear Plot - The Three-Act Structure

Non-linear plots can have multiple timelines, flash-backs and the scenes do not need to be completed in a specified order, or at all (even though some scenes may be missed out entirely any events in those scenes may still occur).   If you've never experienced non-linear story telling then try playing a game of FIASCO.  This indie RPG introduces flash backs and flash forwards as an integral part of the collaborative story telling mechanism.  Games take about 3 hours and there are a hundred genre playsets to choose from.

There's nothing wrong with a linear plot, they're undoubtably easier to write and run, especially if you are a time poor DM, and they can be just as entertaining for players.  Here's a few techniques that I've used to make them seem less linear.

Scenario Timeline - One of the biggest drawbacks of a linear plot is that it's easy for players to start thinking that the world revolves around their characters. Using a scenario timeline allows the DM to trigger events independently of the the PCs actions, they might only hear about the event as a rumour or hearsay or over the radio, tv or net, they will still encounter the scenes you have arrange in a predetermined order but they will feel like there's more to the story that they can't influence.  

If you split your party the timeline can become a useful aid to keeping track of WHEN each group of PCs are rather than WHERE.  It's possible to have multiple timelines in operation but make sure that there are key events which tie them together otherwise it's easy for a subgroup of PCs to get too far ahead of the other party members.

Fast Pace - In my experience it's not a good idea to give players too much thinking time in any adventure.  When this happens they start reverting to their player archetypes and end up thinking about where their next power-up or wander off trying to find an interesting NPC to chat to.  A fast pace to a game often focuses players minds to the immediate task at hand.

Elastic Time - Remember that time is elastic, if you need characters to trigger events and they're in danger of missing it, Don't worry you're the DM, stretch time, but keep up the tension as they race to the next scene otherwise they'll get into the habit of dawdling.  If they're on the ball and ripping through scenes like a chainsaw you might need to slow them down a bit by throwing a  wandering monsters or random encounter at them.  

It's a good idea to have a few of this sort of thing in your DMs toolkit anyway, they don't have to be related to the plot, just the setting, a bit like the little old lady who asks the policeman to help her across the road whilst the perp is running away.

NPCs (aka Plot Monkeys) - When a party does get bogged down in a decision it's useful to have a recurring NPC in the plot you can use to prod them in the right direction.  I often have an NPC as a member of the party for this exact reason and they also come in very handy when you have a drop-in player that needs a character.  Be careful how often you use them though, PCs sometimes take exception to NPCs giving suggestions all the time especially when you have an insecure de-facto leader.

Clues - When you leave clues in a scene to further the plot, make them really obvious.  I can't tell you the number of times that a party has walked past a too subtle clue or picked up on it to only miss it's significance.  It's an easy trap to fall into when writing scenarios as you become immersed in the plot during the creative process, what seems obvious to you at the time of writing may be a leap of cognitive faith several weeks later when a player encounters it.  

I often leave multiple clues in a scene which reinforce each other and the correct path to take to the next scene, if the players miss one, they may pick up on the others and players often get a big buzz out of finding clues.

Use What Works for your Players

These are just a few of the techniques I use when writing, the important thing is too see what works in your sessions and what doesn't and see if you can improve the player (and DMing) experience.  If your players begin to get too comfortable with your writing style mix it up a bit.

Scenario Timelines serious plot tool or DMs curse?

As a DM I've tried a number of different approaches to both writing and running adventures, but they've always fallen into one of two camps, the LINEAR or the TIMELINE based adventure.

Linear Plots

In a linear plot the PCs go from location to location (or scene to scene), the events happen solely within their timeline.  This is how most dungeon crawls are written, the party blunder into room 5 and trigger the goblin attack which they either deal with or don't, then it's off to the next room or location and so on until they end up defeating the evil archmage and rescuing the princess / orb of jozitzky (delete as applicable).  

From a DMs perspective these are easy to write and to run as the PCs don't do much choosing which path through the adventure they take.  However, depending on how immersed they are in the adventure, the PCs can sometimes detect the guiding hand of the DM which often led to player apathy and sometimes even rebellion.  They can also feel a little formulaic (not that there's anything wrong with dungeon bashing) if that's all the DM has in their arsenal.

 

Timeline Plots

In a timeline adventure the PCs wander from location to location but the events have a life of their own and can be triggered by the PCs, NPCs, the villain or even other events.  Often these are decided by an overarching game timeline, for example; at noon a fight breaks out in the marketplace, by 1pm the marketplace is cordoned off by the local sheriff, by 1:30 the aggrieved parties have been carted off to the local gaol, by dawn they are all executed.  

As DM you need to be aware of where the PCs are in relation to the EVENTS and any travelling time it might take them to get there, the time it takes for players to deal with an EVENT and argue about what to do next etc.  These are, on the whole, much more of a challenge to write and to DM but often more rewarding for players and DM alike for a number of reasons.

I find that some settings naturally lend themselves to timelines.  Of particular note are Judge Dredd and Cyberpunk, both of which are set in an urban sprawl:

Judge Dredd: The adventure timeline is usually crafted around a single perp's attempts at either committing a number of minor crimes escalating in scale and severity which (if the PCs follow the clues) will end up in a final showdown or one big crime and then the perp tries to cover their tracks.  

When I write my own adventures I pepper the timeline with lots of other events so the players have to decide which crimes are linked together in order to decide what to react to and which ones are set fressing or red herrings.  

The fact that the PCs are often street judges on patrol (but in constant communication with Justice Central) helps with the planning the events in a more linear way and allows you to communicate alerts and demand responses from the PCs to things that they hear on their radios.

Cyberpunk: The adventure timeline is usually crafted around the nefarious actions of a corporation or some other organisation.  The PCs interact with these events through various intermediaries or connections and may end up either working for or against the organisation at the heart of the plot. 

PCs are usually updated throughout the game with regular screamsheets and media broadcasts giving the players a sense of their insignificance in the world and (as I like to do) coverage of the effects of their actions from the opposite perspective.  The job for the PCs is to work out where they fit into all this and if they can or even should put a stop to it.

Communication is Key

One of the keys to running a timeline scenario is that the players need to be regularly made aware of events outside their immediate sphere.  In modern or sci-fi games this is usually not a problem as PCs usually have access to mobile phones or similar which you can use to appraise them of things happening in other locations.

In fantasy games this can be tricky as long distance communication is usually impossible unless the PCs have access to a magical artifact, spell or reliant on messenger birds.  In a city setting this is much easier due to the shorter distances involved.  You might get word of something happening on the other side of the city passed by word of mouth but this could suffer from Chinese Whispers and the actual details of the message get corrupted.  Alternatively you could have a fixer or a patron act as the party messenger using runners to get information to the PCs as swiftly and reliably as possible.