Rating: 4 of 5 stars
Details: Kameron presented the great idea that the players create their own Minor Quests in his article Silly DM, minor quests are for players.
Why is that a good idea? For one thing the players do your job since you as a GM do not have to come up with quests and for another thing they tell you what they are interested in.
Usage in the session: The obvious usage is that players express their wish to either continue or start a story line which cannot be followed at the current point of a story which which ever reason.
But the players could also come up with minor quests for their characters as part of the background creation. That would give the characters something to do right at the beginning of the game and it would give the player an opportunity to flesh out his or her character since that first quest probably addresses personal issues.
When we started playing D&D 4E I told my players that I would create a personal minor quest for every character based on the background story they gave me. I wanted to motivate them to get invested into the game by introducing and following personal agendas of their characters. If I had known this concept at that time it would have saved me time since instead of me creating the quests I would have asked the players to come up with one. My plan was to give them a new personal quest every time they have finished one but due to lack of time I never created new quests after the first ones.
In an ideal situation each minor quests creates plenty of reasons for new quests on their own and you as a GM have only to get along with the interests of the players.
Impact on our session: Unfortunately since reading the article it did not made sense to introduce this idea to my players because I master the Wizards of the Coast adventure Pyramid of Shadows which is mostly dungeon delves with very little room for side quests.
Advice: Do not be afraid of getting strange or seemingly unusable minor quests. If you, as a GM, do not like a quest or if it does not fit into the story, you do not have to go down-that-line. But sometimes if you just go with it, such ideas turn out to be quit entertaining for everybody.
Our D&D 4E campaign started with each character being on their way to a certain city and they met on the way. I asked everybody why their character was going there. One of my players decided that the purpose of her character's voyage was to visit her aunt to get rosehip jam. At first I was a bit annoyed because I was hoping for something more heroic or dramatic but this story line lead to more role playing and laughter than we had in the rest of the adventure. As it turned out the rosehip jam would have made for a good minor quest worth a reward.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Random Findings: Do not be afraid to kill - resurrections as story opportunities
Scott Wallace shares the same reluctance for fudging rolls to prevent character deaths and gives another reason why not to do it. He writes about resurrections as story hooks in his article Ashes to Ashes, Death to Life.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Thoughts on: Fudging Rolls to improve your GMing?!
Essence: In my experience if rolls are fudged by GMs it happens in the favor of the players. But how about cheating to their disadvantage? Could that add to your game?
Details: Why do GMs roll attacks or damage behind a screen? I can think of only one reason: to fudge rolls.
Interestingly enough this is almost always done in the players favor. Mostly to prevent a character from dying.
As a player I hate that! If I get the impression that the GM is cheating to prevent that my character is killed I lose the interest in the encounter. And believe me, players tend to notice such things (a question about the current amount of HPs is like an announcement that the GM will be cheating anytime soon). Combat should be lethal and if my character cannot die why bother with combat at all? And since I do not like that rolls are fudged to my advantage as a player, I do not do it as a GM either.
If a combat turns out to be too hard, I either withhold enemies the characters might not have yet seen for that encounter, go along with every idea the players have to turn the combat to their advantage and if I cannot the players to rethink their tactics (e.g. by withdrawing) I cut the HP amount of the monsters as a last resort. Maybe it is not better than fudging dice but I hope it is more discreet.
In John Wick's 'Play Dirty' he speaks about cheating against the players favor in order to punish them. I do not like the notion but it got me started thinking if there are situations where it would add to the game if you cheated to players disadvantage.
What if you came up with a idea to make a combat more dramatic, create a awesome/funny scene or give a monster a unique taste but that would require a successful attack. How about a bull rush that would push a character at the edge of a cliff and while the melee continues there every blow has the risk of falling. Or what about monsters with very iconic attacks like a Medusa or a Rust Monster. Only if one of their distinct attacks hit do these monster stick out of the normal crowd of thugs. But does that justifies cheating?
As a note: Even if I have not gotten a lot else from 'Play Dirty' it at least made me think how I GM and I am more willing to give 'dirty' methods a try to improve the game.
Details: Why do GMs roll attacks or damage behind a screen? I can think of only one reason: to fudge rolls.
Interestingly enough this is almost always done in the players favor. Mostly to prevent a character from dying.
As a player I hate that! If I get the impression that the GM is cheating to prevent that my character is killed I lose the interest in the encounter. And believe me, players tend to notice such things (a question about the current amount of HPs is like an announcement that the GM will be cheating anytime soon). Combat should be lethal and if my character cannot die why bother with combat at all? And since I do not like that rolls are fudged to my advantage as a player, I do not do it as a GM either.
If a combat turns out to be too hard, I either withhold enemies the characters might not have yet seen for that encounter, go along with every idea the players have to turn the combat to their advantage and if I cannot the players to rethink their tactics (e.g. by withdrawing) I cut the HP amount of the monsters as a last resort. Maybe it is not better than fudging dice but I hope it is more discreet.
In John Wick's 'Play Dirty' he speaks about cheating against the players favor in order to punish them. I do not like the notion but it got me started thinking if there are situations where it would add to the game if you cheated to players disadvantage.
What if you came up with a idea to make a combat more dramatic, create a awesome/funny scene or give a monster a unique taste but that would require a successful attack. How about a bull rush that would push a character at the edge of a cliff and while the melee continues there every blow has the risk of falling. Or what about monsters with very iconic attacks like a Medusa or a Rust Monster. Only if one of their distinct attacks hit do these monster stick out of the normal crowd of thugs. But does that justifies cheating?
As a note: Even if I have not gotten a lot else from 'Play Dirty' it at least made me think how I GM and I am more willing to give 'dirty' methods a try to improve the game.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)