Pregame Prep Talk

what's your social contract?

Have you experienced a game where expectations varied wildly? Did you have sessions where things went awry because the GM failed to mention some important information about the game?

I've found that a pre-game talk is necessary to establish the ground rules for the game as well as provide a guide for player activities. Here is a list of topics to discuss with the rpg group before the dice fall.

Badass RPG

This is a shameless plug. Overall great guy Jay Steven Anyong has published an rpg, specifically a Badass RPG.

Badass takes you into the world of cinematic action where the improbable happens all to frequently and is usually accompanied by a heaping of special effects. This is a game of crazy car chases, martial artists dueling on bamboo stalks and, yeah, doing the Matrix bullet dodge. Logic and reason takes a back seat to providing fantastic action sequences. In fact, asserting logic strips you of your abilities and turns you into Joe Average. Yep  there are mechanics that force you to shut up and fight.

Needless to say this is a tongue in cheek pick-up game, the kind you'd bring out when the grey matter wants a break. I'd say it's also the game you need if you listen to the news all day. It'll put a smile on your face. Or maybe a wry grin if you want to be a Badass.

... and do I have to mention that its currently FREE on Drivethrough RPG?

Dragon Adversaries

Mix up your dragons

In the early days the draconic nemesis was nothing more than a massively powerful brute lying on top of a pile of gold. Adventurers with enough muscle (ie. levels) regularly prayed on them. Players realized that they wanted more fearsome dragons especially when the adventurers reached higher levels. All sorts of ideas came about, opening many eyes. Dragons became tactical geniuses able to use terrain to the best possible advantage. Some transformed into campaign arch villains or party benefactors. Still others became rather colorful NPCs such as the Greyhawk City dragons.

In all the editions I've played, the dragon has fulfilled one or the other of these niches. In many cases we've had to use GM fiat to modify the dragon to suit its role (ie. homebrew stats). I appreciate 3.5's ideas for codifying these adjustments. That allowed greater interoperability, in a sense giving gamers a more consistent language for describing unusual creatures.

Levels of NPC Development

Give just enough detail

The level of development spent on an NPC should reflect the amount of time the players spend interacting with him or her. It's a waste to completely develop the random wanderer players meet on the road. It's equally wasteful to avoid detailing the background and traits of regular contacts and followers.

For those familiar with management theory, I tend to use the Pareto Principle when working on roleplaying games. This principle states that 80 percent of your results come from 20 percent of your effort.

Rolpunk

are you one of them?

Rolpunk, a term coined by Uncle Bear,  promotes a more accepting view of different gaming philosophies. Read the Rolpunk Manifesto for a better idea of what the term signifies.

I've been espousing something similar and I'm glad someone came up with the idea of a manifesto. Now I can just point people to it instead of trying to explain everything.

Perhaps, I've been too distracted to give so much stock to an edition war. Perhaps its because I've seen so many variations of "roll vs role" I tend to ignore it. I don't act as in-your-face punk about telling people to let it be. Let people play how they want to, so long as it doesn't mess with your fun.

Am I rolpunk? Maybe philosophically, just don't expect much screaming.

Watchers Guild Stats, part 2

Rules for the Organization

Playing a Member

Watchers serve as the counter intelligence arm of a good kingdom. In my game that is Furyondy. Watchers gather information through observation and deduction more than threats and violence. In public they do not have the image of the action-oriented hero. Instead most of them seem to hang back and observe. Of course, things are different out of the public eye.

Combat
Most members avoid combat if possible. The prefer to inform those publicly authorized to use force. That means a Watcher will prefer to call the city guard or town militia instead of tackling threats in public. There are exceptions to this but the individual Watcher must weigh the benefits of keeping their image or breaking it.


Advancement
The organization has a ranking system based on seniority and number of missions performed. The most experienced tend to rise in rank. Those with adventurer classes also tend to attain higher rank given their survivability.

note: in my game the ranks correspond to generic police ranks such as Senior Watcher, Watcher Captain and so on.

Mission
Missions involve information gathering or investigation.

Creating Encounters on a Budget

the saga budget

John Robey aka the Gneech authored some good supplemental rules for a sword and sorcery SAGA game. One of my favorites is the encounter budget adaptation. It helps in gauging the difficulty of encounters. Many games tend to forget that adverse conditions are called such for a reason. Translated to game-speak that means adverse conditions = higher difficulty and higher awards.

In old school AD&D, a GM was encouraged to pile on the adverse conditions to make encounters more interesting. The flip side to this was players could potentially reap incredible amounts of experience points with a good strategem or incredible luck. That was unlikely in 3.x given the experience cap rule. with such a rule it became important to balance the other end of the equation. Giving experience for adverse conditions became important to the game.