Season 09 Episode 13
Mar 4, 2013 19:22:28 GMT -8
Post by HyveMynd on Mar 4, 2013 19:22:28 GMT -8
So I'm about 35 minutes into the episode, and I have to comment. Stork keeps mentioning how GMs keep throwing more and more stuff into the mix until the plot eventually breaks. He said it better than that, but that was his basic point. How the GM just keeps tossing out more and more plot hooks and complications to make the PCs' lives challenging.
I think this is a pretty gross generalization.
Not every GM does that. Not every game works that way. Now that there's an Apocalypse World-Based subforum (thank you very much, ye mighty Forum Gods), there's a dedicated place for me to get into some of the nitty-gritty of how these games avoid that.
In AW and it's derivatives, the GM doesn't plan a story. In fact we're expressly told, in some pretty strong language, to not pre-plan a story. If the GM does so, they are breaking one of AW's three agendas: Play to find out what happens. Every consequence or result in a game should be due to the direct action of a player character. Things don't exist until the PCs interact with them or the players create them, which helps keep the GM's workload down.
Those setting elements are created during play through GM questions about the characters. "Oh, so you're a Savvyhead who earns scratch by trekking through the nearby burnflats to scavenge tech that you then sell to the Hardholder. Cool." Bam! Now there's an artifact-filled ruin nearby that suddenly wasn't there before. There's also a brand new NPC, and a relationship between them and the PC. Now the GM starts fucking with the answer the player gave, and asking a whole bunch of new questions. "What's the burnflats like?" "What's the biggest, nastiest thing you had to run from while scavenging one time?" "Do you take anyone with you when you go out?" "Do you sell to other people in the community, or only to the Hardholder?" "What do you do with your cash?" Bam, bam, bam, bam! The more you ask them, they more they shape your setting and put all the pieces in place for you. The setting grows.
Then, after you have all these wonderful pieces the players gave you, you sit down and find out what's happening. You don't plan a story here. No! You just figure out how everything interacts. You figure out who has what, who else wants it, what they'll do to get it, what tools they have at their disposal, who doesn't like who, etc. Then you drop the player characters into this huge mess and let them go. No matter what they do, they'll butt heads with someone and you'll have a conflict. And because you've figured out all the connections between these pieces, no matter how the conflict gets solved, you'll know how the world around the characters reacts. On top of that, it'll feel organic and real.
So when the players go "Oh shit. We've got so much on our plates right now, what the fuck are we going to do?" they never dump that on the GM. Every issue they are currently dealing with is only because of them. The GM isn't throwing wrenches into their plans to make things difficult for the players, the GM is simply playing out the responses to the characters actions.
So again, Play to find out what happens.
Edit: And now I got to the part where everyone is discussing what will happen in the L5R game now that Stu has introduced some romance into the game. Who will go after who? Who will get rejected, and what will they do? When will happen when two characters are attracted to the same person? As you guys said, you can't fight your way out of that tangle. You can't just roll a die and make everything go away. No matter what you do, there will be fallout which you will then have to deal with.
I think this is a pretty gross generalization.
Not every GM does that. Not every game works that way. Now that there's an Apocalypse World-Based subforum (thank you very much, ye mighty Forum Gods), there's a dedicated place for me to get into some of the nitty-gritty of how these games avoid that.
In AW and it's derivatives, the GM doesn't plan a story. In fact we're expressly told, in some pretty strong language, to not pre-plan a story. If the GM does so, they are breaking one of AW's three agendas: Play to find out what happens. Every consequence or result in a game should be due to the direct action of a player character. Things don't exist until the PCs interact with them or the players create them, which helps keep the GM's workload down.
Those setting elements are created during play through GM questions about the characters. "Oh, so you're a Savvyhead who earns scratch by trekking through the nearby burnflats to scavenge tech that you then sell to the Hardholder. Cool." Bam! Now there's an artifact-filled ruin nearby that suddenly wasn't there before. There's also a brand new NPC, and a relationship between them and the PC. Now the GM starts fucking with the answer the player gave, and asking a whole bunch of new questions. "What's the burnflats like?" "What's the biggest, nastiest thing you had to run from while scavenging one time?" "Do you take anyone with you when you go out?" "Do you sell to other people in the community, or only to the Hardholder?" "What do you do with your cash?" Bam, bam, bam, bam! The more you ask them, they more they shape your setting and put all the pieces in place for you. The setting grows.
Then, after you have all these wonderful pieces the players gave you, you sit down and find out what's happening. You don't plan a story here. No! You just figure out how everything interacts. You figure out who has what, who else wants it, what they'll do to get it, what tools they have at their disposal, who doesn't like who, etc. Then you drop the player characters into this huge mess and let them go. No matter what they do, they'll butt heads with someone and you'll have a conflict. And because you've figured out all the connections between these pieces, no matter how the conflict gets solved, you'll know how the world around the characters reacts. On top of that, it'll feel organic and real.
So when the players go "Oh shit. We've got so much on our plates right now, what the fuck are we going to do?" they never dump that on the GM. Every issue they are currently dealing with is only because of them. The GM isn't throwing wrenches into their plans to make things difficult for the players, the GM is simply playing out the responses to the characters actions.
So again, Play to find out what happens.
Edit: And now I got to the part where everyone is discussing what will happen in the L5R game now that Stu has introduced some romance into the game. Who will go after who? Who will get rejected, and what will they do? When will happen when two characters are attracted to the same person? As you guys said, you can't fight your way out of that tangle. You can't just roll a die and make everything go away. No matter what you do, there will be fallout which you will then have to deal with.
Look how fucking awesome your games become when you add sex, romance, and seduction to them!
*mic drop*
*mic drop*