Structure Or Why We Outline!
Aug 22, 2016 1:21:59 GMT -8
Post by Deleted on Aug 22, 2016 1:21:59 GMT -8
I had an interesting session tonight. Things went ackwardly, and I think I have a culprit! Normally, The Sprawl uses a system of mission directives to keep players from floundering around aimlessly. For those not in the know, they consist of a few milestones for each mission and might look like so:
Gain 1 XP when you accept the mission.
Gain 1 XP when you plan how you will steal the McGuffin.
Gain 1 XP when you escape with the McGuffin.
Gain 2 XP when you complete the mission. (complete, does not imply success. Could be failure as well. Either way it is complete.)
Pretty simple stuff, but important! You see, as a mission based game you really have two major phases of play: legwork and action. You plan the thing, then you do the thing. The rubber hits the road when you try to do so in a timely manner. Our GM did not put out these directives and instead pushed us into action based on time. Thus we went in without a plan and wasted a bunch of time trying to improvise a solution. In the end the GM basicly gave us the win, even though we had never even made a plan, let alone done the thing in question (steal a mcguffin in a building we never even stepped foot inside of).
Thus I had my starship troopers moment where I was being given a medal for first place in a race I took fourth in. I didn't earn it and it sucked. But why did this happen? Well, we didn't have a plan (and the GM was being too catty with info for us to have gotten it done in the time allotted). Neither did the GM! You see, while the structure tells us players what we have to do, it serves double duty. If you have 3 hours to play you should expect an hour of that to be social/pre/post run stuff. You all have to gather as players and get settled. Then you have to get the mission before you may begin it and finally, you have to get paid once you finish the job. You have two hours left, cut that in half for each phase remaining and you have a general idea of how quickly things should be moving along. It may not be exact, but it gives you a feel for things.
6:00 session begins.
6:30 Begin legwork.
7:30 Action begins.
8:30 wrap up begins.
9:00 session closes.
You have our timetable, now how do you keep to it? Time dilation and simplicity. The simpler the job, the less info the group needs up front. If the mission is to knock over a 7/11, the group does not need to know where the register and safe are in advance, they have time to do the legwork to find out. If you instead decide you want to run an extraction of a general from a highly guarded military base in that same time, you need to give them much more information out of the gate. From there you use dialation to maintain the correct flow. Do you role play the characters meeting with their contact or handle it with a few lines of narration? Do you play out a side operation or abstract it down to a single roll? All depends on how much time you have.
Everyone worries about under preparing for an RPG, but the problem I find occurring constantly is running over the time limit. While events can be abstracted down to a roll and a line or two of narration, I find this is not as satisfying. No matter how I feel though, it is a nessessary evil if you want to keep the trains running on time. That said, my advice is to stay simple and glop on the info and resources. It is my goal to empower the players to a place where they can act. Along the way I want as much roleplaying as possible. For this to work I need my players on task (thus half the need for the directives) and I need to keep a pulse on the time. The shorter the game, the more generous I need to be enable my players to hit the finishing line on time.
I can always throw wrenches to put on the brakes if they are in danger of finishing ahead of schedule. What is much harder to do is to give them momentum once I've robbed them of information and resources. Using my structure/outline lets me plan what has to happen and how I can pace the material. Without it I have a finishing line and a desired time I want to reach it, but no sense of how to pace myself or how long the race should be in the first place.
Gain 1 XP when you accept the mission.
Gain 1 XP when you plan how you will steal the McGuffin.
Gain 1 XP when you escape with the McGuffin.
Gain 2 XP when you complete the mission. (complete, does not imply success. Could be failure as well. Either way it is complete.)
Pretty simple stuff, but important! You see, as a mission based game you really have two major phases of play: legwork and action. You plan the thing, then you do the thing. The rubber hits the road when you try to do so in a timely manner. Our GM did not put out these directives and instead pushed us into action based on time. Thus we went in without a plan and wasted a bunch of time trying to improvise a solution. In the end the GM basicly gave us the win, even though we had never even made a plan, let alone done the thing in question (steal a mcguffin in a building we never even stepped foot inside of).
Thus I had my starship troopers moment where I was being given a medal for first place in a race I took fourth in. I didn't earn it and it sucked. But why did this happen? Well, we didn't have a plan (and the GM was being too catty with info for us to have gotten it done in the time allotted). Neither did the GM! You see, while the structure tells us players what we have to do, it serves double duty. If you have 3 hours to play you should expect an hour of that to be social/pre/post run stuff. You all have to gather as players and get settled. Then you have to get the mission before you may begin it and finally, you have to get paid once you finish the job. You have two hours left, cut that in half for each phase remaining and you have a general idea of how quickly things should be moving along. It may not be exact, but it gives you a feel for things.
6:00 session begins.
6:30 Begin legwork.
7:30 Action begins.
8:30 wrap up begins.
9:00 session closes.
You have our timetable, now how do you keep to it? Time dilation and simplicity. The simpler the job, the less info the group needs up front. If the mission is to knock over a 7/11, the group does not need to know where the register and safe are in advance, they have time to do the legwork to find out. If you instead decide you want to run an extraction of a general from a highly guarded military base in that same time, you need to give them much more information out of the gate. From there you use dialation to maintain the correct flow. Do you role play the characters meeting with their contact or handle it with a few lines of narration? Do you play out a side operation or abstract it down to a single roll? All depends on how much time you have.
Everyone worries about under preparing for an RPG, but the problem I find occurring constantly is running over the time limit. While events can be abstracted down to a roll and a line or two of narration, I find this is not as satisfying. No matter how I feel though, it is a nessessary evil if you want to keep the trains running on time. That said, my advice is to stay simple and glop on the info and resources. It is my goal to empower the players to a place where they can act. Along the way I want as much roleplaying as possible. For this to work I need my players on task (thus half the need for the directives) and I need to keep a pulse on the time. The shorter the game, the more generous I need to be enable my players to hit the finishing line on time.
I can always throw wrenches to put on the brakes if they are in danger of finishing ahead of schedule. What is much harder to do is to give them momentum once I've robbed them of information and resources. Using my structure/outline lets me plan what has to happen and how I can pace the material. Without it I have a finishing line and a desired time I want to reach it, but no sense of how to pace myself or how long the race should be in the first place.