cybereverything
Initiate Douchebag
Posts: 15
Preferred Game Systems: Narrative
Currently Playing: Cortex+ (mostly) not-quite Steampunk Pirate Viking...thing.
Currently Running: rotating GM for above
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Post by cybereverything on Jun 2, 2017 23:03:10 GMT -8
Through my own underplanning, I've now got three characters being escorted by an experienced NPC on a wild game hunt in an idiosyncratic island colony. I know it's been done - I mean, we all know that players love to hunt bears - but for some reason I'm freezing up thinking of running the upcoming session where the active hunt happens.
I have a vague sense that this is a type of 'timed event.' Also get that things outside the hunt itself will happen. Any other advice? Pitfalls?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2017 0:56:12 GMT -8
So they are going for a hunt on an island you say? Well, I'd run two hunts concurrently, the one where they go after game and the one where the game goes after them. I'm picturing a jungle/rain forest type setting which means all kinds of potential nasty things live on the island. Big cats, boar, giant/venomous snakes, primates, goats (not scary until you are on a precarious cliff and it decides to head butt you). Lots of things to choose from.
Make sure they hear lots of things they can't see. Describe the crazy yowling, hooting, or grunting noises they hear along with the rustle of underbrush or the scraping of rocks. When they can see things, don't have them be in immediate shot range. Nothing is quite so frustrating/exiting as seeing an animal on a ridge line and knowing you aren't likely to catch up with it.
Hunting, especially trophy hunting (since just not any animal will do), is often grueling work. If its not work, its sitting uncomfortable while your freeze/sweat your ass off. The work and the discomfort doesn't end after you finally get your shot either. Then you still have to go get your harvest and do the harvesting before the meat spoils (the one upside of freezing your ass off is that is lengthens the time before meat spoils).
If you want to TLDR and you have Netflix, I reccomend watching a show called MeatEater with Steven Rinella. He does a podcast by the same name, but I don't think it will be ass helpful for you in trying to get a leg up on what a hunt might be like.
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Post by lowkeyoh on Jun 3, 2017 1:01:52 GMT -8
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cybereverything
Initiate Douchebag
Posts: 15
Preferred Game Systems: Narrative
Currently Playing: Cortex+ (mostly) not-quite Steampunk Pirate Viking...thing.
Currently Running: rotating GM for above
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Post by cybereverything on Jun 3, 2017 12:35:12 GMT -8
lowkeyoh - Cortex+, aka the Leverage system. Modified, because primary GM can't do anything unmodified. I'm currently calling it 'The Bicameral Cortex+'. @steven - thank you for the rec for a show, and thereby also reminding me to go bother a friend who is a bowhunter. These are provision boars more than trophy boars. These characters are even more city folk than I am, so the strangeness is totally something to ramp up.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2017 14:06:14 GMT -8
lowkeyoh - Cortex+, aka the Leverage system. Modified, because primary GM can't do anything unmodified. I'm currently calling it 'The Bicameral Cortex+'. @steven - thank you for the rec for a show, and thereby also reminding me to go bother a friend who is a bowhunter. These are provision boars more than trophy boars. These characters are even more city folk than I am, so the strangeness is totally something to ramp up. Now that I know you are focused on boar I can give you some specific info. Pig Hunting Story by Steven RinellaGuide to Hunting Wild Pigs in California Courtesy of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. It's a pdf, so it may try to download. Just for your knowledge. Depending on how fantastic you want to make your game, hoggzilla is very much a kind of urban myth. Might be a cool thing if you want something that could hunt the party back. A giant man-eating boar is always a fun addition to a game, right?
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Post by stork on Jun 4, 2017 9:31:05 GMT -8
My first thought is once they hunt and kill a boar, it draws the attention of the leader who is a WareboarBTW.... it seems that a group of wild pigs is a Sounder of Swine
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Post by stork on Jun 4, 2017 9:37:31 GMT -8
My other thought is that the NPC is actually a hunt master, who arranges humanoid hunts for his twisted noble princeling master. He's not leading them to hunt boars, he's leading them out to become the hunted.
DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN
But maybe that's too much of a dick move. It will set up a clear villain in the players mind though. They will spend the rest of their adventure trying to get back at that guy.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2017 16:45:30 GMT -8
My other thought is that the NPC is actually a hunt master, who arranges humanoid hunts for his twisted noble princeling master. He's not leading them to hunt boars, he's leading them out to become the hunted. DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN But maybe that's too much of a dick move. It will set up a clear villain in the players mind though. They will spend the rest of their adventure trying to get back at that guy. You can always go the hannibal route and have him leading them out to be food for the pigs too. "Just stay here, I'm going to go have a look up ahead." Great way to mug people and have the bodies go missing in one fell swoop. Pigs attack and eat them, you go back through and scavenge after.
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Post by chronovore on Jun 6, 2017 1:31:29 GMT -8
Through my own underplanning, I've now got three characters being escorted by an experienced NPC on a wild game hunt in an idiosyncratic island colony. I know it's been done - I mean, we all know that players love to hunt bears - but for some reason I'm freezing up thinking of running the upcoming session where the active hunt happens. I have a vague sense that this is a type of 'timed event.' Also get that things outside the hunt itself will happen. Any other advice? Pitfalls? I will admit this made me laugh aloud. The central HJRPG tenet that PCs will ignore your best-laid plans and unwittingly demand a fully improvised encounter is central to its ethos. How about for the ticking clock, but keeping it flexible, having it be a competition where the first hunter to bag two boar is the winner? That way you can impose tension without having it be "before midday" or "TWOOOO DAAAAAYS."
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