The players decided to gather up Mia'thos to help them with this session. Cinderbite, Mia'thos, Khart'ka, and Roderan all hid in the back of the wagon while Dirk drove it.
To keep the players on their toes, I put in several pre-ambush encounters. Most of them were just people asking what they were doing, but one was a potential ambush from humans that was pretty easy for players to bully their way out of. One of the encounters was a baby crying in an alley, which the players chose to ignore. Fortunately for them, it was the Kenku using their mimic ability to try and trap the wagon in a narrow and deadly alley.
The Kenku had to change their plans and ran across the rooftops (their known method of travel) to set up an ambush deeper in the district. One Kenku snuck up behind the cart, one came from an alley in front, and two were firing arrows from the rooftops. The beginning of the encounter did not go well for the players. The Kenku made a pincushion out of Dirk, who didn't manage to get under the cart fast enough. Cinderbite did a nifty acrobatic trick to swing out of the wagon and crawl along underneath it in order to get into a better position. Once the players managed to extricate themselves from the cart, they managed to get Dirk healed and to take down the Kenku in the street. Unfortunately, my players forgot to announce that they were going for nonlethal finishing blows, which they needed to question the Kenku. I figured that was a pretty reasonable "rookie adventurer" error, especially in the heat of combat, so I didn't allow them to take back the oversight (in a different circumstance, I may have, but it made good roleplaying sense for it to be an oversight). By the time the players realized they needed a body, the remaining Kenku were on the rooftops peppering them with arrows. In the interest of survival, they shot the Kenku down instead of managing to capture any of them.
I hadn't exactly prepared for that oversight. The players decided to wait around hoping that more Kenku would show up. Instead, a halfling detective strolled up to the players. He introduced himself and said that he had been following the Kenku for a while figuring that they had made enough enemies. He offered to take them for 25 gold, which my players stubbornly refused to pay. They tried to follow up on several other options, but short of hiring a new detective, no one had known where the Kenku were staying! Roderan, the good cleric, eventually ended up acquiescing stating that gold wasn't worth not keeping the community safe and he paid the entire fee himself (I gave him Inspiration for that definitively selfless act).
The halfling led the players to the Kenku hideout in an abandoned part of the city, a three story building that really was more like a tower on the corner of the street. The halfling explained these were a kind of building project to house the poor, a "project" if you will, but that the crafting quality of these building was so low and location was so bad that living in them wound up being more detrimental than finding other slums to reside in.
Cinder scrambled up the side of the building with the plan of going in from the top while the main group came in from the bottom. The plan was set up to prevent any of the Kenku from escaping, and it worked amazingly. I had originally planned for the Kenku to flee out the window on the third floor and to force the players into a series of skill checks that would be a rooftop chase, but their good planning trapped the Kenku in a death spiral. It was a tough fight, but the Kenku and their Blood Hawks couldn't match up to the players who were much better prepared this time around. One hilarious moment occurred when one of the Blood Hawks landed a critical hit on Dirk, which I described as having the razor sharp beak plunge through the meaty part of his arm through to the other side. He was delirious with pain until the clerics healed him.
Meanwhile, the Kenku were rushing up the stairs to escape...right into the waiting sword of Cinderbite. It was a good fight, but the players wound up making mincemeat of the Kenku. They kept one alive this time, though by their count (and the halfling detective's) they thought that they had captured or killed all of the Kenku.
They proceeded to investigate the rest of the tower, wondering if they could turn it into a base of sorts, and they noticed there were some red fleshy things hanging from the ceiling in one room. Upon distant inspection from the door, there was either a sleeping or dead Kenku in that room as well, but there had been such a racket with the combat that it didn't make sense that the Kenku was sleeping. The open fired on the nesting stirges, who flew to feast on the players but were summarily put down by the party who had prepared for that encounter as well.
After all that combat and haggling with the detective, the session came to a close, with plans to start the next one questioning the last living Kenku on how he got into the city...
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Follow the Campaign 4: Trope Intros
As a DM, the greatest blessing you can have is a group of PCs who make a cohesive group and give you a rough idea of their goals and plans for the future. My players tend to come up with their own character concepts and rarely have goals set out from the beginning. That is, of course, a total valid character creation option, but it requires a DM to be a bit heavy handed in the initial tasks set before the party.
One of the most common roleplaying tropes to jump start a slow-moving game is "cultists burst into the room and attack you! One leaves behind a clue to where they might be." I decided to use this trope by replacing "cultists" with "undead." Cinderbite, the elven ranger, has a history of hating undead and the rest of my players fall into the "Good" category, so I figured it would be an easy enough excuse to make them react.
The players were resting up from their prior adventure when they heard screaming in the streets. They rushed out to figure out what the problem was. Some citizens had no idea, they were just running because other people were running, but finally the players found someone who told them that she had seen the dead walking in the streets.
The players rushed forward to make combat with several groups of strung out undead, tracing their path (and the screams) towards the graveyard. Someone in a second story building opened their window to warn the players that the dead were coming from that way and for them to turn around. The implication by that encounter was that "someone else would take care of it." Since the game is set in a city, I wanted to foster that idea of a presence of a police force. One of the things that is supposed to set the player characters apart as they move forward is that they take accountability and step up to react to situations instead of just letting someone else handle it.
As Cinderbite, Khart'ka, Dirk, and Roderan (Mia'thos was missing this session) approached the graveyard, zombies began pouring out. I don't generally make "enough bad guys until XYZ event happens" but I wanted to in this scenario for two reasons: 1) It's our first time playing 5th edition and I wanted to push the boundaries of challenge to see how combat in the system feels and 2) to once again hammer home that point of a definitive presence of police and other heroes in the city. In fact, the first person I planned to have arrive on the scene after the players is an arrogant paladin (who would decapitate a few zombies and save any dying players) followed by the city guard rolling in a few rounds later to mop up the remainder.
It turns out that the answer to question 1) was that at first level, 5th edition is pretty unforgiving, and a few unfortunate rolls can end in serious calamity for the PCs. After only about four zombies, instead of the dozen I imagined, my players were strictly on the struggle bus, as the undead encounters prior had tapped them pretty heavily.
Nonetheless, the PCs were hailed as heroes for being the first responders to the scene and helping to contain the threat instead of allowing it to spread out over the neighborhood, potentially resulting in additional deaths. The result of the encounter was having a merchant by the name of Jalan Awnson approach the players and ask them to come by his place on the next day for paid work. (Side note: I occasionally craft NPCs based on other fictional characters, Jalan Awnson is based on Alan Johnson from the BBC comedy Peepshow, which is on Netflix and very hilarious).
The players found Jalan Awnson's Emporium, a large multi-purpose shop of a merchant who is clearly quite successful but not necessarily one of the most powerful merchants in the city. As a reminder, Leyhaven is roughly crafted on Venice, and the merchants have a very strong influence on the city, and in fact, they organize and run the City Guard. Jalan creeped the players out with his overconfident tone and tendency to tent his pointer and pinkie fingers while speaking. I purposefully made Jalan a "too slick" merchant type, but the deal he was offering was entirely on the up-and-up. My players did a little vetting of him around the city after the encounter just to make sure though.
Jalan offered the group 150 gold to exterminate a flock of Kenkus (crow people) that had been raiding his shipments. He felt that they were specifically targeting his wares, though it was clear that the gang had been jumping other merchant wagons traveling through the city as well. More specifically, Jalan wanted the players to find out where the Kenku threat was finding their information from, and he outwardly suspected a rival merchant or a corrupt guard at the city gate (remember, the guards are ALSO paid by the merchants) of being the source of this new threat.
Awesomely, my players spent the rest of the session being very cautious and information gathering to make sure they wouldn't be stepping on anyone's toes by carrying out this task. They got burned in my last campaign by fetching someone for a wizard without asking questions about the task, so it is definitely exciting to watch them grow as players.
The players focused most of their efforts on researching what exactly the Kenku gang was. I hadn't planned for this portion of the game, so there was a fair amount of improvisation involved. The first place they went to was a seedy tavern in the poor district where this Kenku gang seemed to carry out most of their activities. Our first exchange went like this:
DM: "You go to a tavern called the....uh.."
Dirk: "Rolling Rhino"
DM: "Sure, the Rolling Rhino. The bartender is a half-orc who has one tusk" *Cue laughter*
These kinds of little improvisational moments make for the best kind of D&D. Rhino, the half-orc bartender with a penchant for not so creative names, is a pretty basic bartender, happy to help the players out as long as they tip well. He is and will probably remain a mainstay for quests that start off in the seedy district of town, and it came from a three line momentary exchange. I wrote the name down and we continued on. Rhino informed the players that everyone hates the Kenku in this part of the city and no one seems to know where they came from. That was good news for the players not stepping on anybody's toes, but they wanted to double check their answer. The players also made a wise choice in this interaction I wanted to point out, only two of the four PCs went out, Dirk (the shady local rogue) and Khart'ka (the liberally tipping diplomat). The PCs chose their best players for interacting with the situation which really helped in the interaction. A fair amount of my NPCs will be nervous when approached by a group of 4-5 players. As hard-boiled detectives from crime novels would lead you to believe, it feels more natural to open up to a person or two than it does to a large group. I appreciate that my players followed this kind of "social construct" in a game where "never split the party" is said far too often.
The players went to double-check their information so they went to the Cockroach, a gross open air street bar owned by a disgusting and disgraced high elf who makes more of his money from information peddling than from his crappy bar (another spur of the moment character creation). For a few more coin, the Roach confirmed the information the players had received.
The players followed up at the guard gate but could find little information from them. So they took the wagon of Jalan's that was meant to be a shipment of his, and prepared for their counter ambush. The plan was to have Dirk drive the wagon, and hopefully he'd be able to feign death when the Kenku ambush occurred. When the Kenkus came up to the wagon, surprise!, PC counterattack.
We ended the session on that precipice.
One of the most common roleplaying tropes to jump start a slow-moving game is "cultists burst into the room and attack you! One leaves behind a clue to where they might be." I decided to use this trope by replacing "cultists" with "undead." Cinderbite, the elven ranger, has a history of hating undead and the rest of my players fall into the "Good" category, so I figured it would be an easy enough excuse to make them react.
The players were resting up from their prior adventure when they heard screaming in the streets. They rushed out to figure out what the problem was. Some citizens had no idea, they were just running because other people were running, but finally the players found someone who told them that she had seen the dead walking in the streets.
The players rushed forward to make combat with several groups of strung out undead, tracing their path (and the screams) towards the graveyard. Someone in a second story building opened their window to warn the players that the dead were coming from that way and for them to turn around. The implication by that encounter was that "someone else would take care of it." Since the game is set in a city, I wanted to foster that idea of a presence of a police force. One of the things that is supposed to set the player characters apart as they move forward is that they take accountability and step up to react to situations instead of just letting someone else handle it.
As Cinderbite, Khart'ka, Dirk, and Roderan (Mia'thos was missing this session) approached the graveyard, zombies began pouring out. I don't generally make "enough bad guys until XYZ event happens" but I wanted to in this scenario for two reasons: 1) It's our first time playing 5th edition and I wanted to push the boundaries of challenge to see how combat in the system feels and 2) to once again hammer home that point of a definitive presence of police and other heroes in the city. In fact, the first person I planned to have arrive on the scene after the players is an arrogant paladin (who would decapitate a few zombies and save any dying players) followed by the city guard rolling in a few rounds later to mop up the remainder.
It turns out that the answer to question 1) was that at first level, 5th edition is pretty unforgiving, and a few unfortunate rolls can end in serious calamity for the PCs. After only about four zombies, instead of the dozen I imagined, my players were strictly on the struggle bus, as the undead encounters prior had tapped them pretty heavily.
Nonetheless, the PCs were hailed as heroes for being the first responders to the scene and helping to contain the threat instead of allowing it to spread out over the neighborhood, potentially resulting in additional deaths. The result of the encounter was having a merchant by the name of Jalan Awnson approach the players and ask them to come by his place on the next day for paid work. (Side note: I occasionally craft NPCs based on other fictional characters, Jalan Awnson is based on Alan Johnson from the BBC comedy Peepshow, which is on Netflix and very hilarious).
The players found Jalan Awnson's Emporium, a large multi-purpose shop of a merchant who is clearly quite successful but not necessarily one of the most powerful merchants in the city. As a reminder, Leyhaven is roughly crafted on Venice, and the merchants have a very strong influence on the city, and in fact, they organize and run the City Guard. Jalan creeped the players out with his overconfident tone and tendency to tent his pointer and pinkie fingers while speaking. I purposefully made Jalan a "too slick" merchant type, but the deal he was offering was entirely on the up-and-up. My players did a little vetting of him around the city after the encounter just to make sure though.
Jalan offered the group 150 gold to exterminate a flock of Kenkus (crow people) that had been raiding his shipments. He felt that they were specifically targeting his wares, though it was clear that the gang had been jumping other merchant wagons traveling through the city as well. More specifically, Jalan wanted the players to find out where the Kenku threat was finding their information from, and he outwardly suspected a rival merchant or a corrupt guard at the city gate (remember, the guards are ALSO paid by the merchants) of being the source of this new threat.
Awesomely, my players spent the rest of the session being very cautious and information gathering to make sure they wouldn't be stepping on anyone's toes by carrying out this task. They got burned in my last campaign by fetching someone for a wizard without asking questions about the task, so it is definitely exciting to watch them grow as players.
The players focused most of their efforts on researching what exactly the Kenku gang was. I hadn't planned for this portion of the game, so there was a fair amount of improvisation involved. The first place they went to was a seedy tavern in the poor district where this Kenku gang seemed to carry out most of their activities. Our first exchange went like this:
DM: "You go to a tavern called the....uh.."
Dirk: "Rolling Rhino"
DM: "Sure, the Rolling Rhino. The bartender is a half-orc who has one tusk" *Cue laughter*
These kinds of little improvisational moments make for the best kind of D&D. Rhino, the half-orc bartender with a penchant for not so creative names, is a pretty basic bartender, happy to help the players out as long as they tip well. He is and will probably remain a mainstay for quests that start off in the seedy district of town, and it came from a three line momentary exchange. I wrote the name down and we continued on. Rhino informed the players that everyone hates the Kenku in this part of the city and no one seems to know where they came from. That was good news for the players not stepping on anybody's toes, but they wanted to double check their answer. The players also made a wise choice in this interaction I wanted to point out, only two of the four PCs went out, Dirk (the shady local rogue) and Khart'ka (the liberally tipping diplomat). The PCs chose their best players for interacting with the situation which really helped in the interaction. A fair amount of my NPCs will be nervous when approached by a group of 4-5 players. As hard-boiled detectives from crime novels would lead you to believe, it feels more natural to open up to a person or two than it does to a large group. I appreciate that my players followed this kind of "social construct" in a game where "never split the party" is said far too often.
The players went to double-check their information so they went to the Cockroach, a gross open air street bar owned by a disgusting and disgraced high elf who makes more of his money from information peddling than from his crappy bar (another spur of the moment character creation). For a few more coin, the Roach confirmed the information the players had received.
The players followed up at the guard gate but could find little information from them. So they took the wagon of Jalan's that was meant to be a shipment of his, and prepared for their counter ambush. The plan was to have Dirk drive the wagon, and hopefully he'd be able to feign death when the Kenku ambush occurred. When the Kenkus came up to the wagon, surprise!, PC counterattack.
We ended the session on that precipice.
Sunday, November 2, 2014
DMing 101: Making awesome BBEGs
The PCs are the protagonists of the collaborative story that is roleplaying. As the DM, your job is to create engaging villains. Many campaign arcs contain the idea of the Big Bad Evil Guy, BBEG, who the players are ultimately struggling against. The question we have to ask ourselves is, how do I make my players really want to take down the BBEG?
Note: Not all campaigns need to have a BBEG! This post is about those games that have one.
To create a BBEG that really engages your players, think through the 6 questions below:
What is BBEG's end goal?
It is really important for a BBEG to be working towards some goal. This should just be a one sentence phrase that says what will happen if the players fail to disrupt BBEG's plans.
-Gurak, the half-orc, half-elf high priest of Gruumsh,wants to kill all elves.
-Walter White wants to be the most powerful drug kingpin.
-Darth Vader wants to be an efficient galactic leader, which requires absolute control.
Why is that the BBEG's end goal?
Motivation is king. Villains can be evil for evil's sake and that works in a hack and slash style of game, but if you really want to make your villains believable then you need to ask WHY they are choosing to walk the path of wickedness. For certain villains the answer is inherent to the creature's nature, but I think this makes for black-and-white villains, which tend to be less interesting. When creating your villain's motivation, you want your players who find out to say, "Huh, wow. I kinda get that. Too bad I need to kill you anyway." For example, Gruumsh, the god of Orcs, wants to kill all elves. Gurak wants to kill all elves because an elvish adventuring party slaughtered his tribe but left him to live because of his half-elven blood. Who is the better villain, Gruumsh or Gurak? The answer is Gurak, because Gruumsh, by his very nature, MUST be evil because he just IS. Gurak, on the other hand, has a compelling story of why he chose the path that he did. When your villains have motivation, rather than just being evil, it is easier as a DM to figure out what actions your villain would take and for the PCs to buy into their villain.
-Walter White spent a lifetime being an unrecognized genius.
-Darth Vader has mommy issues and thinks he can fix everything.
What makes your BBEG different?
Any experienced player of rpgs is familiar with the concept of a BBEG and has watched, read, or roleplayed almost every single trope of villain. Using tropes is just fine, but you have to give your villain something that makes him, her, or it unique.
-Gurak is a half-elf and is self-loathing, a twist on the classic evil orc priest.
-Walter White is a desperate, dying, poor man who turns to crime, but it turns out that crime actually makes him feel more alive than he has his entire life prior.
-Darth Vader is Luke's father.
Giving your villains something unique and notable makes remembering them much more "sticky," which allows for a memorable experience with the villain.
What makes your BBEG awesome/dangerous/badass?
Something has to set your villain apart from the normal run-of-the-mill villain. The benefits of having awesome aspects to a villain are obvious: it's more exciting for the GM and it creates a very fun and terrifying image for your players to get behind. Fallen paladins are popular because there is something inherently badass about a shining star turning into a burning comet in black full plate. Maybe the villain has a really cool magical weapon or ability. Maybe the villain has a truly insane level of tenacity and zeal. Maybe the villain has a life perspective that is really similar to the PCs perspectives, but with a much darker conclusion.
-Gurak's hatred makes him an illogically powerful warrior under very stressful situations, kind of like a WWE wrestler on PCP
-Walter White has 99% purity heroin.
-Darth Vader has the Death Star, a red laser sword, and ranged choke attacks.
Spend a fair amount of time thinking about what your villain looks like as well.
-Gurak has long scars on the side of his head where his ears are supposed to be because he cut them off.
-Walter White is bald from chemo and has a dopey hat.
-Darth Vader is in a black robo-suit with a flowing black cape.
What makes your BBEG totally normal?
If the BBEG is just big and bad and evil and awesome and terrifying, he will certainly have a large cool factor. That being said, you should also design villains with a mundane touch. This serves several purposes:
1) it gives the idea that the villain could have been anyone, which is one of the most chilling concepts of evil in gaming and the real world
2) it can help inform your BBEG limitations (which we will talk about below)
3) it helps to remind the players that there are always more evils in the world, possibly those that are even more evil than their BBEG
-Gurak makes tactical mistakes in favor of vengeance
-Walter White wears tighty whities and is a bumbling idiot at many points
-Darth Vader has kids
What are your BBEG's limitations?
This is a really important question. In my opinion, there is no villain that is lamer than the lich who sits patiently in his arcane tower waiting for the adventurers to show up and kill him. Your villains should be active in the world and attempting to reach their goals, otherwise they aren't believable. So the question is, why is the BBEG incapable of having reached his goal already? Maybe the lich will die if he leaves his tower, so he sends his minions to do his bidding so that he can eventually escape the tower. A limitation does two things: for one, it explains why the villain hasn't succeeded yet, and second, it might give the players a way to hamper the villain before they go to the final confrontation.
-Gurak has the entire orcish horde under his command but lacks the arcane knowledge to cast the Genocide ritual
-Walter White leads a double life
-Darth Vader isn't the one who is actually in charge
If you can answer these 6 questions while crafting your BBEGs, you will already have a very good idea of who your villain is and what makes him, her, or it a dangerous force to be reckoned with. Happy villain crafting!
Note: Not all campaigns need to have a BBEG! This post is about those games that have one.
To create a BBEG that really engages your players, think through the 6 questions below:
What is BBEG's end goal?
It is really important for a BBEG to be working towards some goal. This should just be a one sentence phrase that says what will happen if the players fail to disrupt BBEG's plans.
-Gurak, the half-orc, half-elf high priest of Gruumsh,wants to kill all elves.
-Walter White wants to be the most powerful drug kingpin.
-Darth Vader wants to be an efficient galactic leader, which requires absolute control.
Why is that the BBEG's end goal?
Motivation is king. Villains can be evil for evil's sake and that works in a hack and slash style of game, but if you really want to make your villains believable then you need to ask WHY they are choosing to walk the path of wickedness. For certain villains the answer is inherent to the creature's nature, but I think this makes for black-and-white villains, which tend to be less interesting. When creating your villain's motivation, you want your players who find out to say, "Huh, wow. I kinda get that. Too bad I need to kill you anyway." For example, Gruumsh, the god of Orcs, wants to kill all elves. Gurak wants to kill all elves because an elvish adventuring party slaughtered his tribe but left him to live because of his half-elven blood. Who is the better villain, Gruumsh or Gurak? The answer is Gurak, because Gruumsh, by his very nature, MUST be evil because he just IS. Gurak, on the other hand, has a compelling story of why he chose the path that he did. When your villains have motivation, rather than just being evil, it is easier as a DM to figure out what actions your villain would take and for the PCs to buy into their villain.
-Walter White spent a lifetime being an unrecognized genius.
-Darth Vader has mommy issues and thinks he can fix everything.
What makes your BBEG different?
Any experienced player of rpgs is familiar with the concept of a BBEG and has watched, read, or roleplayed almost every single trope of villain. Using tropes is just fine, but you have to give your villain something that makes him, her, or it unique.
-Gurak is a half-elf and is self-loathing, a twist on the classic evil orc priest.
-Walter White is a desperate, dying, poor man who turns to crime, but it turns out that crime actually makes him feel more alive than he has his entire life prior.
-Darth Vader is Luke's father.
Giving your villains something unique and notable makes remembering them much more "sticky," which allows for a memorable experience with the villain.
What makes your BBEG awesome/dangerous/badass?
Something has to set your villain apart from the normal run-of-the-mill villain. The benefits of having awesome aspects to a villain are obvious: it's more exciting for the GM and it creates a very fun and terrifying image for your players to get behind. Fallen paladins are popular because there is something inherently badass about a shining star turning into a burning comet in black full plate. Maybe the villain has a really cool magical weapon or ability. Maybe the villain has a truly insane level of tenacity and zeal. Maybe the villain has a life perspective that is really similar to the PCs perspectives, but with a much darker conclusion.
-Gurak's hatred makes him an illogically powerful warrior under very stressful situations, kind of like a WWE wrestler on PCP
-Walter White has 99% purity heroin.
-Darth Vader has the Death Star, a red laser sword, and ranged choke attacks.
Spend a fair amount of time thinking about what your villain looks like as well.
-Gurak has long scars on the side of his head where his ears are supposed to be because he cut them off.
-Walter White is bald from chemo and has a dopey hat.
-Darth Vader is in a black robo-suit with a flowing black cape.
What makes your BBEG totally normal?
If the BBEG is just big and bad and evil and awesome and terrifying, he will certainly have a large cool factor. That being said, you should also design villains with a mundane touch. This serves several purposes:
1) it gives the idea that the villain could have been anyone, which is one of the most chilling concepts of evil in gaming and the real world
2) it can help inform your BBEG limitations (which we will talk about below)
3) it helps to remind the players that there are always more evils in the world, possibly those that are even more evil than their BBEG
-Gurak makes tactical mistakes in favor of vengeance
-Walter White wears tighty whities and is a bumbling idiot at many points
-Darth Vader has kids
What are your BBEG's limitations?
This is a really important question. In my opinion, there is no villain that is lamer than the lich who sits patiently in his arcane tower waiting for the adventurers to show up and kill him. Your villains should be active in the world and attempting to reach their goals, otherwise they aren't believable. So the question is, why is the BBEG incapable of having reached his goal already? Maybe the lich will die if he leaves his tower, so he sends his minions to do his bidding so that he can eventually escape the tower. A limitation does two things: for one, it explains why the villain hasn't succeeded yet, and second, it might give the players a way to hamper the villain before they go to the final confrontation.
-Gurak has the entire orcish horde under his command but lacks the arcane knowledge to cast the Genocide ritual
-Walter White leads a double life
-Darth Vader isn't the one who is actually in charge
If you can answer these 6 questions while crafting your BBEGs, you will already have a very good idea of who your villain is and what makes him, her, or it a dangerous force to be reckoned with. Happy villain crafting!
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Sunday, October 12, 2014
DMing 101: Yes, and...
My game running style is relatively off the cuff, I build skeleton structure
adventures and then fill the holes in with improvisation. You might be a
DM who prefers to plan everything out and to have all your characters established before you sit down at the head of the table. Even for the most hardened scheduler, there will ALWAYS be something the players do that surprises you. No matter how much of a planner you are, this DM 101 skill is going to help you become a more fluid and more fun Dungeon Master.
This skill is called "Yes, and...", and it is a boon to DMs and players alike. "Yes, and..." is a skill from improvisation which encourages actors to take a statement that someone made, no matter how ridiculous, accept it as true, and then expand on it.
You might be familiar with the show "Whose Line is it Anyway?" In the scene below, you can see examples of the actors playing along with every weird statement made (Why do you have a bow? It's quieter, I guess). At the end, Lauren Cohan accidentally kicks over Wayne, who gets up from the stage and proceeds to run away even though he is supposed to be the dangerous zombie. Taking something that happens and making it something cooler, bigger, or funnier is what "Yes, and..." is all about. Wayne could have gotten up from the stage and said "Hey! I'm a zombie, I'm supposed to be the dangerous one" but he chose the funnier route of accepting the ass-kicking he got.
In Dungeons & Dragons, the "Yes, and..." principle is primarily useful for two purposes: the first is progressing storylines and the second is for making awesome moments.
How does "Yes, and..." work?
In improvisation, someone starts off the scene by saying something. Using the principles of "Yes, and...", the second person takes that statement and adds information to it. This continues on and on until the scene reaches a climax. For instance:
Actor 1: "You're right, this cheesecake is delicious, thanks for taking me here!"
Actor 2: "Well, the truth is I didn't just take you here for the cheesecake. I think I want to spend the rest of my life with you"
A1: "Oh. Um, wow. This is just our third date."
A2: "Yeah, but sometimes you can just tell. My love for you is like the taste of the cheesecake"
From these four lines we have established that one person is head over the heels in love with the other after only three dates and we are set up for a hilariously awkward or emotionally painful scene depending on where the actors take it. Imagine if Actor 2 had instead said, "What? We've been going out for over a year!" One of the characters would be a liar or delusional, and as an audience member, you don't know which one is true. Using "Yes, and..." the actors reinforce each others' characters.
In D&D, the most egregious violation of "Yes, and..." that I see is when people say "Your character wouldn't do that." One of the biggest flaws of the alignment system in D&D is that it encourages exactly these kind of statements. "Oh, you're neutral good? You'd never, ever torture a living being to get information." People are much more complicated than 9 buckets of morality, and allowing a player to play his character exactly how he or she wants to play them is the crux of "Yes, and...". Of course, characters still need to deal with the consequences of their actions, but the key of the "Yes, and..." principle is allowing them to take those actions.
How can "Yes, and..." progress the story?
As a DM, I would have a talk with my group about the "Yes, and..." principle before starting the game. D&D is a collaborative storytelling game, and everyone needs to understand that in order to progress the story, players need to react to the scenarios that arise before them, and the DM understands that what the players choose to do should make an impact on how the story progresses (the opposite of this is commonly referred to as "railroading.")
The most extreme instance I had of this was when I ran a very short (three-session) home-brew horror campaign. I told the players that their characters would have a ton of reasons to leave the mansion they were in and try to escape, but that for whatever reason (curiosity, pushover, fear, bravery) they would choose to stay. My players didn't take the principle to heart and it forced me to create a somewhat unthematic circumstance that kept them on the property. The alternative was to allow them to leave and for the game to just end, which wouldn't be very fun for anyone. Getting your players to buy into "Yes, and..." can inspire a game to move along.
The very first time "Yes, and..." will come into play is when you introduce the players to one another. As D&D players we love to make fun of somewhat unrealistic scenarios where we instantly trust someone we meet. However, being accepting of circumstances like this are necessary for the game to run and for the story to unfold. There is nothing harder for a DM than having players create characters and then spend an hour arguing about "why should I even adventure with you?"
The same goes for players reacting to circumstances. If you have a woman wailing about her baby and your party says "I don't care" then you have a real problem on your hands. Even if your group is a crew of villainous scallywags, they could still go up to the woman and say "Why should I care?" which gives the woman the opportunity to say, "I'm the wealthy Duke's daughter."
"Yes, and..." doesn't tell you HOW you must react, just that you SHOULD be reacting with something more than "whatever."
As a DM, you use "Yes, and..." to progress the story. In my previous campaign, the players snuck into a dwarven city that was being besieged by a necromancer and his legions of dead. I wrote two adventure sequences, one where they traveled through a secret mountain passage to assassinate the necromancer, and the other where there was a full on invasion. My players opted for option 3, which was to go and speak with the necromancer to see what he wanted. When he explained that he wanted to get through to the Underdark to go in search of a Gem of great power, the players OFFERED to go get it for him. As a DM, I had to "Yes, and..." their creative solution to the problem and re-plan the course of the game. This lets players know that their decisions truly matter and led to a new series of interesting events.
How can "Yes, and..." make for awesome moments?
The most basic example of "Yes, and..." moments are when players say "I'm going to do this insane thing!" and you say "Sure, go for it." One of my players attempted to aggressively use Tree Shape to ram a person who was flying just out of reach. Another player then proceeded to climb the Tree and jump off of it in an attempt to grab the flying mage. Unfortunately, both of these players flubbed their rolls, but the moments were memorable (and imagine how memorable they would have been if they worked!).
Another time, my players encountered an extremely dim-witted Ettin who enjoyed carving rocks more than his full profession of raising Giant, Violent Beetles. They talked him into giving up his life of violence and they supported his artistry by spreading rumors of the quality of his work in the nearest underground city. I had absolutely no expectation that my players would try this and it was so damn cool that I had to use the principle of "Yes, and..." to encourage the behavior (in general, I think most approaches to problems that aren't violence should be rewarded in D&D).
A word of caution about using "Yes, and..." though. There is certainly a limit of allowable realism. Sure, you can climb up the wall and try to jump off at the flying mage, but your odds of doing it fast enough and successfully grabbing him are very, very low. Sure, you can eat the demonic foci instead of allowing them to complete their ritual, but your stomach might burst into flames. Sure, you can try to persuade the mind flayer to let your friend have his brain back, but it just isn't going to work.
Let me know when you've successfully (or unsuccessfully) used the "Yes, and..." principle in your games in the comments below!
This skill is called "Yes, and...", and it is a boon to DMs and players alike. "Yes, and..." is a skill from improvisation which encourages actors to take a statement that someone made, no matter how ridiculous, accept it as true, and then expand on it.
You might be familiar with the show "Whose Line is it Anyway?" In the scene below, you can see examples of the actors playing along with every weird statement made (Why do you have a bow? It's quieter, I guess). At the end, Lauren Cohan accidentally kicks over Wayne, who gets up from the stage and proceeds to run away even though he is supposed to be the dangerous zombie. Taking something that happens and making it something cooler, bigger, or funnier is what "Yes, and..." is all about. Wayne could have gotten up from the stage and said "Hey! I'm a zombie, I'm supposed to be the dangerous one" but he chose the funnier route of accepting the ass-kicking he got.
In Dungeons & Dragons, the "Yes, and..." principle is primarily useful for two purposes: the first is progressing storylines and the second is for making awesome moments.
How does "Yes, and..." work?
In improvisation, someone starts off the scene by saying something. Using the principles of "Yes, and...", the second person takes that statement and adds information to it. This continues on and on until the scene reaches a climax. For instance:
Actor 1: "You're right, this cheesecake is delicious, thanks for taking me here!"
Actor 2: "Well, the truth is I didn't just take you here for the cheesecake. I think I want to spend the rest of my life with you"
A1: "Oh. Um, wow. This is just our third date."
A2: "Yeah, but sometimes you can just tell. My love for you is like the taste of the cheesecake"
From these four lines we have established that one person is head over the heels in love with the other after only three dates and we are set up for a hilariously awkward or emotionally painful scene depending on where the actors take it. Imagine if Actor 2 had instead said, "What? We've been going out for over a year!" One of the characters would be a liar or delusional, and as an audience member, you don't know which one is true. Using "Yes, and..." the actors reinforce each others' characters.
In D&D, the most egregious violation of "Yes, and..." that I see is when people say "Your character wouldn't do that." One of the biggest flaws of the alignment system in D&D is that it encourages exactly these kind of statements. "Oh, you're neutral good? You'd never, ever torture a living being to get information." People are much more complicated than 9 buckets of morality, and allowing a player to play his character exactly how he or she wants to play them is the crux of "Yes, and...". Of course, characters still need to deal with the consequences of their actions, but the key of the "Yes, and..." principle is allowing them to take those actions.
How can "Yes, and..." progress the story?
As a DM, I would have a talk with my group about the "Yes, and..." principle before starting the game. D&D is a collaborative storytelling game, and everyone needs to understand that in order to progress the story, players need to react to the scenarios that arise before them, and the DM understands that what the players choose to do should make an impact on how the story progresses (the opposite of this is commonly referred to as "railroading.")
The most extreme instance I had of this was when I ran a very short (three-session) home-brew horror campaign. I told the players that their characters would have a ton of reasons to leave the mansion they were in and try to escape, but that for whatever reason (curiosity, pushover, fear, bravery) they would choose to stay. My players didn't take the principle to heart and it forced me to create a somewhat unthematic circumstance that kept them on the property. The alternative was to allow them to leave and for the game to just end, which wouldn't be very fun for anyone. Getting your players to buy into "Yes, and..." can inspire a game to move along.
The very first time "Yes, and..." will come into play is when you introduce the players to one another. As D&D players we love to make fun of somewhat unrealistic scenarios where we instantly trust someone we meet. However, being accepting of circumstances like this are necessary for the game to run and for the story to unfold. There is nothing harder for a DM than having players create characters and then spend an hour arguing about "why should I even adventure with you?"
The same goes for players reacting to circumstances. If you have a woman wailing about her baby and your party says "I don't care" then you have a real problem on your hands. Even if your group is a crew of villainous scallywags, they could still go up to the woman and say "Why should I care?" which gives the woman the opportunity to say, "I'm the wealthy Duke's daughter."
"Yes, and..." doesn't tell you HOW you must react, just that you SHOULD be reacting with something more than "whatever."
As a DM, you use "Yes, and..." to progress the story. In my previous campaign, the players snuck into a dwarven city that was being besieged by a necromancer and his legions of dead. I wrote two adventure sequences, one where they traveled through a secret mountain passage to assassinate the necromancer, and the other where there was a full on invasion. My players opted for option 3, which was to go and speak with the necromancer to see what he wanted. When he explained that he wanted to get through to the Underdark to go in search of a Gem of great power, the players OFFERED to go get it for him. As a DM, I had to "Yes, and..." their creative solution to the problem and re-plan the course of the game. This lets players know that their decisions truly matter and led to a new series of interesting events.
How can "Yes, and..." make for awesome moments?
The most basic example of "Yes, and..." moments are when players say "I'm going to do this insane thing!" and you say "Sure, go for it." One of my players attempted to aggressively use Tree Shape to ram a person who was flying just out of reach. Another player then proceeded to climb the Tree and jump off of it in an attempt to grab the flying mage. Unfortunately, both of these players flubbed their rolls, but the moments were memorable (and imagine how memorable they would have been if they worked!).
Another time, my players encountered an extremely dim-witted Ettin who enjoyed carving rocks more than his full profession of raising Giant, Violent Beetles. They talked him into giving up his life of violence and they supported his artistry by spreading rumors of the quality of his work in the nearest underground city. I had absolutely no expectation that my players would try this and it was so damn cool that I had to use the principle of "Yes, and..." to encourage the behavior (in general, I think most approaches to problems that aren't violence should be rewarded in D&D).
A word of caution about using "Yes, and..." though. There is certainly a limit of allowable realism. Sure, you can climb up the wall and try to jump off at the flying mage, but your odds of doing it fast enough and successfully grabbing him are very, very low. Sure, you can eat the demonic foci instead of allowing them to complete their ritual, but your stomach might burst into flames. Sure, you can try to persuade the mind flayer to let your friend have his brain back, but it just isn't going to work.
Let me know when you've successfully (or unsuccessfully) used the "Yes, and..." principle in your games in the comments below!
Sunday, October 5, 2014
Follow the Campaign 2: Meet the PCs
There are 5 players in my gaming group. All 5 are friends or relatives of mine. All of my players are there to have a good time, and we mix a fair amount of in game banter with out of game banter over the course of play.
A/Mia'thos: A has been playing since high school but is in the bottom half of the group in terms of raw hours played. While he did spend some time in college playing, it did not last for very long. A tends to play characters with big personalities and does an excellent job of describing how his characters cast their spells or swing their swords.
Mia'thos is a tiefling warlock. Mia'thos was raised in a life of slavery in The Fingers. He is a good character but he made a pact with Dispater, the lord of the second level of Hell, to give him the power to break his shackles and affect change. Unfortunately, he now owes Dispater 8 favors - so the question is will Mia'thos be able to walk the path of the righteous or will the lure of hellish powers and his tiefling heritage drag him into darkness?
E/Khart'ka: E is the newest player in our group, she started at the beginning of the last campaign. She started nervously, but has come to really embrace the game and is arguably the strongest roleplayer of the entire group despite being the least experienced. E also has a historical preference for science fiction over fantasy, mostly because she does not enjoy the black/white nature of Tolkien style high fantasies.
Khart'ka is a dragonborn cleric of Bahamut, god of Good dragons and the Tempest. E originally described the concept of Khart'ka as being "like a Klingon. A warrior-poet, but more awesome." Khart'ka hails from a matriarchal tribe in the Arak steppes, and she carries the dead ashes of their saint to give her strength. E likes approaching character creation organically, and we shall see how the character develops, but she has already established a hilarious blessing of "May Bahamut burn you" that garners strange looks and anger from strangers.
J/Dirk: J started playing some form of D&D in middle school, but didn't play terribly much in college. He has on occasion played with another group that he describes as somewhat more chaotic. J is an avid reader and I think this helps him create characters in the sense that he tends to have the most fleshed out character concepts. On the other hand, J occasionally gets bored with his characters over time. He also accidentally has a reputation for being the guy who dies the most, because...uh, he dies the most.
Dirk is a dashing human rogue who has given up a life of piracy. The only Leyhaven local, Dirk returned to Leyhaven after being spurned by the only woman he ever truly loved. Good at heart but greedy at the surface, Dirk loves to tell tall tales. His desire to be free and wander the world comes from the simple life that his parents lead running a wand shop, Wanderland, in Leyhaven.
K/Cinder: K is the most experienced of my players, having played from a young age and throughout his entire life. K isn't a true min/maxer, but his familiarity with the rules certainly lends itself to building some of the most powerful characters. K doesn't general build 'group leader' characters, but often falls into that role or of relatively highly regarded opinion because of his experience.
Cinderbite is a "wood" elf ranger from the Wolom Ravine. Cinderbite is from a tribe of wandering scavengers that has a pragmatic view of the world. Tribes in the Wolom Ravine use undead for labor, but undead used for harm or evil are viewed as pure anathema to those such as Cinderbite. She left her home to travel the world.
V/Roderan: V has most of his experience playing from college with 4th edition, and I actually can't remember if that was his first experience or not. We like to tease V for playing characters that are just V with swords or spells, but he has actually become much better recently at playing out his character. Interestingly, V chose to randomly roll for his ideals, backgrounds, traits, and flaws in this campaign as per the 5e rulebook.
Roderan is a dwarven cleric of Ula, goddess of the hills. Roderan is a life cleric, devoted to saving others. He is a pilgrim of sorts, spreading the good word of Ula and helping those in need. His most notable quirk so far is his penchant for citing scriptures to advise action. Whether those scriptures are accurately remembered or not is a different matter.
A/Mia'thos: A has been playing since high school but is in the bottom half of the group in terms of raw hours played. While he did spend some time in college playing, it did not last for very long. A tends to play characters with big personalities and does an excellent job of describing how his characters cast their spells or swing their swords.
Mia'thos is a tiefling warlock. Mia'thos was raised in a life of slavery in The Fingers. He is a good character but he made a pact with Dispater, the lord of the second level of Hell, to give him the power to break his shackles and affect change. Unfortunately, he now owes Dispater 8 favors - so the question is will Mia'thos be able to walk the path of the righteous or will the lure of hellish powers and his tiefling heritage drag him into darkness?
E/Khart'ka: E is the newest player in our group, she started at the beginning of the last campaign. She started nervously, but has come to really embrace the game and is arguably the strongest roleplayer of the entire group despite being the least experienced. E also has a historical preference for science fiction over fantasy, mostly because she does not enjoy the black/white nature of Tolkien style high fantasies.
Khart'ka is a dragonborn cleric of Bahamut, god of Good dragons and the Tempest. E originally described the concept of Khart'ka as being "like a Klingon. A warrior-poet, but more awesome." Khart'ka hails from a matriarchal tribe in the Arak steppes, and she carries the dead ashes of their saint to give her strength. E likes approaching character creation organically, and we shall see how the character develops, but she has already established a hilarious blessing of "May Bahamut burn you" that garners strange looks and anger from strangers.
J/Dirk: J started playing some form of D&D in middle school, but didn't play terribly much in college. He has on occasion played with another group that he describes as somewhat more chaotic. J is an avid reader and I think this helps him create characters in the sense that he tends to have the most fleshed out character concepts. On the other hand, J occasionally gets bored with his characters over time. He also accidentally has a reputation for being the guy who dies the most, because...uh, he dies the most.
Dirk is a dashing human rogue who has given up a life of piracy. The only Leyhaven local, Dirk returned to Leyhaven after being spurned by the only woman he ever truly loved. Good at heart but greedy at the surface, Dirk loves to tell tall tales. His desire to be free and wander the world comes from the simple life that his parents lead running a wand shop, Wanderland, in Leyhaven.
K/Cinder: K is the most experienced of my players, having played from a young age and throughout his entire life. K isn't a true min/maxer, but his familiarity with the rules certainly lends itself to building some of the most powerful characters. K doesn't general build 'group leader' characters, but often falls into that role or of relatively highly regarded opinion because of his experience.
Cinderbite is a "wood" elf ranger from the Wolom Ravine. Cinderbite is from a tribe of wandering scavengers that has a pragmatic view of the world. Tribes in the Wolom Ravine use undead for labor, but undead used for harm or evil are viewed as pure anathema to those such as Cinderbite. She left her home to travel the world.
V/Roderan: V has most of his experience playing from college with 4th edition, and I actually can't remember if that was his first experience or not. We like to tease V for playing characters that are just V with swords or spells, but he has actually become much better recently at playing out his character. Interestingly, V chose to randomly roll for his ideals, backgrounds, traits, and flaws in this campaign as per the 5e rulebook.
Roderan is a dwarven cleric of Ula, goddess of the hills. Roderan is a life cleric, devoted to saving others. He is a pilgrim of sorts, spreading the good word of Ula and helping those in need. His most notable quirk so far is his penchant for citing scriptures to advise action. Whether those scriptures are accurately remembered or not is a different matter.
Follow the Campaign 1: Evershift World
Enter Evershift.
Evershift is a world loosely inspired by Magic: The Gathering's Zendikar setting, a world of dangerous terrains where adventure and travel were as dangerous as the monsters one might face. One thing I wanted to encourage in my new campaign was a sense of exploration and dungeon-delving, so I chose to design a world based that encouraged that basic premise.
One thing DMs tend to love doing is making maps, and I am no exception. I always tell my players they are welcome to add something to the world or modify it, but I like to come up with a wide, basic expanse of ideas that the players can draw from. Some of the regions I design will never be interacted with. I also don't force myself to stay strictly to the constructions of the map - I will happily fill things in in the middle and I purposefully avoid discussing scale to allow myself to distort the map size and length if it becomes necessary for the game. For me, creating the map is a source of inspiration for both myself and my players, and not limitation.
I also told the players they would be starting in Leyhaven, a relatively powerful city-state that exercises a decent amount of influence over the world by being a powerful trading hub. Centrally located by land and by sea, Leyhaven is inspired by the concept of Venice during the Renaissance, and I decided that a Doge and a Council of Merchants would rule the city to add to that flavor. Unlike Venice, however, Leyhaven sits atop a mesa that borders the sea. Many theorize Leyhaven was created by magic: a large obelisk sits in the center of the mesa and some scholars say it was placed there to capture the magic of leylines (magical 'strands' that travel across the world), and when it did, it caused the mesa to rise out of the plains that Leyhaven is now surrounded by.
Leyhaven has a powerful crank that brings ships up from the sea into the city, but this is only for ships that can pay the port fees. Leyhaven Below is a shanty town that sits at the coast below the mesa, touching the sea, and is a dangerous place of cutthroats and sailors.
In introducing the campaign, I also included the map below, and a link to a Google Doc listing out some of the basics of the geography, politics, creation myth, and religion of the world. In some games I create my own pantheon, but in this one I chose to use a pre-established one as my previous game has been heavily impacted by the home-brewed pantheon I used. I chose the Greyhawk deities because there were a fair amount relating to both travel and terrain: deities that would be notably revered in a world like Evershift.
Details of the campaign in this googledoc
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