Races & Chases Aren't Just Speed

 Races and Chases make great action sequences in books, comics, movies, and tv-shows, but sometimes feel flat when it comes to the gaming table. Part of this is that it is hard to get the sensation of speed and danger that comes naturally with a high speed chase - or the direct competition of a race - when you're sitting around a table rolling dice. And part of it is because while RPGs have a lot to say about how you swing a sword or shoot a gun and hit someone, they have less to say about the nuances of movement.

This is forgivable for the most part. Imagine having to determine a character's unique speed, how quick they can turn, and how fast they can accelerate. Quite a lot of systems will just say "a character moves X units." Some get more complex and do it by size - small creatures move slower than medium or larger creatures. Some will derive your speed from other stats, but not much about the rest.

You Don't Need To End With A Boss Fight

 There is a thought, perhaps even an unspoken rule, that an adventure of campaign has to end with a boss fight. You need to face the Big Bad Evil in some form of combat to best them and save the world. It's not an uncommon or unexpected thought. After all, most RPGs are based around combat mechanics. The root of RPGs comes from tactical combat games. The grand daddy of RPGs is D&D, a game about fantasy heroes fighting ancient gods and monsters to save the world (in the end game at least.)

You need to have a climax to the game. That climax does not need to be combat though. What else is there?

Moving Fights Around

This is less advice and more thinking through a problem. Just some quick thoughts (a rant or ramble if you will. If you have ideas on this, please share. I'd love to have a discussion on it.)

 One of the things that happens in table top RPG fights is that the combat itself tends to be static. The crunchier or more tactical the RPG, the less likely you are to get characters to move. This can lead to two characters not moving at all once they get into range of each other, as instead they just trade blows and see who can deplete the HP of the others first.

This isn't a problem for the most part, but it can cause one. Static combats can quickly just become math and dice rolls. Which in turn can become completely mechanical and depending on your players that can make it more boring than exciting.

Initiative Systems

 Every RPG out there has an initiative system. It is a necessary evil when it comes to playing games like Table Top RPGs. Necessary because when things get hectic in the game, there needs to be a system that figures out who can talk and whose actions resolve when. Evil because by their nature initiative systems take what is a very exciting and chaotic sequence of events and slows it down while chunking it into very orderly segments or bites.

However, while every RPG comes with a pre-packaged initiative system, I can't think of a single game where how the initiative system works is of fundamental importance to the system. And with the exception of 7th Sea 2nd Edition I have yet to see a game with an initiative system that can't be taken and used in other games. I could be off on both of those - my experience is limited - but in most games - especially the mainstream ones - you can change initiative systems with relative ease.

That said, let's talk about initiative systems and why you may want to change from the default in your game.

Why Do You Play? Why Do You Run?

 With all the stuff going on in the world of late, I've found myself lacking motivation for prepping for game. This is unusual for me, because normally game is the thing I look forward to all week. Prepping for game is thus a fun activity that brings some of the joy of the actual playing into the monotony of my week. Of late though it hasn't been as fun.

For my professional life, I'm reading a couple of what I guess would be called 'self-help' books for getting organized and approaching projects. In reading those, one of them brought a question to the fore that has led me to what might be part of my problem. The question is the topic of this post.

"Why do I run game?"

Organization

 Organization is something I've slowly progressed from loathing to loving as I've grown older. Up until fairly recently in life I did, and could, almost literally keep all the relevant details for games I was running in my head. I could do the same for work. As time went on, and the amount of stuff I wanted to keep in my head increased, that kind of broke down. This has led to the very real problem of having to learn how to take notes, track notes, and organize those notes along with NPCs, locations, maps, pictures, and all that on top of things.

In a lot of ways this has been as frustrating as when I realized part way through majoring in Japanese in College that I had no studying skills because up until then, I had simply never needed to study. I don't say this as a brag, but as a pointer that I am very much in the early stages of my 'getting organized' journey, and that that is ok. Life throws a lot at all of us. You juggle it as long as you can, but then you need somewhere to keep things because you can't juggle all the things all the time.

Also, if you've been holding back, I've also found this: I'm happier the better I get at keeping things organized. This is true in my games as well as in my life. My mind is more free to handle things because I don't need to keep 80 things in mind all the time. They have a place to go, and I can grab them when I need them.

That said, let's talk about organization and your game.

Grand Goals & Current Schemes

 It occurred to me today that there is a great lesson for running your villains and campaigns to be found in Super Hero comics that I had never quite caught on to. These lessons show up in other fiction, even in pre-published campaigns, but they're never really called out as such. Like I've said numerous times about things in sociology: the concept is so simple that we frequently don't discuss it. Also like sociology though, in not discussing it and assuming it is already broken down as simple as it needs to be we leave room for misunderstanding what is going on and what we need. When we're running a game, that leaves room for plot holes and other things that can leave an arc feeling unsatisfying. 

So today let's talk about your villain's grand goal, and their current scheme.

Sometimes They Find Trouble. Sometimes Trouble Finds Them

Not every problem gets wrapped up with a neat little bow before the PCs move on. Sometimes the PCs start to interact with a plot line or NPC group in an area, and then end up leaving before things wrap up but not before causing a world of trouble for said NPC. This can happen for a lot of reasons. The PCs think what they're interacting with is tied to a different plot, the PCs get bored in an area, they don't know how to follow up on a thing, or the cost of following up feels higher than the payout, or sometimes something else is just a higher priority. When that happens, one of two things can happen. The plot can return to normal - or as normal as it can get with Hurricane  'The PCs' having just torn right through a chunk of it. Alternatively, the NPCs pushing the plot can go looking for the PCs in much the same way PCs often go looking for the cause of trouble.

Not All Campaigns Work - But Don't Count Them Dead Too Early

Campaigns, like any creative work - and whether you realize it or not, every campaign is a creative work - sometimes don't pan out the way we expect. Sometimes the idea doesn't carry through, or doesn't have the depth we thought it did. Sometimes the differing views of what could and should happen bring us to an impasse. Sometimes games go bad, even when everyone involved in the game has successfully worked together to make fun and interesting campaigns multiple times before.

If you think this is happening to a campaign you are running, it can suck. The thing to remember is that likely it is nobodies fault. Yes, small bits and pieces may be able to be blamed. Someone maybe didn't make a character that fits in with what the group discussed. You didn't communicate a point clearly leading to a misunderstanding. Often times though, it is just something that happens. A character goes a different way than expected, or planned for. Or there is just a place where in this game, at this time, with these people, you don't all see eye to eye on what is fun and what people want.

Making NPCs for Intrigue

Sometimes you want the game to go along a more social avenue than straight combat. Sometimes the PCs end up in a place where everyone is a chessmaster, or a wanna-be chessmaster, and you need a quick way to track them all so that when your PCs look into things you know how to go.

Like with so many things, I find having a template that distills the character down to the core things I need to have on hand works well here. And for intrigue we need to know a few things, but none so important as what it is the character is actually aiming for - in the long run - and what levers exists to try and budge or move them.

Goals: Something You Can Never Have (and why!)

We talked on Monday about your character's desire. The emotional reward they seek. An emotional reward is good, but even better is a goal that is fueled by that desire. This makes for a personal connection to something in the world. It mixes together the desired emotional reward that gives the story resonance, with the tangible physical.

The best goals for dramatic tension involve other characters - whether a PC or an NPC is up to you, but if you're setting your sights on something with or from another PC make sure they're cool with it and involve them in the conversation.

Fortunately, the steps for doing this are super easy. So let's begin.

What Is Your Character's Emotional Desire?

What is the emotional desire of your character? If you're the GM, what is the emotional desire of the important NPCS? Do you know? Have you thought about it? I don't blame you if you haven't. Until recently I hadn't either. Then I watched the "Asians Read Oriental Adventures" play list, and Daniel brought up Hillfolk and the Dramatic Poles. A quick purchase to Pelgrane Press later and I'm reading about the 'Desire' mechanic.

Well, it is less a desire and more a thing to help you define the character. Though it is something you can make mechanics on or around. More importantly, knowing your character's desire will help you in role playing the character.

Puzzle Mechanic Boss Fights

Boss Fights tend to come in one of two flavors in the world of videogames: stat checks and puzzles. In a stat check boss fight there is nothing particularly special to the mechanics of fighting the boss. It is just a question of if you can avoid or tank the boss's damage while doing enough damage to get through the boss's defenses before you lose.

In an RPG like Final Fantasy or Dragon Age this means healing your people, potentially positioning them well, and managing your resources to do your damage and keep your people alive through the fight. In a more action game like Devil May Cry this involves the player having to avoid the damage combos of the boss while dishing out their own damage combos in the windows of opportunity.

Who Can Say No To Who?

In a friend's game recently he made a point while presenting a group of people that they had servants, not slaves. After the session we were discussing the game, and he asked if there was anything he could have done better in presenting the people the PCs met. We talked a bit about his goals, and it sounded like his hope was to present how these people operated quickly so we could get a sense of how they were similar to what we expected, but also different from other groups with a similar background (incredible amounts of wealth, fashion, the 'elite' of society as it were.)

For this I honed in on the servants. Part of this is my own character has a background of being a slave. They know what it is like. Also, from their background, they will notice if servant is just a slightly better compensated slave or actually deemed a full on person with rights, responsibilities, and treated as such. I mentioned this, that seeing more of how the servants were servants would be a very efficient way to show the character of the people we were working with.

Travel: A Journey Or A Hassle

In your game is travel a journey or a hassle?

In a kinder, or more extended way, is the journey, the trip, the PCs are taking a part of the game where what they do along the way is a thing with effort or is it just something to get through in order to get back to the real game?

It's ok whichever way you answer that by the way. In my own games - for literal decades - I never thought of the trip between two points as anything more than just something that had to be done. If I was running a game like D&D, I'd roll for random encounters and other hazards on the way, but otherwise I'd be just as prone to hand wave the whole thing with a simple "it takes you 5 days of travel."

This amuses me considering how much of my own advice to myself has been that it is ok to slow down and really enjoy the moments that happen in the game. There's no rush to get to the next big plot item. The campaign is not a race. Really, unless you have to do something by a certain time - i.e. you're running a game at College and everyone leaves mid May giving you 3 sessions to wrap up this adventure - it's ok to slow down and indulge. In fact, your game could be better than it.

So why did traveling escape me?

Well, for one, it's part of who I am. I'm not the kind of person to go off exploring in real life. To the point I couldn't tell you what restaurants or shops are in the town center not 5 minutes up the road from me.  I flat out never really thought about it. It was just "we want to get to X location for Y reason, and to do that we have to travel Z miles." And put like that, why would you even consider that the Z miles could be as meaningful to the game?

And it turns out quite a lot.

The Lord of the Rings 5e books talk about how the 'Journey' the venturing out into the wilds is an adventure into itself. Complete with modified rules to make it something for the PCs to pay attention to, while also pointing out all the ways this can help your game. Further conversation with a friend, and some recent real life experience, fills the rest.

By focusing on the journey you can do a lot of good. A few examples being:

Give The Players A Chance To Express Their Character
Indulging in the journey gives players a chance to express their character when the action of the adventure isn't on full bore. What does being at camp look like for the group? Where do people sleep? Who cooks? What does the morning look like? Is anyone a late sleeper? A light sleeper?

If you are doing a more sci-fi or modern game with vehicles, who is prone to breaking off and exploring the local towns and municipalities or planets that you come across?

Does someone collect souvenirs? Are there neat sights to see along the way? Speaking of...

A Real Chance To World Build
Having big cities and stuff is cool and all, but if you want to sell your world you also need to sell the space between those destinations. The wilderness, plants, weather, natural wonders to see, people to interact with, these are all ways to build your world. If most of your game takes place in cities, the traveling gives you a chance to contrast all the established facts with how life is different out in the country, or on the road.

You can sell how dangerous the wilds are with how other people talk about and do their travel. In fact, this can be better than just having random encounters. A random goblin attack at night on the PCs camp is one thing. Seeing every traveler on the road going in groups complete with armed guards to keep them safe? That can do a lot more to sell the danger of what is going on.

'Side' Quests and Other Encounters
Journeys also give you a real chance to bring in side quests, personal items, and all sorts of other - combat and non-combat - encounters. It can let you challenge PCs in small, interesting ways to go along with the larger ways that the main plot and events do. It can let you show the change in NPCs, or highlight changes in PCs.

You can also have small moments, or even try to foreshadow things. A deer watching the PCs then scampering off is a nice descriptive detail. That same deer being found dead later on can be a warning. And if it died in flight from a perceived danger that sent it into the real danger, you can establish that theme before trying to spring it on the PCs themselves. Maybe they'll notice. Maybe they won't. Subconsciously most will probably pick up on it selling the feel even more.

The 4, 5, and 6 "Man" Bands of Gaming

Most table top groups tend to be about 4-6 players. There are some indie games that are aimed for 2-5 players, but in general most games I've seen are aimed for 4-6 people. This coincides with the general idea that a 6 player table (not counting the GM) is a "full" table, while a 7 player table is "oversized."

In those games an "optimized" group tends to have certain roles covered. This was a common practice for so long that a lot of experienced players will default to trying to "fill roles" around this when it comes to making characters - and in some cases will complain about their being gaps if people make their characters without knowing what everyone else is making.

Newer games, even mainstream games like D&D 5e, have tried to break this but it is very heavily baked into the lore as much as the mechanics. Even fantasy, sci-fi, anime, and comics will play into these roles when there is a team more than a solo or duo book. So what are they?

How Does A Character Approach Their Skill?

Skills in RPGs cover broad areas. It feels less common to run into a system like GURPS with a very granular skill system, than it does for ones like D&D 5e or FATE with very broadly defined skills. Even with more granular systems there is only so granular you can get. Not many people are going to take the time to play in a system where there are different skills for different types of surgery or where combat skills are broken down not only by the weapon type, but the general properties of how that weapon works and feels.

Civil Unrest?

Just a quick post today. I don't know enough about all of this to go too far into it, but a couple points going around in our current situation in the US is definitely a guide to how to run civil unrest in your games. Consider the following questions:

1. What do the people protesting want?
2. How is that being expressed?
3. What triggered the current outburst of activity?
4. How is the other side presenting their case/spinning the matter?
5. Who is trying to take advantage of the situation?

If you can answer all five of these questions, you have the basic information for what is going on. Just remember, people don't mass protest over nothing. It frequently means some basic need is not being met. The current issue in the US - and across the world - has to do with police brutality and the fact that to many, Black Lives do not matter even though they should (and no that is not debatable.)

Two and three are often linked. If your civil unrest has gone from peaceful to violent, something likely triggered it. What was that? While it has been triggered, there are always people trying to keep to the original path. Don't forget them. So what does the unrest look like? What are they doing?

Four is the other side, often the people in power. What do they think the issue is? What are they claiming the issue is? Is it an overreaction to one situation? Is it people just wanting free stuff? People not willing to sacrifice or learn their place? Remember, people don't act thinking they're being evil or not in the right, so how do they justify their side of things?

Finally, whenever you have conflict you'll have people trying to take advantage and do their own thing. Looters turning protests violent trying to make things look bad for one side - or just steal shit. People looking to make a name for themselves. People looking to profit in other ways. Who are the people playing opportunist, and what do they want?

Also consider those questions when looking at the real world. What do both sides want? How are they presenting it? Who is trying to twist it? Why? Who is trying to take advantage?

How Strong Are The PCs? How Rare Is That Strength Level?

One of the good things I've found to keep in mind when roleplaying NPCs, and when designing my worlds - or setting my expectations for worlds - for games is the answer to the two topic questions. Just how strong are the PCs compared to your random, normal person? What does that look like as the PCs progress mechanically through the system and gain levels/xp/power - or however your system of choice does progression. Just as important as that first question though is how rare that power level actually is in the world.

Sometimes A Helpful NPC Is Just A Helpful NPC

A conversation with some friends recently brought up this point. One friend mentioned that in a game they were in they had the inevitable betrayal from the friendly NPC, and that the GM was a little disappointed everyone saw it coming. I got unasked for kudos in this conversation because it was compared to my game where the friendly NPC betrayal came out more as a surprise, but the friend didn't quite know what the difference was. Having talked about this a few times over the years, I explained that the difference is that in my games 90% of the time or more a friendly NPC is just a friendly NPC, and that I not only make sure to keep the ratio like that, but I take pains to make sure I do.