And Sometimes You cannot find the path...

Last night's game turned out ... different.  After a late start, the party got off track - a lot.  So did the DM.   And that is part of the problem with social gaming.  Its ... social.   And we gamers like to talk.

I am trying to reign in my tendencies to go off track.  But that does not always help.  And even when I stay the course, there is always one player who does not.   What to do.


So I throw it out to the winds of cyberspace.  How do you keep your players on track?  And the game gaming?  If anyone has any ideas, let me know.

Everything I Know About GMing I Learned on TV, Part 1

Justified started its season up again this week.  (If you are not watching it, you should be).  As I was delving down into the strange waters of the Elmore-verse, I realized something.  EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THE SUPPORTING CHARACTERS WOULD STAY WITH ME.  Elmore Leonard and the writers know how to make their NPC's stand out.

They seem way over the top, but you remember them.  Bob the "Draw on Me" Constable, Jody the "its not my fault" murderer, and all the rest.  They jump off the screen and make you pay attention to them.

This leads me to understand something for my next campaign.  The NPC's are going to be big and loud.  No sitting back and seeing what the players want.  They are going to jump out and act.  And hopefully be remembered as more than "the guy in the office".  They are going to be quirky and strange, and not forgotten.  I hope.

Another thing from Justified is language.   Set in the wilds of Kentucky, the characters can be darn near unintelligible to the first time viewer.  Elmore Leonard loves his speech quirks.   And I am going to  copy that too.   I am thinking of putting together about 10-12 words, terms, phrases for each region and have the NPC's use them when they are getting in the players faces.   When an NPC shows up for the second time, I want the player's to know who they were.  And feel for them, even if its hate or disgust.  Because my NPC's deserve to be more than background description.  And I think the player's (in the long run) will enjoy it more.

Welcome to the Forbidden City. Where entrance is ... Forbidden

"Thank You Eric, Blue Sage and your friends for freeing our city from the invaders".
"Your welcome, your eminence, but the threat is not over.  They have fled through a gate to some hidden rebdout , likely to plot more villainy."
"So, you will follow them?"
"Aye, we must away before the gate closes.  This evil will end, finally."

So, in my Friday Night C&C game  the players have driven the Serpent Men from the Elven City of Emerald Rains, and back to their home in Valusia.   Tonight they will, loaded with treasures and rewards from the Elves, follow the Serpent men back to that lost city.   In looking how to do this, I was faced with a quandary.  The party has the means, thanks to a Wand of Illusion, to infiltrate the city, and play factions against one another.  This would lead to an awesome political game as they sabotage the efforts of their enemies and cause them to destroy themselves.  But, the players are not the most politically inclined.  In fact "I'm bored, let's go kill someone" is pretty much the parties motto.  And in an political/infiltration scenario, that would end up with everyone jumping them, and a total party kill.

So I pulled my old copy of I1 out.  This module came out around 1980 and introduced the Yuan-Ti and Aboleth to D&D.  And features a lost city of the serpent folk, controlled by 3 or 4 different factions of monsters at war with each other.  And Just ripe for adventurers to take on one at a time without being attacked by the resources of an entire city.

So,  with a little modification to match my world - the monster factions are going to change - we have a scenario. And a MAP!  Being able to steal a map and use it for your game is great for the less artistically inclined DM.   But that is another post.

Eric looks down at the rift, and the ruined city filling it.   "This is not going to be a lot different than I thought."

Let us see what happens tonight.

The Adventure Begins

Far over the Misty Mountains grim,
To dungeons deep and caverns dim,
We must away, ere break of day,
To win our harps and gold from him!
-- JRR Tolkien

 Welcome to my little bit of cyberspace.  I am devoting this blog to all things Adventure.  In particular Role Playing Games.  After 35+ years of running them, I thought I would share my ideas.

With the start of the new year, I am starting a new campaign.   My game of choice these days is Castles & Crusades, an Old School Renaissance game.   Our current campaign is heading towards its end - the rest of the game is pretty much written, just waiting for the players to get through it.   As this large story arc ends, I wanted to start over and avoid some of the mistakes I made in setting up this campaign.

As I get started on writing, I am going to use this space to present my ideas and test them out.  Hopefully there will be readers here to give some feedback.