Getting Into Character Pt 2: PCs

Based on an image by FreeImages.com/Henry Gretzinger
This is the second of a two-part article that I wrote while away attending a brace of family functions. (Actually, technically, it’s the third of four-and-a-half, but why get picky?)
It’s so much easier when you’re dealing with an NPC. You have total control over everything. The character is what you define it to be and the circumstances are those that you engineer; it would be quite easy to make an NPC the central focus of an RPG adventure. But that’s not what RPGs should be about: the PCs are the stars.
If you want to make a PC the focus of an adventure, you will need to get inside the head of that PC – and that’s entirely under someone else’s control, and may not even be defined within the mind of that someone else. That makes it infinitely more difficult.
The Place To Start: Context
Before you can begin planning an adventure that will make one character the central focus, you need to know what the context of the adventure is going to be. I wrote about this some time ago in Ensemble or Star Vehicle – Which is Your RPG Campaign?.
Star Vehicles comprise adventures in which one character is the central focus most if not all the time, even when other characters have the spotlight. Ensemble Casts give everyone their share of the focus, and some characters may have no more than peripheral involvement in the significant components of the plot.
That doesn’t mean that non-featured characters have nothing to do in the course of the adventure, it simply means that the adventure can be divided into two components: one with long-term impact, repercussions, and significance, and one that is self-contained and has no such long-term relevance.
There are even hybrid models, in which adventures successively focus on different characters – so this adventure is a star vehicle for character X, the one that follows is a star vehicle for character Y, that’s followed by an Ensemble adventure in which all the characters are equally prominent, and then a star vehicle for character Z, and so on. That, for example, is the way the Adventurer’s Club is usually run. The Zenith-3 campaign, in comparison, is far more ensemble in nature most of the time, and – by definition – the Lovecraft’s Legacies campaign is a star vehicle (one player, one PC)!
The characteristics of the campaign in this respect determine how the other characters are to be handled in the course of the adventure. For example, in order to ensure that Character A is highlighted, you may need to ensure that Character B is kept busy doing something else or their reactions to events might drown out the reaction of Character A, they might take control away from Character A, or steal the spotlight in some other respect. This is centrally important to the structure of the finished adventure.
A Clarification
Evidently I wasn’t clear enough in the above paragraph, or perhaps I misspoke. Don’t neglect the other PCs! But make their presence and involvement all about the character in the spotlight, and the situation that the plot focuses on. They can have a conversation about it, they can give an interview about it, they can decide to do something about it, they can state their sympathies or voice their congratulations or try and be supportive, or whatever.
Here’s an example to consider: It’s PC#1’s Wedding. PC#2 is the Best Man, PC#1’s sister is Maid of Honor, and the other PCs are guests. PC#1 is so deliriously overwhelmed that he couldn’t tell you what day of the week it is – or at least, that’s the way the player indicated to the GM that he was going to play it, when asked in advance. When PC#4 hears a rumor that the PCs arch-enemy is lurking around the ceremony somewhere, intentions unknown but presumed hostile, the other PCs can choose to join together to hunt the enemy down and drive him off so that nothing interferes with The Big Day, all without letting #1 know anything unusual is going on.
Half the day’s play can be all about PC#1 without his playing any significant role in it – though if I were writing this up as an adventure, I would keep cutting back to wedding preparation scenes (and would have re-watched Father Of The Bride for ideas, most likely). That at least gives the player something to do and the PC the chance to actually roleplay that deliriously overwhelmed status.
Stage 1: Preliminary Planning
Before you can get into detailed planning, or even analyze the PC who is to be the focal point of the adventure, you need to have some idea of what questions you need to ask. That requires having some idea of the broad scope of the adventure. “Something that the character wants to do something about, leads to the uncovering of something that makes the character angry, which leads the character to make what seems to be the right choice of action but which only makes matters worse, forcing the character to re-examine some of its most fundamental beliefs.” No specifics, just a vague outline.
There are innumerable such patterns beyond the example quoted.
Stage 2: The Interview
Once you have your preliminary planning sorted, the next step is to talk about the character with the player who controls it. In fact, it is often useful to have this be an interview conducted in-character, in a situation in which the PC is doing his best to cooperate by answering correctly and concisely. Even if there are details noted on the character sheet, which is often the case when dealing with games such as the Hero System, you want to tap into the way the character thinks when it is being roleplayed by the owner.
Start by setting the context, which is that you are working on an adventure that will feature the PC, and you want to get the players’ take on how the character thinks. All truth, but, like the questions that follow, shorn of all other context so that the questions don’t give away any of the intended content of the adventure.
Questions such as:
- “In order of intensity, high to low, list the top three things that make [PC Name] angry.”
- “Tell me, in as few words as possible, three circumstances that would make [PC Name] want to act upon a situation immediately, even if there was no urgent need to do so.”
- “What three things give [PC Name] the greatest pleasure?”
While these questions will include everything on the list of dominoes to fall that you compiled in your preliminary planning, at least 1/3 and perhaps as many as half should be totally unrelated.
In an interview, it’s often common for the response to include miscellaneous verbiage. People tend to reply to questions in full sentences, or to revise and clarify responses, or to consult the character sheet. You don’t want any of this. If the reply is “Probably… Injustice, especially for the poor and helpless – no, make that poor or helpless – and…”, trim it down to the essentials: “Injustice for the Poor/Helpless.”
At the same time, don’t be afraid to insert follow-up questions that may prove enlightening: “Is [PC Name] particularly conscious of apparent economic class, or is there some means that you use to determine whether someone qualifies as Poor or Helpless? Do you base everything on appearances or the claims of the person affected?”
These clarifying questions are frequently the most useful and revealing. It’s entirely likely that such questions will force the player to probe more deeply into the character than they ever have before, and reveal shortcomings to the persona that were not previously appreciated.
“Well… I guess I rely a bit on description but mostly I just take your [The GM’s] word for it.” Which, of course, would leave the character open to being deceived. Such material is Gold for both the GM and the player in terms of understanding the character. In fact, I would probably ask a further follow-up question immediately: “So, would you describe yourself as a sucker for a convincing sob story?”
Make sure you note the results in writing, and especially highlight any discrepancies that appear between past play and the answers that arise. These should be specifically questioned during the interview process. Why? Because sometimes there is a large gap between the character the way the player thinks that they play him, her, or it, and how they really play the PC. You want the latter, not the former.
Stage 3: Basic Planning
Basic planning consists firstly of translating the results of your interview into simple bullet points:
- Sucker for a sob story
- Often judges by superficial appearances
- Sympathizes with the poor and helpless
- Feels guilt over unearned luxury
…
Include the answers to all your questions, even those that weren’t part of your original plan.
Secondly, you need to map a series of reactions and situations that will form the final plotline. Again, bullet-points are the best technique. The format is: situation, response, result – and repeat as often as necessary. To save time, precede each entry with the PCs name.
Thirdly, you need to map out the likely reactions to each situation of each of the other PCs, especially in light of the subject PC’s responses. Where this will enhance the plotline, you can permit the character to simply join in; where the reaction is going to be counterproductive, you need that character to be involved in some other situation at the time, which means inserting an empty “situation, response, result” set for the additional PC. Continue until you know what each PC is doing at each point in the adventure.
This might result in one or more having a mini-adventure that is completely unrelated to that of the main character. However, I find it beneficial to maintain the theme of each “situation, response, result” trilogy – so if the situation is supposed to deceive the subject PC, have the other PCs involved in some other form of deception.
I also try to contrast these thematic similarities with that of the main character – so if the main subject is to be deceived into doing something they shouldn’t, another character might be asked to help plan a surprise party for someone, and a third to look into a case of counterfeiting, and a fourth might foil the attempted theft of something only to learn that the object in question is a duplicate used by the owners to protect the real thing from such acts. Some of these are neutral, some are negative, and some are positive – but they all involve some form of deception. Another possibility might be a character receiving a “Nigerian Bank” spam email… the possibilities are almost endless, unless you have failed to generalize sufficiently in the translation stage.
If, therefore, you run out of alternatives, the solution is to expand on their number by interpreting the responses you got during the interview in a slightly broader fashion.
An extra tip:
It’s easy to confuse events that are supposed to occur to different PCs simultaneously with one set of “situation, response, result” relating to the subject PC, with the set that precedes or follows. You can solve this by dividing each trio of notes relating to the subject PC into separate Acts, or just put a blank line between them, or simply by numbering each trio of responses relating to the subject PC and applying the same number to those of all other PCs who are to be involved in something else at the same time.
One more tip:
By forcing the player to dig deeply into the specifics of the characterization that they have been applying to the character, you may persuade the player to alter or amend the way they play. For example, the player may decide that the character should henceforth be more cynical when it comes to swallowing “sob stories”. There are two ways to deal with this:
Firstly, in the interview process, you could ask outright, “Will this realization alter the way you play the character?” – but after the fifth or tenth time, this wears VERY thin. The alternative is to allow for the possibility in your planning.
To illustrate this, imagine that you have formulated a plan consisting of situation/response/result statements that have been numbered 1 through 5: “[PC Name] situation 1, [PC Name] response 1, [PC Name] result 1, [PC Name] situation 2, [PC Name] response 2, [PC Name] result 2,” and so on. To response 1, you would list the alternative response, with a note that this leads to plan A. At the end of your main plan, you would then start plan A with [PC Name] result A1, [PC Name] situation A2, [PC Name] response A2, [PC Name] result A2,” and so on:
- [PC Name] situation 1
- [PC Name] response 1
- [PC Name] result 1
- [PC Name] situation 2
- [PC Name] response 2
- [PC Name] result 2
…. - [PC Name] result A1
- [PC Name] situation A2
- [PC Name] response A2
- [PC Name] result A2
….
This more than doubles the scope of the planning, but it means that you are prepared for the major alternatives. If there were 5 response stages in the main plan, then options A through E will deal with variations based on those branches of the major plan, F through I will deal with the alternatives to responses in the A line, and so on. Go as deeply as you need to – you are only writing one line for each at this point.
Stage 4: Final Subject-specific Planning
Once you have your bullet-point plan and alternatives mapped as deeply as you feel necessary, it’s time to expand on the particulars. Specifically, you need to write up the details of the situations, and may need to clarify exactly how the response leads to the result.
You don’t need to do them all – I would at least do the main plan, but might leave the rest in bullet-point form an rely on my capacity for improv if things go that badly off-track.
If you are planning your adventure sufficiently in advance, you may even get hints as to the effects of the interview simply by paying closer attention to the way the character is played in between the interview and the planned adventure.
Stage 5: Other Beats
With the main action sorted, at least sufficiently for play, its time to turn your attention to the situations that apply to the other characters. While it might be clear to all concerned that a single PC is the focus of the adventure, the others should not be neglected in the process.
What not to discuss: Preserving the mystery
I’ve touched on this already, but want to emphasize it again: Avoid any discussion of outcomes, specific situations, or internal logic. Save all of that for the adventure itself, so that the responses of the featured PC are as “uncontaminated” by foreknowledge as possible.
Stage 6: Execution and Follow-up
The adventure is now ready to play. At it’s conclusion, some of the information that came out in the course of your interview will also have been brought to the attention of the PC (as opposed to his player) – so it is only reasonable that you have a discussion with the player about the longer-term consequences and how the player wants the character to develop as a result.
It might be that the player wants to eliminate the misjudgment potential that was exploited. There is nothing wrong with this, though the GM might rule that it is not that easy a change to make; but a clear path to doing so should be agreed between the two.
However, not every character flaw can be, nor should be, redacted. Remind the player that if all the character’s flaws are eliminated, they will effectively be ruling themselves out of such featured roles in the future, and that will eventually impact the character’s opportunities for further development. It can often be more fun for the player to retain a character flaw, knowing it to be a character flaw, and knowing that – from time to time – it might get the character into trouble.
Fun, after all, is the primary objective of the game.
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