Image courtesy FreeImages.com/Andreea Scutariu

The Context

Saxon, one of my players and a fellow GM who has contributed guidance through ATGMs on a number of occasions was telling an anecdote the other week about what transpired in the D&D 5e campaign that he plays in.

It seems that one of the players was unable to attend. That happens in every group from time to time, and every group has a different way of handling it. The group in question used to have another player handle the PC belonging to the absent player – I’m not sure whether the GM did the allocating, the absent player nominated someone, or someone simply put their hand up. After a couple of bad experiences where players felt their characters were abused or disrespected (Irish Mine-detector Syndrome), the policy had been established that the present players ran the absent-player PC as a group, making collective decisions about what the character was doing, and that has apparently worked out satisfactorily for them.

On this particular occasion, the group decided that the absent-player PC – a Rogue – would climb the walls and hide out on the roof of the church where bad things were going on, avoiding committing herself to any particular course of action while things remained unclear. One of the group then rolled for the Rogue to climb the wall – and got a critical failure. The character fell to the ground with a great clatter and promptly became the center of attention for the bad guys, and was lucky to escape with her life.

After hearing this anecdote a second time – Saxon had also mentioned it the week before – I began to wonder whether or not an absent-player PC should be permitted to suffer critical failures or successes, regardless of what was rolled on the dice. This was not a question that had ever arisen for any of those present in the past, and no-one had a ready answer. The consensus was, however, that it was a very interesting question, and so that’s the subject of today’s discussion.

Actually, it turns out that there was rather more to the story. But that doesn’t invalidate the principle that was raised, even though it is less directly applicable than I thought. More on that at the end of the article.

Critical Failures – An Unwarranted Risk?

Do critical failures represent an unwarranted risk to a character whose owner is “loaning” it to the group?

That they pose a risk is incontrovertible, and so is the fact the player who owns the character is not there to choose whether or not to expose the character to the risk in question. So the key question is whether or not this rises to the level of “unwarranted”?

The dictionary definition of “unwarranted” is “not justified or authorized”. Justification obviously relates to the circumstances, and that’s what the group judgment is there to assess, so the risks can’t be considered unwarranted on that front. But unauthorized? That’s the rub.

It’s not like the player in question is handing the group power of attorney, with complete control over the character, and complete willingness to accept whatever may happen; the entire point of handing control to the group instead of another individual is to limit the degree of authority held over the character.

Which means that unless the player specifically foresaw the circumstances even in general terms and explicitly authorized the taking of risks of this magnitude, the dangers can indeed be considered unwarranted.

A Failure Of Trust?

If a PC dies because of a critical failure, either directly or indirectly, is that a failure of the trust placed in whoever was looking after the character in the absence of its owner?

To answer this question, I need to pose another: What was it that the player who owns the character was entrusting the player who looked after the character to do? What should be the priority?

Are they being entrusted to use the character to assist the team in achieving their goals? Or is priority number one to look after the character’s interests, even at the expense of compromising that success?

Neither of these are black-and-white yes-and-no decisions. There are degrees of risk, and degrees of consequence being risked, and degrees of benefit to those team goals that results from a success. Clearly, substantial risk for a minor gain is unwarranted – yes, there’s that word again – but things grow murkier when the potential rewards from the team perspective outweigh the degree of risk. What we have here is a three-dimensional moral space in which risks may be justified – but which has very fuzzy edges, not sharp boundaries.

In other words, the answer to the first question is that “it depends on what the expectations were of the player caring for the character in the first place”.

Now, in the incident that sparked this discussion, there is no question of any failure of trust; the players caring for the character were trying to do the right thing and get the character out of harm’s way; it’s just that this attempt went horribly wrong. And that’s an important principle to note: risk can be minimized but never eliminated whilst a character is in the field.

It’s that principle that makes this particular question so important – and so interesting.

Balanced Contributions: No Critical Successes

If you take away the risk of critical failures, balance demands that you also take away the chance of a critical success. The character can still succeed or fail, and may still get killed, but the dangers are significantly reduced.

The converse of this statement is that if the character under absentee ownership is deemed capable of achieving extraordinary results – i.e. critical successes – then she must also face the commensurate risk of failure.

Interpretational Confinement

Outside of combat, when predetermined game rules define a critical success and there is no such thing as a critical failure, it might be possible to cut this Gordian knot, because under these circumstances, it is the referee’s job to interpret the results. Simply by showing some restraint in that interpretation as a matter of policy, the GM can mitigate against the criticality of the question.

Take the case in question: the GM was the one who decided that the critical failure would result in a fall. Having so decided, it is entirely reasonable for the noise to attract enemy attention, but the GM could easily have taken the intention of the players and the metagame circumstances into account and found some other interpretation of the critical failure.

I’ll come back to this point, shortly – because it’s not all honey and sunshine.

An NPC’S Share Of The Spotlight?

A side benefit of taking critical successes (and failures) off the menu is that a “lucky shot” by what is effectively an NPC (for the session) poses less danger of stealing the thunder from those characters whose players are present.

It’s the players who are present who should get spotlight share, not players who are absent. Because the absent player has a PC, it would be impossible to completely deny them a small share of the spotlight – usually in passing – unless you completely cut the character out of the adventure with no in-game explanation.

Perhaps it’s more realistic to expect that the absent player’s PC would receive an NPC’s share of the spotlight – i.e. none of their own accord, but whatever is appropriate when they are interacting with another PC. And no more, which is the point that I’m making here.

You don’t play a game for the people who aren’t there; you play it for those who are. However, when someone who is usually there is absent, their future participation has to be protected, and their past participation has to be respected. And the best way of doing that is to have their character step back from the spotlight while they are away.

Potential Abuse

That’s all good in theory, but as a policy it can be abused. If a player knows that there is a fight coming up next session that they aren’t sure their character will survive, and don’t particularly want to have, what’s to stop that player from making some excuse not to turn up so that his character is protected? What if you had a big fight an nobody came?

In effect, this would mean that the player was willing to raise the danger level to all the other PCs in order to protect his own character. I’m quite sure that this would not apply to any of the players that I deal with in my current games, but have definitely known one or two in the past who were overprotective of their characters to this extreme.

Be Less Than You Can Be? – A Counterpoint

Which, in fact, brings up a counterpoint that needs to be acknowledged and considered: Should the absence of a player be permitted to diminish the opportunities for success for the entire group?

You can’t remove the potential for critical successes from one segment of the group and not have it affect the aggregbate capabilities of the group. A vigorous argument can therefore be made that the diminished likelihood of group success establishes that it is in the group’s best interests for critical successes to remain an option.

Balanced Contributions: You Took The Risk

But if you permit whatever chance of critical success normally applies to remain in force, even when the character’s owner is absent, then balanced contributions demands that the risk to the absent-player’s PC also apply. Any alternative to this policy gives the players an advantage that they shouldn’t have. Suddenly, the whole question doesn’t seem so cut-and-dried.

The Willing Acceptance Of Danger

You can also argue that the absent player knew the risks of ceding control to someone else and accepted them when he decided not to attend. This too, is not an entirely invalid point, especially if the character’s intentions and priorities, as determined in advance by the absent player, are respected. The willing acceptance of danger has always been a mitigating factor in lawsuits, especially civil liability cases; a great deal of court proceedings in such cases relate to the degree of contribution to whatever occurred by the nominal victim. If you choose to play on the train-tracks, you can’t really sue your public transport authority when you get hit by a train – or simply trip over and break your arm or leg, for that matter. The “reasonable person” standard generally applies, to wit: were the consequences of the act reasonably foreseeable by a reasonable person?

There are many parallels between such civil liability cases and the question under consideration. One of the limitations on the “reasonable person” mitigation is the principle of a Duty Of Care. A Duty of care is essentially a legal responsibility for the wellbeing of an individual under defined conditions that cannot be abrogated even if the other party is willing to do so. This often comes up in cases where an employee has been injured and is claiming negligence on the part of his employer, for example.

A “Duty of Care” also has limitations; it’s unreasonable for the employer to be responsible for ‘acts of god’, for example. Enter, once again, “the reasonable person” and what they can “reasonably foresee”.

There is a perception in some quarters that when lawyers talk about “the reasonable person”, they are really asking the jury to put themselves in the place of that hypothetical individual, but that’s not the case – a juror can be more or less intelligent, have received better or worse education, may have a greater or lesser degree of relevant experience, and none of that matters; it’s not a question of what any individual juror can or can’t foresee, does or doesn’t consider reasonable. Nor is it a question of the average person’s abilities and perspectives; what has to be determined is what it was reasonable for an individual responsible for the decision, given the expertise and qualifications that they can be assumed to posses, to foresee, and it’s exactly the same when a Judge making the decision.

So, the questions can also be phrased: “What, if any, Duty Of Care is owed to the absent player’s property, i.e. his character, and by whom?”, and “How far does that duty of care extend?”, and “Were the dangers to which that property was exposed foreseeable by a reasonable person?” – because, if they were, it’s reasonable to assume that the owning player gave his permission – and the argument then shifts grounds to a debate over whether or not that permission has, or should have, any enforceable authority.

Rebuttal: Not All Absence Can Be Controlled

What if someone can’t attend because they have to work unexpectedly, or have been hospitalized, or has to care for a sick relative? They had no choice in their absence, and hence can’t be considered to have weighed the pros and cons and risks; they simply accepted them as something beyond their control, or the price of honoring a more important commitment (it might seem like I’m arguing in circles, but that happens when you look at an important subjective question from all sides. This isn’t something that can be resolved by findings of fact, it’s one of those far messier (and often, more important) questions).

Real life happens, and only the most obsessed would argue that it should not take priority over a source of entertainment. The issue has to be kept in perspective.

GMs normally take a player’s word for it when they claim such extenuating circumstances, and it’s only reasonable for players to have an expectation of such credibility. But this puts “the willing acceptance of risk” into an entirely different perspective; every argument that falls into that category presupposes that the absence was voluntary. What if it was not, or has to be deemed to be involuntary because a reasonable assessment of the social value of gaming places a higher relative value on other events?

If the absence stems from circumstances beyond the player’s reasonable control, then the degree to which the other participants are bound by a duty of care obviously rises. They are the ones choosing to proceed with the game in the absence of one of the participants. after all, so they are the ones choosing to expose the character to risk.

Now, it’s not normally reasonable for everyone’s fun to be ruined because one player can’t be present, which is what cancellation would represent. So that puts the obligation and onus squarely back on the shoulders of those players and GM who were present, demanding that the character receive an extraordinary level of protection – and that, in turn, means taking both critical failures and successes off the table.

The Willing Acceptance Of Danger, Part 2

A good lawyer, treating this as a compensation case, would no doubt point out that “The Willing Acceptance Of Danger” also undermines all arguments about the party members whose players are present being exposed to greater risk because of the absence of the player, either directly (character is removed from the danger) or indirectly (reducing the group firepower).

They were the ones who chose to go ahead with the game, after all, when it would be completely obvious to them that the group’s effectiveness might be compromised by the absence. They accepted the risks, and so have no grounds for complaint about the absent character being “sheltered” by table policy.

A Halfway House: The Torg Inspiration

Perhaps circumstances can be divided by the GM into two categories – Dramatic and Normal. Dramatic situations entitle the absent-player PC to both risks and rewards from criticals; ordinary situations do not. The GM should make the decision as to which category any given situation falls into, depending on the consequences to the overall game. That would mean that the chance of an extraordinary success – counterbalanced by the risk of a critical failure – is only invoked when the situation is at its most dire, and the outcome of an individual check would have consequences for the entire party.

Returning to the anecdote which spurred this discussion, it seems clear to me that the game did not, or should not, hinge on whether or not the absent-player’s character made her climbing roll or not when the objective was to remove her from a position in which she might have such an impact on the game. She was effectively an NPC and should not be placed in a spotlight position like that. Therefore, this would not qualify as a Dramatic situation, and both critical success and failure should be off the table.

On the other hand, if another PC were climbing alongside the absent-player’s character, and suffered a critical failure, falling to the ground and alerting their enemies, until another PC reached a position to participate in the battle, a PC’s life would hang in the balance, and that’s a dramatic enough circumstance that both critical hits and failures should be in force. As soon as another PC can join the melee, however, principle responsibility for rescuing the fallen character shifts to them, and the combat stops being “dramatic” from the point-of-view of the absent-player’s character.

As a compromise solution, this has a lot to commend it.

Vox Populi: An Alternative Solution

Or perhaps one of the choices available to the controlling group is whether or not the risk is merited according to the circumstance. They could make this decision for the entire session, or on a roll-by-roll basis – and this would be part of the responsibility that they took on by running the character. The implication would be that part of the control conceded by the absent player is the right to determine whether or not the PC should take the risk.

Avoiding The Issue?

You might think that you’re avoiding the whole problem by choosing one of the many alternative solutions to the problem of what to do with a character whose player is absent – giving control of the character to the GM, having the character mysteriously vanish from the playing field (only to reappear when their character does), but that’s really substituting one headache for a completely different set.

I looked at a range of such solutions in Missing In Action: Maintaining a campaign in the face of player absence in response to a question sent to Roleplaying Tips and which appeared in issue 522. A whole bunch of solutions from other readers also appeared in Issue 523, which have never been posted online in their archives, which jump from Issue 513 to Issue 619. Johnn is slowly getting the gap filled in but progress has been slow and sporadic. (If they aren’t available to readers, they might as well not exist, Johnn! I think it’s time for another push on this front…)

Questions get raised by the alternatives such as “Is it right for characters to earn experience for events they were not present for?”; “Is it right for the difficulty level of an adventure to effectively increase perhaps beyond the point of possible satisfactory resolution because player absence reduces the resources available to the PCs?” and “Is it fair for a player’s absence to impose additional workload on the GM?” – questions that are beyond the scope of this article, but which are no more susceptible to easy answers than the problems raised here.

So here’s another (somewhat rhetorical) one: “Have you really dodged the bullet when you (or your campaign) gets wounded by another (metaphoric) projectile instead?” For my money, the answer is no.

Clouding The Issue: Sauce for the gander

If you accept the principle that any character should only be exposed to the risks of a critical failure and the benefits of a critical success under certain circumstances (such as their player being present, or having explicitly authorized such risks), a further headache looms on the horizon. Should PCs whose players are present also have the authority to determine whether or not to risk a critical failure in the pursuit of a critical success?

This puts a whole new spin on the concept of an “optional rule”, and is technically beyond the direct scope of this article, but it’s definitely a question that merits debate!

My Usual Solution

My usual solution to the problem of absent players doesn’t really help shed a lot of light on the issue. I first determine the level of criticality to the expected course of play of the absent player’s character.

• If they are central to the adventure, then I cancel game sessions rather than adopt any other solution.
• If they aren’t, but do have one or more crucial decisions to make in the course of the adventure, then I run the character as a semi-protected NPC to whom nothing permanently bad will be inflicted, after soliciting specific guidance from the player in question on the decision to be made. If necessary, I will even reveal details of the planned plotline to the player who is going to be absent.
• If they are simply making up the numbers through the course of play, then they will be run by me as sheltered NPCs who fade into the background unless they have some specific knowledge or ability to contribute.
• And no, the character doesn’t get XP if the player is not present, unless I regard the absence as reasonable and the player has made all reasonable efforts to provide reasonable notice of their absence. Reasons of health, unexpected family commitments, work demands – those are all on my list of reasonable grounds for absence, and the question of adequate notice depends on how much notice the player in question had. On at least one occasion (following the death of the player) I specifically got in a guest player to look after the PC so that the character could be given an appropriate honorable retirement from the campaign.

So my answer is a blend of the Interpretational solution and the avoidance of both critical successes and failures. I simply hadn’t thought to frame the question in quite this way before; it wasn’t an official policy, just an instinctive one on my part. Needless to say, it will be such a policy going forward.

A Question Of Policy

This isn’t about how your group handles absent players, but whether or not a character whose player is absent should be increased in mediocrity for the protection of both that character and the game overall. That’s a fairly deep and profound question, at the end of the day, with deep roots in the gaming philosophy of the GM and group. It should be clear from the above discussion that this is one of those occasions in which there is no one perfect answer. Perhaps this is another question to which each group must define its own answer?

Any decision will work provided that it is known to everyone in advance. All the complicated questions about acceptance of risk go away when a reasonably-accurate determination of that risk can be made in advance – when players know what they are letting their characters in for in the event of their absence.

Communication is the key – at least, that’s my conclusion.

Addenda

I forwarded the draft of this article to Saxon for him to pass on to the other members of his playing group and to offer an opportunity for any correction needed. Here’s his reply (slightly edited, and with subheadings added to break it up a little):

Hi Mike,

Just three points of clarification, plus some quick thoughts that I came up with overnight.

• The rogue character in question was female – so, minor nitpick on pronoun [fixed].
• Another nitpick is that this was the first time that any GM deliberately assigned the group-of-players-who-were-present-on-the-night to run the non-present PC (as well as the collective actions of the NPCs inside the temple of Chauntae in planning the defense against a siege).

  I’m not sure if that was an idea that the GM in question (TeacherDave, in this case) used because it was simply something that was useful at the time, or whether it was a considered response to the Irish Mine Detector phenomenon. I can asked TeacherDave if you want.

  The “IMD” phenomenon has been an issue within that group for a very long time, and one of the players and sometime-GMs (Peter) has been very vocal about avoiding it, both in his own game and warning against its dangers when it comes up in other games. For his part, when Peter runs his Space1889/Call of Cthulhu campaign, if a player is not present, their character simply comes down with a bout of ‘Martian Lurgi’ and is medically incapacitated for the session(s). (At one point I made a similar ruling for my own Dr Who game, and had the characters be temporarily retconned out of existence by fallout from the Time War, with a vague intention that this may become a future plot point).

• A final nitpick, and arguably the most important, is that the Rogue who tried to climb the roof fell because of the bad roll, but that failed action was not what attracted the attention of the enemy kobolds. A few rounds later, when the besiegers started killing off a number of townsfolk NPCs inside the temple, was when it was decided that she would start using her back-stab attack to reduce the number of attackers, and that was when she successfully made one kill but failed on the second, attracting attention to herself and forcing her to flee.

A Question Of Intentions

Thinking about it, that last paragraph raises an interesting point that may be relevant: at the time in-game, when the other players were feeling stressed because the group of allied NPCs in the temple were being killed, was it appropriate for the players-who-were-present to assume that the rogue character would be moved by the slaughter inside the temple to try and help them with some surreptitious backstabbing?

Or was that simply a rationalization by the players to try and get as many favorable factors engaged on their side of the battle?

I looked at her character sheet and can confirm that she was of Good alignment and had the character trait summarizable as ‘I don’t make long term plans and tend to act on the spur of the moment’ – so there was nothing there that argued against her actions; but the character’s backstory plot hook that was given out by the GM was that she was in this town (called Greenest) as part of an attempt to infiltrate the cult that was planning to attack the town.

So on the one hand she had no particular commitment to the cult’s stated plans of killing everybody and looting the town, but on the other hand, would she have necessarily broken cover if her player had been there to make decisions for her? Doing what’s right in the short term versus following a plan for a long term good? And as always, there’s the question of whether a character will follow even strongly held beliefs if it’s done at the risk of their life.

The Psychology Of Spotlights

There’s also an interesting thought that occurred to me about all players getting to feature, getting “a share of the spotlight”, as you put it.

Usually it’s the case that GMs need to make sure that all players get to do something in the course of the game, simply to stave off boredom. With that in mind, some overview of this game: It’s the first adventure that we’ve played under 5e D&D, and the characters are all new rather than imports from TeacherDave’s 4e campaign. The GM is playing a ‘getting the band together for the first time’ angle, but rather than everyone meeting in the proverbial tavern the characters had been traveling singly to Greenest for their own reasons. In the first session, some (but not all) of the characters had been introduced to each other. The Druid (PC of DrDave) and the Bard (PC of Johno) had been traveling together to Greenest for work; had encountered the overturned carriage of the Warlock (PC of Peter) and then fought off some kobolds that were working with the cult. They then continued to Greenest to discover it under large scale attack, and got into a fight to defend a family (who were related to the PC of Ray – another player who was not present for the first two sessions). During session 1 neither my Wizard, nor Urban’s Rogue, got any gameplay – although we did get some summarized backstory developed by the GM about our motivations for being in Greenest, in order to keep us at least vaguely interested.

In the second session, we cut to another part of Greenest, for the siege of the temple of Chauntae. My Wizard was inside, helping the townsfolk NPCs to defend themselves. Urban’s Rogue was on the outside.

In the third session all the players were present, and as a result of our various fights the characters all shepherded scared and wounded townsfolk NPCs to the safety of the town’s keep, where the characters were recruited to go and gather other townsfolk still trapped outside.

Now, Urban had known weeks in advance that he would not be available for the second session, since he would be at his mother’s farm hundreds of kilometers away. He had expressed surprise and mild irritation that he would not be there to play the first actions of his character in the game.

Is it possible that, subconsciously, the players wanted to make sure that Urban got to do *something*, even if only by proxy? Frankly I’m unsure, and think it more likely that the aforementioned theory of needing to have all hands on deck to defend the townsfolk played a more direct role in the decision-making – but it’s an interesting idea.

An Option of Hand-waving

Finally, a weird thought on handling the situation: most of your article has dealt with the aspects of fairness and responsibility and dealing with consequences. However, there is precedent for hand-waving the whole thing away.

I have a vague recollection from one of the 2e Dragonlance products given GM advice that if the main villain of the plot gets killed and he’s needed later in the storyline, simply declare that the dead villain was an underling who had been sent in the main villains place, and because of the masks that the commanders of the Dragon Armies wear that player (and their PCs) would never know the difference).

In the same vein, I came across a random spoiler for Horde of the Dragon Queen in the form of an observation/complaint that that plot line was set up to have specific villains later in the story, and if those villains get killed then the GM should arrange for it to have happened to substitutes.

But even if my memory is inaccurate, if it’s fair play for GM’s to hand-wave events to suit plots, then that begs the question of whether or not (and if so, when) it is fair to do so for characters.

Obviously this would need to be handled carefully, but in this instance: not only was the player genuinely away and acting in good faith (I’m honestly not even sure whether the GM had consulted with the player about using the Rogue character in this way), but also the actions that took place were away from the sight of the other characters. Those events could have very easily been retconned away.

This is exactly what I was proposing when I wrote about “interpreting the critical” in some other way, though Saxon’s proposal goes further – Mike

Now, in the end, the way things turned out were good, since Urban’s character developed a reason to flee the cultists and join the other player characters inside the keep as a result. In practical terms, the party got together, and his character wasn’t sidelined any further. But in other circumstances this may have led to rather more annoying results.

So the general premise holds, even if the inspirational circumstances weren’t quite as I understood them to be.

A Projection Of Intentions?

But this raised a further possibility in my mind: that the group, aware of the desire to “get the band together” had made choices that were more likely to bring about that result rather than preserving the initial independence of the Rogue character, or that the GM had steered events on such a course. Saxon also replied to this possibility, when I raised it:

I don’t think that the GM engineered things that way. I also don’t recall any discussion among the players towards that end, even off-the-cuff joke suggestions. I think it was a combination of bad rolls and decisions made on the spur of moment.

Due to a battery failure, we were not able to get a podcast recording for the benefit of the two players who were not present, and I did a writeup the following day while my memory was still fresh. Consulting it now, I see that there were at least two really bad rolls (5 week old memory suggests that there were 2 critical failures, but the second back-stab on the kobold may have been a mere very low roll). Not that that makes a lot of difference.

First-hand absence of the experience

I was also particularly interested in the take of the player who was most directly involved, Urban, who I have never met. He is the player who was absent and had conceded control of his character for its first in-game appearance as a result. I’ve never met him (as far as I know) but Saxon agreed to forward the draft article for his consideration.

Here are Urban’s thoughts:

It’s a very interesting article but I think our group doesn’t really fit into these structures. I think all our GMs all seem to have their own rules (Peter’s Martian lurgy for example) but basically [we]`make it up as we go along. I think you guys must take play very seriously that you send apologies and give adequate reasons not to come to a session as well as setting up what seems almost like a constitution. We seem to play it more by ear.

I don’t really have a problem with my character being played by others because I feel the chance of my buggering up a roll is the same as anyone else and I have put my own characters in crazy situations. My frustration was produced from the context in which the buggering up happened. This has more to do with the GMs organization and our lack of structure, something you guys seem to be more on the ball about.

Thanks for sending the article Saxon, it’s very thought provoking.

I can certainly appreciate that point of view; it’s one that I suspect many readers will share. I’ve taken the question seriously because it bears thinking about, even if you reach the same conclusion that he has, and because many groups will consider the question more seriously.

The Last Word?

However, it seems that even the group with which he plays is not always quite as devil-may-care about the issue, as Saxon acknowledges in some additional remarks included when forwarding Urban’s reply:

For all that they are very general, I think they are spot on in that the overall style of the Wednesday group is far more casual in style. A looser and often more silly game, where simply socializing over a shared hobby is often just as important as any in-game continuity, can afford to do that.

That said, I will offer one last observation that occurs to me as I read and forward Urban’s comments. There is the phenomenon of players identifying with their characters to the point where they have trouble separating the fantasy from the reality on an emotional level even when they can easily differentiate it on an intellectual level.

I know this feeling because it happened to me about a decade ago, and in the five minutes of quick recollection that I’m doing now I think that it was simply the case of one of the Wednesday-group GMs doing a quick shuffle of what the character was doing in order to quickly fill a plot hole in an adventure.

Because I was aware of the phenomenon and try to be an analytic person, my eventual reaction – starting from the day after, when I’d had time to sleep on it – was to go “Huh. So that’s what it feels like. Interesting.”

But I distinctly recall that at the time and for the hour or so of the trip home that evening, I was feeling resentful. And this proprietorial feeling was simply from having the GM decide on something that the character would do to fit a plot point – nowhere near as serious (or permanent) as having the character seriously injured or even killed through carelessness, malice, or simple circumstance when control was taken away from me as a player. Just a random thought that may be useful.

It’s certainly a relevant point, and one that ties the whole subject line back together. I’ve certainly both been in Saxon’s shoes in terms of the type of incident that he describes – and I’ve also been on the other side of the (metaphoric) GM’s screen when it’s happened, and (on at least two occasions that I can recall) when I was falsely accused of same.

Every GMing decision that does not immediately and fully yield gratification to the player concerned risks treading on toes, however lightly. If those toes are sore from past abuse, or simply more sensitive than most, or if the GM has used spiked boots instead of the lightest of dancing shoes when tap-dancing on the toes in question, there can be bruised egos and even wounded friendships.

That is an issue that deserves to be taken seriously, no matter how casual and easygoing the group may be. And, depending on the circumstances, that is exactly the type of damage that can result from a critical – when the owning player is absent. If a critical failure, it’s the absent player who suffers, whether they can shrug it off or not; if a critical success, it’s another player at the table who suffers, losing the chance at his moment of glory because what is effectively a glorified NPC has made off with their share of the spotlight.

The price of not at least thinking about the questions that I’ve raised in this article is too high for my tastes, and not worth the “purity” of game system or maintenance of a casual attitude. You don’t have to change anything about the way you game, if you don’t want to, or don’t think it necessary; but at least you should make a conscious decision not to do so, in light of the possible repercussions. Or, to phrase it a different way, we’re serious about having fun, here at Campaign Mastery!

PS:

If any other members of Saxon’s Wednesday group wants to comment, I welcome their thoughts. The same goes for the rest of the readership here at Campaign Mastery, of course, but I wanted to extend a special invitation to them, since they are at the heart of the incident that sparked the discussion.

Alas, this article is being posted late; I lost track of time working on the Tavern Generator. My apologies to anyone affected!

Image courtesy FreeImages.com/Alexander Rist

In part one of this series, six tables (and one set of subtables) defined the physical properties of a tavern (no guest accommodations) or inn (with guest accommodations), plus – because the modifiers needed were at hand – the meals provided by the kitchens. (This is an era when “restaurants” (i.e. locations for the sole purpose of dining) were fairly rare, but most taverns and inns provided meals of some sort for those who patronized the establishment. It might be that it was the introduction of age restrictions on the labor force that led to age restrictions on entry to pubs and taverns, and hence to the introduction of dedicated dining establishments – that’s just a theory on my part, I have no information from which to determine its validity. I mention it only because any GMs who have such restrictions as part of a “progressive” society in their worlds might need to investigate further).

The establishments created using this generator assume that there are no such age or gender restrictions in place!

A Note Regarding Table 12

I also want to draw reader’s attentions to Table 12, which is a simplified form of a personality generation system that I created for my TORG campaign. That system used a d20 to select from 20 tables each of which had 20 related personality traits. There were also various ways of biasing the results thanks to the way they were organized, so that I could roll d6+14 for trait one if I wanted a criminal, or d6 for a lawman, and so on. One of these days, when I find where I filed it away after that campaign closed down, I’ll present it in a game supplement or something – but, in the meantime, Table 12 can exist quite happily as a standalone personality generator for use in just about any campaign for just about any NPC.

Tavern Generator (cont)

We pick up the process right where we left off. It is not possible to use some of these tables without having completed the first part of the process.

Table 7: Common Room Wall Decorations

Roll d% to determine the nature of the decorations in the Common Room.

Table 8: Bar Decorations

Roll d20 to determine the decorations behind the bar.

Table 9: Librations Served

Roll 5d6 and add the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the range and quality of the drinks provided by the tavern.

Hint: Think about what this result says about the clientele and why they might choose to drink there. And if the business doesn’t seem viable given the location, it’s a good bet that the tavern owner has at least one “additional” source of income on the side!

Table 10: Accommodations Details

Roll 3d6 OR 2d6 + Tavern Size Modifier (GM’s Choice) to determine the size, quality, and suggested price of accommodation in rooms provided by the tavern. The referee should use the latter as nothing more than a guide; proximity to services, travel routes, etc will all alter the value, as will the type of local businesses and so on. Most taverns will permit travelers to sleep in the Commons Room for 1 cp per night. It is assumed that these accommodations are on a second story. Prices are based on those quoted in the Pathfinder Core Rules p159.

* suggests proximity to disreputable parts of town, undesirable industry, location in the poor/slum quarter, etc.

** suggests proximity to the better parts of town, protection from undesirables, location in the mercantile or wealthy quarter, on a major thoroughfaire, etc. If none of these is true, it suggest that the innkeeper has some reason for not wanting strangers to reside in the inn, is using pricing to drive customers away, and is probably up to something underhanded.

NB: Most taverns of common or good quality will not let rooms by the hour – this usually signifies a brothel operating within the tavern.

NB2: Note that this table does not tell you how many of these rooms there are, that is calculated later.

A Word On The Interpretation Of Quality

I’m not going to reiterate my precious spiel on the subjectivity of statements of quality; for one thing, objectivity is easier when describing a room relative to the more personal experience of consuming food.

Quality of accommodations is best defined as the intersection point of additional services & comforts and the quality of both those and the more fundamental elements of residential existence, but that is a definition that might not be clear to the casual reader; it requires explanation, and hence this brief insert.

The more services and comforts that are included with the residence, the more quality that accommodation will be percieved as having. A room with a view is better than one without; a room with better access to amenities is better than the alternative; additional furniture for the use of the resident, services such as the provision of fresh linen on a regular basis, and so on, all contribute to a better percieved standard of quality.

But each and every one of these additional services and comforts can be better or worse, a relative value statement, and if they are sufficiently poor, they may as well not be there, or could even be contrary to a better quality assessment; a room with a view of a dungheap may have “natural light, fresh air and a view” but the view is undesirable, the fresh air smells foul, and the natural light is not worth the price of the problems that come with it; better to brick up that window, cover it with a tapestry, and provide an extra lantern!

On top of that, basic expectations of accommodation are subject to the same demand for a satisfactory standard. It doesn’t generally matter how good the view is if the walls are dirty and the linen mouldy! Basic expectations can only lift quality of accommodations so far, however; beyond that, it is the presence of extras also of a satisfactory standard, or better, that can elevate quality.

Table 11: Barman skill

Roll d6 and add the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the skill of the barman. Each result also specifies a “Staff Modifier” which is a reflection of how many typical staff the Barman counts as – a skilled individual may be worth as many as 4 or 5 average staff.

“Barman skill” should be used as the number of ranks in all relevant skills in D&D 3.x / Pathfinder. It may need interpretation for use with any other system. It has been expressed as a die roll which should be rolled seperately for each such skill.

Table 12: Barman personality profile

Roll d20 three times to determine the basic personality profile of the barman. I think I’ve weeded out all the nonsense combinations.

* note that most members of the watch / local law-enforcement will prefer to drink at an establishment run by an ex-colleague of good character/reputation.

** fanatics may refuse service to particular groups, individuals, races, or professions. This result may modify the outcome of other rolls.

Example: The Palomino and Fox (continued)

What we know so far:
The “Palomino and Fox” is a Medium-Large Tavern. It contains (with relative sizes) a bar (2), Large Common Room (5), Storage Cellar, and Family Dwelling (2). The Kitchens consist of Medium Stove, Large Ovens, Medium Grill (1.75) and a Medium-sized Food Prep area (2.5) relative to a business of this size [Total Kitchen Area 4.25]. The cuisine is Good Quality Food, a hearty meal with bread and meat/fish 0-1 (d3:0, 1/2, 1) day old, costing 7 sp.

Within the common room are 6 large tables that seat 20 each, occupying a total of 72 five-foot square spaces. The tables are L-shaped and made of wood. The walls of the tavern are rough-hewn stone.

The name is suggestive either of a tavern sign featuring the named animals, or of hunting, but which one has yet to be determined.

I want either The Palomino and Fox or Example #3, “The Robber’s End”, to be a multistory residential Inn, while the other is to be a more typical 2-story building, but haven’t decided which yet.

Tavern Size Modifier is 4, Commons Size Modifier is 3.

Resuming the example:
It’s always worth re-examining undecided questions after each major stage of the process, to see if any can now be resolved. In this case, there are two questions, both indicated above:

• Is this tavern/inn a hunting lodge or similar, or just a name? And,
• Is it more appropriate for this to be the larger building example that I want to include, or should I leave that “honor” to “The Robber’s End”?

There’s been nothing decided that contributes to the first question in any way; it’s still completely up in the air. Some clues may come from the ambience, which is the subject of this part of the generation process, in particular from the decorations; if anything comes up that might be reflective of hunting, that would be a positive indicator. That could be scoreboards, or trophies, or weapons, or even some of the tapestry options.

What is more clear is that the size of the tavern is very relevant to the second question. With a large tavern, multiple stories for guest accommodations would indicate a substantial residential capacity, and that would be consistent with the size of the kitchens and the size and number of tables in the common area; but that in turn is suggestive of a location that is very central to a well-populated area that many guests would travel to, which is not appropriate to the hunting-oriented approach. The roll results therefore indicate that this is an either-or situation: either this tavern is a hunting-oriented establishment, or it is located near the capital or in some other major population centre to which many guests will flock, and is the multi-story example.

In actual use for a game, of course, you wouldn’t generate an Inn or Tavern for the sake of generating one, you would generate it for a specific locality, and this would be decided on that basis. I, on the other hand, have that luxury, and hence don’t have to decide yet; I can let the results continue to speak for themselves.

• Table 7: Roll 02: Common Room Decorations are stuffed or preserved animal heads.
• Table 8: Roll of 13: Behind the bar are mounted weapons, whole and intact. These last two results are definitely supportive of the “hunting lodge” interpretation, and are less appropriate for a major urban inn. Even the name has a slightly rural feel to it, now that I think about it.
• Table 9: 17 rolled, plus Tavern Size Modifier 4, = 21: The bar serves very poor quality versions of the two most popular drinks, locally. There are no better alternatives available to patrons. Whatever people come here for, it’s not the alcohol.
• Table 10: Because the tavern size is somewhat unusual, I am choosing the 2d6 option. Roll of 11 + Tavern Size Mod 4 = 15: Rooms (if any) are medium, capable of accommodating 2-4 people, and of common quality. They are overpriced at 5.5 sp/night, or 3.5 gp/week. Relative room size is 0.1 x (d12+10): 9 rolled, so 0.1 x (9+10) = 1.9.
• Table 11: 2 rolled, plus Tavern Size Modifier 4, = 6: The barman’s skills are given by d4+1. I could roll once for all of them (the quick & generic solution) or seperately for each relevant skill. He counts as 1 worker, so nothing special.
• Table 12: rolls of 8, 12, and 15: The barman’s personality profile is angry but soft-hearted, bold, fanatical about his religious beliefs, and a snitch or cheat who thinks with his emotions. “Snitch” doesn’t seem to fit, so he’s a cheat of some sort, behavior that obviously is not forbidden by his faith. The subject/cause of his anger remains undecided and suggests that he tries to mask his tenderheartedness behind a gruff exterior, so it might not even be real.

More fairly rural results. Every result this time around argues in favor of the “hunting lodge” approach, with only one floor for accommodations.

So that decision is made, but there’s a new question or two to take it’s place: what (if anything) is the barman angry about, and what does he cheat at?

My preliminary thoughts are that the Tavern is the centre of a fox-hunting club or association, with a quite respectable clientele, and that they have run afoul of a Druidic order in the vicinity, who have used their powers to persuade all the foxes to go elsewhere. Rather than try to actually reach some settlement with the Druids, who have a philosophic objection to hunting for sports, the Barman has resorted to “cheating” to make sure that each hunt bags something they can brag about. If this deception is exposed, he will have even more trouble with the Druids, and hence would be a little paranoid about strangers. Because of his cheating, the tavern/inn has built up a reputation, publicly justifying the “overpriced” accommodations; in reality, the extra covers the cost of maintaining that reputation.

Example: The Spotted Parrot (continued)

The name is so suggestive of pirates that I wanted to play on that; this is an example of how to shape the results to fit a preconcieved idea or requirement, essentially re-rolling until you get results that “fit”.

The concept is of a floating tavern, either a barge decked out to look like a sailing ship, or an unseaworthy vessel that has been recommissioned as a novel tavern or inn. The presence of a cellar would decide which. Meals would be served on the deck, and would have a definite seafood theme. If there are any accommodations – something I haven’t yet decided – these would be small staterooms, probably below decks, while the family would live in accommodations on the ship’s deck level, which is also where the kitchens would be located.

What is known so far:
The “Spotted Parrot” is a Medium-sized Tavern. It contains (with relative sizes) a bar (1.5), Small-Medium Common Room (3.5), Storage Cellar, and Family Dwelling (1.5). The Kitchens consist of Small Stove & Ovens (0.75) and a Medium-sized Food Prep area (0.75) [Total Kitchen Area 1.5]. The cuisine is of Good Quality and consists of bread and a small meal (soup, stew, or pie) AND meat/fish 0-1 (d3:0, 1/2, 1) day old, costing 6 sp per serve.

Within the common room are 12 medium tables that seat 6 each of rectangular shape (2:1 proportions), made of stone; these occupy a total of 38.4 five-foot square spaces. The walls of the tavern are sawn timber.

Tavern Size Modifier is 2, Commons Size Modifier is 1.

Resuming the example:
As stated above, this is a good point to take stock of the unanswered questions. The fact that this tavern indicates a storage cellar instead of ground-floor storage rules out a barge, and automatically makes the inn big enough to have guest quarters. However, the size of the kitchens makes it clear that these would be quite limited in capacity; and, if anything, the number of people who can be seated at the tables (up to 60 at a time) is far in excess of what can be justified given the size of the kitchens, unless those tables are used for something more than meals. The suggestion is, therefore, that a lot of the tables are used for sitting and drinking, and not for the consumption of food.

• Table 7: Roll of 76: The Common Room decorations are scoreboards or honor rolls. That doesn’t quite make sense in light of the piratic “theme”, but can be reinterpreted as a series of wooden panels illustrating infamous acts of piracy, which does fit the ambience. The “scores” are thus the tonnage of ships captured or raided, the value of treasures looted, and so on, and might be half-truths or complete fictions.
• Table 8: Roll of 4: Behind the bar, the skulls of slain enemies are mounted as decorations – or (it may be assumed) reasonable facsimiles, thereof. This is a result that feels like it might or might not fit, with a little more thought. Just in case it doesn’t work out, I made a second roll – result of 16 – which yields, “Painting, Good Quality.”
• Table 9: 22 rolled, plus Tavern Size Modifier 2, = 24: The bar serves average quality versions of the two most popular local drinks and has 1 uncommon option of Good Quality available. Given the motif, the “two most popular” are probably rum and ale, and the third, uncommon option might be a wine or brandy.
• Table 10: The tavern size is not all that exceptional, so I choose the 3d6 option and roll a 14: Any accommodations are small (large enough for a couple), of good quality, but overpriced at 6 sp per night. The actual room size is determined by 0.1 x (d12+7.5); 2 rolled = 0.95.
• Table 11: 5 rolled, plus Tavern Size Modifier 2, = 7: The barman’s skills are given by d6+1. I could roll once for all of them (the quick & generic solution) or seperately for each relevant skill. He counts as 2 workers, so he is skilled at his profession.
• Table 12: rolls of 13, 6, and 18: The barman is polite, greedy, cautious, impious, sensible or practical, and lawless, a felon, or an ex-felon. Sounds a lot like Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) from the Pirates Of The Carribbean movies, maybe in retirement.

This all seems to be coming together nicely – and I didn’t even have to reroll anything!

The behind-the-bar decorations remain a problem. The thought that was eluding me during the generation process was sets of skull-and-crossbones using real bones inset into the timber behind the bar; that sort of works, but seems a bit cheesy, in hindsight. Similarly, the “wooden panels” idea seems a bit too Walt Disney. So I’m going to override the latter result and go with the alternative roll for the former: The common room is decorated with leg irons, cutlasses, and other piratical/nautical memorobilia, while the space behind the bar is decorated with a large and quite good painting of a ship at sea in a storm.

Example: The Robber’s End (continued)

What we know so far:
“The Robber’s End” is a Small Tavern. It contains (with relative sizes) a bar (1), Small-Medium Common Room (3.5), Ground-floor storeroom (0.75), and Family Dwelling (1). The Kitchens consist of a Small Pit/Rack (0.5) and a Small Food Prep area (0.25) [Total Kitchen Area 0.75]. The cuisine is of Average Quality, normally bread with soups, stews, or broths containing a little meat 0-3 (d4-1) days old, and costs 2 sp per serving.

Within the common room are 12 small tables that seat 4 each, taking up 31.2 five-foot sqr spaces. The tables are square and made of wood. The walls of the tavern are plastered/surfaced/rendered brick.

Tavern Size Modifier is 0, Commons Size Modifier is 1.

Resuming the example:
“The Robber’s End” is defined more as being whatever the “Palomino and Fox” are not than by any other preconcieved ideas. This is very much whatever the dice decide to throw out.

What can be said is that if “The Robber’s End” is the multistory establishment, there would not be very many rooms on each level; it would be a small building with many floors, probably sandwiched between a couple of other buildings, almost a tower in design. That would posess a rather interesting ambience.

The alternative suggests that most if not all of the one residential floor would be taken up with the family accommodations, especially if the family (to be generated in part 3) is large in size. There would be few if any guest accommodations, and that points to this being a rather more seedy and disreputable establishment in the poorer quarter of a large town or a city.

The name, “The Robber’s End,” is also quite suggestive – but can be interpreted in many different ways. Is this a hangout for thieves, burglars, and pickpockets? Is this where a famous criminal was hunted down, hanged, or otherwise brough to justice? Is it both, signifying a wittier owner than is normally the case? No decisions can yet be made, but at least we know what to look out for, as we proceed!

• Table 7: 23 Rolled; The common room is decorated with tapestries of battle scenes.
• Table 8: Roll of 14: Behind the bar, weapons that are bent, broken, and mangled are mounted, clearly souvenirs of some past military campaign or battlefield booty.
• Table 9: Roll 15, plus Tavern Size Modifier 0, = 15: The bar serves poor quality versions of the three most popular local beverages, which fits well with the suggestion that this establishment is located in the poorer part of a community.
• Table 10: This tavern is unusually small, so I choose the 2d6 option. 12 rolled, plus Tavern Size Mod 0, = 12: Accommodations (if any) are small (big enough for a couple), of common quality, and underpriced (3 sp/night or 4 cp/hr). Relative room size is 0.1 x (d10+7.5); 1 rolled = 0.85, which is almost “tiny”, but is appropriate given the size of the inn.
• Table 11: 1 rolled, plus Tavern Size Modifier 0, = 1: The barman’s skills are given by d3. He counts as just 1 worker, so nothing special.
• Table 12: rolls of 19, 19, and 4: The Barman is friendly but a penny-pincher, fearlessly brave and a pious man without being fanatical, viewed as a respectable man, and coldly logical. Not the criminal type, in other words, or the type who would turn a blind eye to criminal activities that he came across. However, he does sound like the sort of person who would start a legitimate business in an area known to be rife with crime, insist on his establishment being neutral territory, and manage to make a go of things, eventually becoming a local fixture and trusted arbiter of neighberhood disputes.

The focus on battle-related decorations, coupled with the barman’s profile, suggests that he served with distinction in the military before creating his establishment, and is probably still someone not to be messed with. The profile suggests a third interpretation of the name: this is where ‘robbers cease to be robbers’. Perhaps many of the staff are reformed criminals. It might even have the local nickname of the “second chance”.

It has been decided by their respective results that this is the tall, small-footprint idea, possibly built into what used to be a square Tower.

Variations on the idea are still possible; if the region was invaded, years earlier, perhaps the barman was already located here, and fought off the invaders rather than seeing his establishment razed, or perhaps it was one of his ancestors who did so, making this a long-established local fixture.

If these walls could talk: wrap-up and prolog to part 3

With the three example taverns taking clear shape and distinctive character – exactly what the “ambiance” section was supposed to provide – we next must turn our attention to the questions of guests and other residents. That happens in Part 3, which includes the most comprehensive medieval family generator that I’ve ever seen, anywhere…

This image combines
Windmill by FreeImages.com/Dave Evans and
Guidebooks by Freeimages.com/dog matic.
Thanks to both!

How do you work accents into your speech patterns for voicing NPCs? I have three techniques that I use repeatedly, and two general principles that I rely on continuously. Today’s article is going to look at these five secret weapons in my characterization arsenal (some of which I have described before, I must admit, though I’m digging a little deeper into them this time around).

A caveat:

the techniques offered in this article work to deliver foreign accents in English. I don’t know if they will work for foreign accents in any other language – nor do I know they won’t. I have often wondered, in fact, at what French spoken in an Irish accent, or a Russian Accent, or in fact any other combination of language and accents, sounds to those who speak the foreign language. So it might work, but I can make no guarantees. Let me know!!

Technique 1: The locking phrase

To start with, I know I’ve repeated this tip many times. It actually derives from Babylon-5, and is the technique that Peter Jurrasic used to get into character as Londo Mollari. He discovered a “locking phrase”, a series of words that he could not possibly forget which automatically – when delivered in Londo’s faux-Hungarian accent – “locked” his voice ‘in character’ for any text that the script required him to deliver. His phrase was “Good Morning, Mis-ter Garaboldi”.

The trick is working out – and documenting for later use – the best possible locking phrase. Jurassic discovered his because this was something that early scripts had him say on several occasions – sheer coincidence and fate played their part in the outcome, in other words. You probably won’t be so lucky.

There are five requirements that a potential locking phrase needs to meet in order to succeed in performing this function. It needs to:

• …make the accent accessible – there’s no use having a locking phrase that doesn’t deliver the accent!
• …work quickly and silently – unlike a television set, where you can say or do whatever you need to before the cameras start rolling in order to get into character, you can’t go around repeating your locking phrase out loud. And it has to be very short, or it will disrupt the rhythm of play.
• …be reliable and persistent – you don’t get to re-shoot a scene where it doesn’t work, so your locking phrase needs to work almost every time – and it has to reinforce the accent you are impersonating strongly enough that you can drop it (for narrative and game admin delivery) and pick it back up (for dialogue), both at a moment’s notice.
• …be appropriate to the character – the identification between the NPC that you are playing and the way that character speaks needs to be definitive; the result states by definition that the NPC always speaks that way.
• …make the accent obvious without being a caricature – perhaps the hardest requirement of all, and achieved by applying some of the other techniques and principles I’ll be discussing in this article.

That’s a pretty tall order, but it can still be done. The secret is to:

1. Pick a phrase that the character is going to say early in most conversations; it might be a greeting, or “let’s get down to business”, or any of a hundred other lines that can become a vocal habit of the NPC.
2. Pick a phrase that captures the key elements of the accent.
3. Customize that phrase in some manner that is distinctive to the NPC.
4. Use the phrase as a tag to indicate that the NPC associated with it is doing the talking.

Two Standards

I use two standards for accents: the stock character and the key NPC. Most of the instructions above refer to the more demanding of those standards. For stock characters, the bar is set much lower.

It’s often helpful to “channel” some actor or on-screen character who has the same accent. You want Austrian? “I’ll Be Back” (impersonating Arnold Schwarzenegger) works for most people, but isn’t something you can place early in most conversations. But choosing some other famous line by Arnie that is more appropriate to such placement gets you there. And if none come to mind, use it silently – it’s brief enough.

“Faith and Beggorrah” works for me for Irish accents. Sometimes “Saints and Beggorah” as a variation.

For German, I use “Gut Mornink, Herr Kapitan” – which is probably appalling sentence construction, but it gets my mind and tongue moving in the right ways.

For Russian, “Can you direct me to the nuclear wessels?” (or just “nuclear wessels”) does the trick.

For Scottish, “Och Aye, the noon; Captain, my wee bairns canna take any more”.

For British, I use Sir Humphrey Appelby (spelling? never mind) at his smarmiest, “Dear Lady”, “Prime Minister” (condescending, disapproving), etc.

For Spanish, I channel Speedy Gonzales: “Senõr Duck, I presume? Welcome to me-hi-co” …. You get the idea.

Technique 2: The foreign excursion

The occasional word in a native tongue, especially when the players will still understand the statement, works wonders. Favorite words for the purpose are “yes”, “no”, “hello”, “goodbye”, and “excuse me”/”pardon me”.

“Si”, “Hola” and “Scuza”- Spanish.
“Da” and “Nyet” – Russian.
“Oui”, “Non” and “Pardohn?” (and “Madamoiselle” which is not on the standard list) – French.
“Si” and “Ciao” – Italian.

And always get a translation of “I do not speak English” and “My English is not so good” or “… is so-so” and write it down phonetically!

Technique 3: The Rhyming Dictionary

An accent is basically a consistently-different way of pronouncing certain syllables. Pick the one that you find the most iconically representative of the accent that you are trying to convey – that’s fairly easy, because these are the sounds that are exaggerated in caricatures of the population in question – and then find one or two words that contain that syllable. Then look these words up in a rhyming dictionary.

Rhyming dictionaries are designed for use by poets and lyric writers, but they work wonderfully in identifying words that contain the “accented sound” that you have chosen – then all you have to do is find ways of working those words into your dialogue. Don’t force them in, use them only when it seems natural in preference to some synonym, and you will deliver your accent in a way that seems natural and unforced – because it is.

Here are a few for you to consider:

• New Oxford Rhyming Dictionary – Most expensive of them all, but also seemingly the most up-to-date and Oxford’s reputation secures it pride of place on the list
• Merriam-Webster’s Rhyming Dictionary – Reputation is there but this appears to be an older edition by almost 8 years. At least it’s relatively cheap – but you’re mostly relying on second-hand copies for anything but the Oxford, and that’s why I’ve listed so many
• Essential Songwriter’s Rhyming Dictionary – Looks good but I haven’t used it. The first rhyming dictionary I ever saw had the same name, and was excellent – but I’m not sure it was the same book, that was many many years ago, so I can’t give it bonus marks for that.
• The New Comprehensive American Rhyming Dictionary – Most of my readers are from the USA (Canada, the UK, and Australia are next best, with the order changing somewhat from time to time), so this might be more useful to them than I would consider it. But it’s affordable – while copies last.
• Scholastic Rhyming Dictionary – I wasn’t quite sure what to make of this one; it might be excellent, or it might focus on the correct pronunciation of words rather than the everyday usage of those words. But it seemed quite affordable, though copies are limited.
• The Complete Rhyming Dictionary by Clement Wood and Ronald J. Bogus – The first book that Amazon offered me in response to my search and also the one that I am least confident in recommending because of the second part of the title: “Including The Poet’s Craft Book”. Now, if you want to use poetry in your games and need a hand writing it, this might be the perfect weapon; I don’t, so it makes the list – in last place.

There were more, but these should be enough to get one for everyone whose inspired by this tip enough to buy one – for at least the reasonably-foreseeable future.

General Principle 1: A little applied consistently is better than a lot applied inconsistently

Having dispensed my three killer techniques (three-and-a-half if you want to get technical), it’s time to move on to the two general principles that I always try to follow, and which have been rammed home to me repeatedly.

At one point I developed the theory that it was better to establish the accent or foreign language all at once and that the memory of that would then persist, refreshed with the occasional reminder. As a theory, it sounds good – but in practice it simply didn’t work. The opening salvo was so densely-populated with accented words and foreign language that it was incomprehensible to the players, especially in a noisy environment.

I was also busy in that opening salvo with establishing the personality of the character doing the talking – and there wasn’t enough room to do both, and as a result, both purposes failed, as did the primary purpose of the dialogue, to communicate. Three strikes, and the theory was out.

A light, but more consistent, sprinkling quickly proved more effective. I try to make sure that there’s at least one reminder of the accent in every substantial paragraph of dialogue. And I try to put one in for every three or four lines of canned dialogue, or every 45-seconds-to-a-minute or so of improvised dialogue.

What’s more, I discovered that I gained greater control over nuance by adopting this theory; by increasing the frequency just a little (to one every 30 seconds, say) I could distinguish between characters with heavily-accented English and characters with excellent English who were not native English-speakers, all without compromising comprehension on the part of the players. This turned the accent from a detriment in characterization to an asset that aided it. General principles don’t get much better – or more useful – than that!

General Principle 2: A little applied consistently is better than a lot applied consistently

It’s still necessary to watch out for overload. A particular problem arises when you are playing an NPC who speaks no English with someone – could be a PC, could be an NPC – translating (or even occasionally, mistranslating). Once again, you need to provide an opening salvo in the foreign language, which needs to be prepped in advance, and in which you also need to establish the initial perception of the personality of the speaker; then you need to shift gears and deliver the comprehensible translation without losing the identification as a foreign-language speaker.

Because you no longer require that opening paragraph to be comprehensible to the players, this becomes a manageable process. There’s enough room in any given piece of dialogue for it to do two jobs, but not three, which means that for every piece of dialogue you need to choose which combination of two you want to achieve:

• Delivery of information & comprehension of that information;
• Delivery of accent/foreign language;
• Delivery of characterization.

By ruling that the first paragraph of dialogue did nothing but focus on jobs two and three and ignored job one, and then shifting to a different focus in which job one is primary and jobs 2 and 3 alternate in some ratio as room within the dialogue permits, the situation becomes manageable.

What I have found is that you can employ the “little, consistently” as an accent (even if the translator speaks both languages like a native), you can manage to perform all three jobs at the same time, with that opening salvo as a platform.

This seems to contradict the findings reported in describing the first principle, but there is a subtle difference in the circumstances, and thinking about that difference led me to formulate the principle now under discussion.

You can think of any dialogue as possessing information content and having a limited “overhead capacity” to convey other information. Processing an accent is one of the things that can occupy that overhead capacity – but if you oversaturate the dialogue with an accent, you suck all the air out of that capacity, air that you need for other purposes – characterization, emotion, etc.

What’s more, one of the surest routes to caricature is to overemphasize the accent. That might be fine for a cartoon Pepe Le Pew, but it’s no good for any serious characters in a believable RPG.

The process

I write the first couple of lines of whatever dialogue the character is to deliver in English. I then copy and paste into Google translate, and then attempt to sound out the translated lines in an appropriate accent. After doing that a couple of times, and editing to replace any words that don’t translate into something that will, I copy and paste the translated text back into my word processor and rewrite them as phonetically as possible. After that, I switch to delivering the dialogue in accented English.

For example:

• “Disaster at the old farmstead, come at once! The midnight cockerel has been slain by the a nightmare guardian!”

In French, this becomes:

• “Catastrophes à l’ancienne ferme, venez à la fois! Le cockerel de minuit a été tué par le tuteur d’un cauchemar!”

Replacing “Cockerel” with “bird” gives me:

• “Catastrophes à l’ancienne ferme, venez à la fois! L’oiseau de minuit a été tué par le tuteur d’un cauchemar!”

Now, I don’t speak French, so I make my best guess as to what this would sound like, phonetically (with apologies to anyone who does for the hatchet-job I am about to perpetrate on their language):

• “Catastroph alan-sien fer-me, venez ala fois! Loys-oo de min-wit a-ete tue-par le-tut-you-are dun corsh-em-ar!”

With a minute or two to practice a few times before the game, I can just about rattle that off in a pseudo-French accent and at least sound like I know what I’m doing.

Next, I take that French translation, and plug it back into Google translate to render it back into English:

• “Catastrophes à l’ancienne ferme, venez à la fois! L’oiseau de minuit a été tué par le tuteur d’un cauchemar!”

becomes

• “Catastrophes in the old farm, come at once! The bird midnight was killed by the guardian of a nightmare!”

The burst of faked French dialogue is followed by a “translation” based on this reverse-translation, also delivered in faux-French accent: “Mon Diu, he says there has been catastrophe at the old farm. Le black bird was killed by a monster who guards nightmares.”

Everything that follows is simply written in plain English (or improvised on the spot) and delivered with false French accent. Job done.

Bonus (marginally-relevant) tip: you can sometimes get ideas for the most wonderful mistranslations by taking the foreign-language version and spell-checking it using an appopriate dictionary (I write for an American audience, so I use an American English Dictionary):

• “Catastrophes e ancientness femme, veneer e la foist! Aloise de Minuit a étude tun par el hauteur dun gaucher!”

which I would render as

• “An old woman has exposed herself to the audience while doing the minute song in her best dress! It was catastrophic!”

Any resemblance between this translation and the “real” meaning are purely coincidental… :)

Conclusion

More than once, people have told me they “can’t do accents”. Heck, I’ve said it myself on occasion, because I can’t do real accents. But I can fake them – and now, so can you.

The Palomino and Fox and other establishments: Mike’s Fantasy Tavern Generator Pt 1

Old Tavern courtesy of Freeimages.com/Karol S

Preface

As part of the series on Beginner GMs, I promised a Fantasy Tavern Generator after showing how you could start with one Tavern and ring in variation after variation as needed.

This is a little more complex than the example provided in that article simply because I’m not a beginner and a more thorough solution comes naturally to me. To make it practical to post – there’s a LOT of formatting involved – I’ve divided the system into three parts:

• Part 1: The physical properties of the Tavern/Inn;
• Part 2: The look-and-feel of the Tavern/Inn;
• Part 3: The family-in-residence of the Bartender, the guestrooms (if any), and the tavern entertainments.
• Part 4: The worksheets that bring it all together.

Each step has full instructions, and each part is accompanied by three ongoing examples. Length is another reason for dividing the article; this has turned out to be a VERY long item because of all the html code and explanations – in fact, some 36,200 words (and counting)! Anyway, without further ado:

Introduction

A Tavern serves multiple functions. It’s a place to drink, eat, socialize, and rest; it may be a place to gamble, hold meetings, meet contacts, catch up on the latest gossip, or serve as a base of operations; all too often, it serves as the launching point of a campaign wherein the PCs gather together as a unit for the first time. You can buy, sell, haggle, and horsetrade. In fact, there’s not very much that you can’t do in a tavern! Technically, if an establishment has accommodations other than the common room, it’s an Inn or Hotel; if it does not, it’s a Tavern. So what I’m offering is actually a “Tavern/Inn generator”.

This generator has been designed to accommodate and facilitate that entire myriad of activites. I can’t tell you how many valid combinations there are; only that the number is something less than 695,335,579,885,000,000,000,000,000 combinations (6.9e+25) – more than one for every kilogram in the weight of planet earth, by a factor of 10). Maybe as few as one one-billionth of that preposterous number. but even lopping 9 zeros off the end, or 12 (depending on what you mean by a “billion”) should leave more than enough to keep everyone going for the foreseeable future!

Tavern Generator Instructions:

The following is just an outline; more specific instructions accompany each table.

Part 1: Physical Construction

• Table 1 – Overall Size: Roll a d% to determine the overall size of the tavern and a partial listing of the rooms within. Each result on Table 1 also yields a Tavern Size Modifier that is used extensively as a modifier on other tables.
• Table 2 – Common Room Size: Roll 1d8 and add the Tavern Size Modifier to determines the relative size of the common room of the Tavern. This result yields additional modifiers used on some tables.
• Table 3 – Common Room Table Size: Roll 1d6 plus modifiers to determine the number and general size of dining/drinking tables. Each result also directs attention to a subtable (Tables 3a to 3e) that is used to determine the specific shape and construction of the tables. Note that each table space includes room for the chairs and for people to move around the table.
• Table 4 – Kitchens: Roll 1d8 plus Tavern Size Modifier to determine the nature and size of the cooking facilities. This roll is also the minimum result on table 5. Kitchens are divided into two components, Cooking facilities and preparation space. Although it is possible to roll seperately, the same roll normally determines both. The total size of the kitchen space is used as a modifier on table 5.
• Table 5 – Meals: Roll 2d6 + Kitchen Size to determine the nature, quality, and price of the meals provided by the tavern. If this result is less than the result rolled on table 4, use the table 4 result instead. Prices are based on those in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, p159.
• Table 6 – Walls: Roll d20 and cross-referance with the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the nature of the walls.

Part 2: Interior Ambience

• Table 7 – Decorations: Roll d% to determine the nature of the decorations in the Common Room.
• Table 8 – Bar Decorations: Roll d20 to determine the decorations behind the bar.
• Table 9 – Bar: Roll 5d6 and add the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the range and quality of the drinks on offer.
• Table 10 – Accommodations: Roll 3d6 to determine the size, quality, and suggested price of accommodation of guest rooms provided by an inn. It is assumed that these accommodations are on a second story, and note that the rooms include corridor space used to access the guest quarters. Also note that there is no random determination as to whether or not accommodations are provided; that is a choice for the GM to make. Prices should be used as a guide rather than a fixed result, and are based on those quoted in the Pathfinder Core Rules p159.
• Table 11 – Barman Skill: Roll d6 and add the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the skill of the barman. Each result also specifies a “Staff Modifier” which is a reflection of how many typical staff the Barman counts as – a skilled individual may be worth as many as 4 or 5 average staff. For Pathfinder / 3,x, the skill result may be read as the number of ranks the barman has in any skill the GM deems relevant to his occupation; for other systems, it may need interpretation.
• Table 12 – Barman Profile: Roll d20 three times to determine the basic personality profile of the barman. I think I’ve weeded out all the nonsense combinations.

Part 3: Residents, Staff, and Guests

• Table 13 – Family Size: children: Roll d% to determine the size of the barman’s family-in-residence. The result may give a modifier to Table 13a. Each entry also gives a Family Size Modifier representing the number of “staff” the family can provide (younger children are less than a whole worker). A pre-calculated distribution of ages is assumed.
  • Table 13a – Co-owners: Roll d10 to determine the presence of co-owners who also work in the tavern. Some results require rolls on Tables 13b and 13c. Some entries also give a bonus to the Family Size Modifier.
  • Table 13b – Parental presence: Roll d20 to determine the presence of parents or in-laws. Most entries also give a bonus to the Family Size Modifier.
  • Table 13c – Non-Parental relatives table: Roll d% to determine the presence of relatives other than parents and in-laws. Most entries also give a bonus to the Family Size Modifier.
  • If parents, in-laws, and other relatives are not present, any third party indicated by Table 13a is an unrelated business partner who also works in the Tavern.
  • The Family Size Modifier is used to adjust the Family Residence size from table 1.
• “Table” 14 – Staff Numbers & Entertainment: A three-line worksheet (with instructions) uses 2d4 plus modifiers to determine the number of staff (excluding entertainers) required to maintain and operate the Tavern. This result is adjusted for Barman Skill and Family-in-residence, assuming that they also work in the Tavern, to determine the number of paid employees required. The third line of the worksheet uses some of these values to determine how many rolls should be made on Table 15.
• Table 15 – In-Tavern Entertainment: Roll d% and cross-referance with the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the type of entertainment (if any) offered by the Tavern. Each entry is accompanied by a relative size for the space inside the tavern that is devoted to the entertainment.

Part 4: Layout and Size Specifics

• “Tables” 16-21: Final Calculations: A series of worksheets to generate final specifics of the ground floor and possible first, second, third, and fourth floors. This is followed by a worksheet to determine the patronage at different times of day (ie how busy the bar and kitchens usually are).
• Give your tavern a name (if you haven’t already), decide on its customer base (ditto), describe the ambiance as though you were stepping into the place for the first time, and you’re done!

The observant may note that there is nowhere in the procedure given where the number of levels within the tavern is determined. I wanted to leave this, and the size of the building’s “footprint” entirely up to the GM – which is why the relative space system was devised. In fact, there is (intentionally) very limited information concerning the exterior appearance of the tavern, again to permit maximum flexibility for the GM. Nor is there any table for determining the clientele – that is something that the GM should decide for himself based on the other answers determined and the location of the tavern.

As a rule of thumb (percentages are approximate and can be varied according to the “local” architectural style):

• A Large Tavern/Inn will sometimes have 4 floors (20%), most commonly will have 2-3 floors (40% and 30% respectively), and will sometimes (10%) only have 1 floor.
• A Medium-Large or Medium Tavern/Inn will rarely-if-ever have 4 floors (5%), will rarely have 3 floors (15%), most commonly will have 2 floors (50%), and will sometimes (30%) only have 1 floor, indicating that all accommodations are located on the ground floor.
• A Medium-Small Tavern/Inn will never have 4 floors (0%), only truly exceptional examples will have 3 floors (10%), will usually (70%) have 2 floors, and will occasionally only have 1 floor (20%), indicating that all accommodations are located on the ground floor.
• A Small Tavern/Inn will never have 3 or 4 floors (0%), will often have 2 floors (60%), but will frequently (40%) have only 1 floor, indicating that all accommodations are located on the ground floor.

I thought about including each of the descriptive elements that I have listed as omitted, but realized that there was no practical way to do so, cover all the alternatives, and ensure consistency. On reflection, I realized that this is actually an advantage to the GM, who can customize the tavern’s layout and outward appearance based on the surroundings, location, bartender, etc, so that it fits the location and game world like a glove. Furthermore, it was clear that the clientele would be dependant on several of these factors, so logically, that also had to be left to the GM’s creativity, inspired by what information the system provides.

Finally, although primarily intended for D&D 3.x / Pathfinder, it should be realized that the Tavern Generator will require minimal adaption to serve in other fantasy games, in 7th sea, or in a pulp/steampunk setting.

Anything more modern will require further tweaks, as will usage for Sci-Fi campaigns, but the generation of a “psuedo-medieval” tavern which can then be updated in technology – adding poker machines, etc – should not present insuperable difficulties. You will probably need to add space for services that medieval taverns and inns would not provide eg laundry, boiler room, etc. Room sizes should generally be increased to include bathroom facilities, though some intermediate-period dwellings may well dedicate a “guest room” to the purpose of being a shared bathroom facility instead. And, of course, the number of floors can increase massively; additional ground floor space can be consumed by adding shops and restaurants, booking desk, concierge, etc. Kitchen spaces may also need to increase in size considerably.

Update: With the examples for Part 3 now totalling 10,000 words and not finished yet, I’ve made the decision to split this article into four parts instead of three, and updated the above accordingly.

Tavern generator tables

As far as was possible, the following tables are specified in a standard format that should be self-explanatory.

Table 1: Overall Size

Roll a d% for the overall size of the tavern and a listing of the rooms. Some rooms have a number in brackets after their listing which represents their Relative Room Size (more on that below). Each result on Table 1 also has a Tavern Size Modifier associated with it.

Table 2: Common Room Size

Roll 1d8 and add the Tavern Size Modifier. The result determines the relative size of the common room of the Tavern. Each size of common room also has a Relative Room Size value and a Commons Size Modifier Value.

Table 3: Common Room Table Size

Roll 1d6 and add both the Tavern Size Modifier and the Commons Size Modifier value. The total determines the result on Table 3, which describes the number and size of tables. Each result also directs attention to a subtable for shape and construction of the tables. Table sizes include space for chairs and for staff/customers to walk between tables.

Table Notes: These numbers have had to be revised several times to correct errors on my part, especially given that some were giving space per table and some space for ALL tables.

Table 3a: Tables Details Subtable A

Roll 3d6 to determine the shape of small-sized tables and d% on the associated sub-subtable to determine the primary construction material. Note that some designs may involve carved surfaces, decorative inlays, and/or glass tops – such details are left to the creative powers of the individual GM.

Table 3b: Table Details Subtable B

Roll 3d6 to determine the shape of smaller medium-sized tables and d% on the associated sub-subtable to determine the primary construction material. Note that some designs may involve carved surfaces, decorative inlays, and/or glass tops – such details are left to the creative powers of the individual GM.

Table 3c: Tables Details Subtable C

Roll 3d6 to determine the shape of larger medium-sized tables and d% on the associated sub-subtable to determine the primary construction material. Note that some designs may involve carved surfaces, decorative inlays, and/or glass tops – such details are left to the creative powers of the individual GM.

Table 3d: Tables Details Subtable D

Roll 3d6 to determine the shape of smaller large-sized tables and d% on the associated sub-subtable to determine the primary construction material. Note that some designs may involve carved surfaces, decorative inlays, and/or glass tops – such details are left to the creative powers of the individual GM.

Table 3e: Tables Details Subtable E

Roll 3d6 to determine the shape of longer/larger large-sized tables and d% on the associated sub-subtable to determine the primary construction material. Note that some designs may involve carved surfaces, decorative inlays, and/or glass tops – such details are left to the creative powers of the individual GM.

0

Table 4: Kitchens

Roll 1d8 and add the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the nature and size of the cooking facilities. This roll is also the minimum result on table 5. Kitchen Sizes are divided into two variables, cooking facilities and preparation space. Normally both are determined by the same roll, but can be rolled seperately for more diverse results. The downside of doing so is that consistency is not assured – you might get a combination that make no sense. I think the design of this subsystem will protect you from that, but it’s not certain.

Table 5: Meals

Roll 2d6 + Kitchen Size to determine the nature, quality, and price of the meals provided by the tavern. If this result is less than the roll made on table 4, use the table 4 roll instead. Prices are based on those in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, p159.

A Word On The Interpretation Of Quality

A meal’s quality is a very subjective appraisal, but I’ve tried to take the subjectivity out of such questions whenever possible. This insert contains my own, strictly non-canonical, interpretation of the quality results given in the table above.

“Quality” refers to flavor, texture, and appropriateness of cooking time. Flavor and texture are both, to some extent, also functions of cooking time, but an equally-important factor is the age of the raw materials. An awful lot of progress in the late 19th and early-to-mid 20th century was in the field of food preservation; before these techniques, something always had to be done to preserve foods that would otherwise go rotten. Popular methods were salting, smoking, and pickling, and each of these methods imparted a different flavor and texture to the food being preserved. Similarly, fruits were turned into jams, dried, or occasionally pickled.

However, sometimes these methods were incorrectly applied, or the resulting food was incorrectly cooked, or the cook simply used “fresh” produce that was getting a bit long in the tooth. What’s more, it was not uncommon to cook food and leave it in the pot (topping up liquids) until it was consumed – which might take days. I doubt that a stew that was palatable on day 1 would be anywhere near as tasty four, five, or six days later! Spices were often added to disguise the flavor of meat that had begun to go bad.

Ultimately, quality comes down to the freshness of the meal and its ingredients and the skill of the cook in processing those ingredients. I’ve provided a measure for the first within the meal descriptions, and if you feel that this result is enough to justify the quality assessment, that’s fine; any shortfall in such justification indicates a problem with the food processing. It might taste a little off, or be too salty, or the meat might be rubbery and overcooked, or undercooked (which may lead to health problems), or the chef may have used a flavor combination that simply doesn’t work very well.

The quality indication gives an overall non-subjected interpretation that sums up all of these factors except quantity and variety, which were used to distinguish between the different meals:

• “Poor” – It’s nourishing, there’s little more to be said about it. You eat it because you have to eat something.
• “Average” – An “average” dish or meal makes an occasionally-nice change-of-pace but it’s nothing more than edible.
• “Good” – A “good” meal is one that you can actually enjoy eating. It’s not something that you’re likely to go out of your way for (unless all the other choices would qualify for a “poor” rating).
• “Very Good” – A “very good” meal is one that you – and many other diners – would go out of their way for. It’s most enjoyable and will frequently lead to eating more than you really should.
• I also thought about incorporating a fifth rating, “Excellent,” but these four were the quality ratings given in the Pathfinder core book, there wasn’t enough difference between “very good” and “excellent” to justify it, and “excellent” meals would be too rare to matter, anyway. Save the “Excellent” rating for invite-only feasts at Noble Tables, and don’t worry about the price if you don’t have to – it could be anything up to hundreds of GP per diner, as you see fit, but your PCs won’t be paying for it, anyway.

One other term gets used in the meal descriptions that needs clarification, while I’m at it: “Hearty” means there’s lots of content in the meal – lots of meat, lots of veggies, plenty of variety of veges, etc. As you descend the quality scale, the meat not only gets worse, but the quantity of protein per serving goes down; and as you descend still further, even the quantity, quality, and variety of non-meat content declines, leaving you with a thin, watery, concoction of little substance, flavor, or dietary value.

Table 6: Walls

Roll d20 and cross-referance with the Tavern Size Modifier to determine the nature of the walls.

Table Notes:

• “Rendered” means that the bricks have been coated with something that gives a textured or smooth finish and hides the gaps between bricks.
• “Poor Quality bricks” are inconsistent in size and shape, necessitating additional filler between them. These bricks are frequently more fragile, and often broke during the building process, further compromising the consistency of shape and size.
• “Superior Bricks” are still not as uniform as those produced by modern industrial processes, but if you could afford decently-made bricks, you could usually afford to throw away the odd one that was incorrectly shaped or that broke along the way, yielding a far superior result.

An example: The Palomino and Fox

The first example I’m offering is “The Palomino and Fox”. Obviously, to identify the examples, I have already given these taverns/inns names (and it was quite a struggle without knowing anything else about them). The name is vaguely suggestive of hunting, though it could simply be named for the picture shown on the tavern sign, so I haven’t let that influence me!

• Table 1: 87 rolled: Medium-Large Tavern: bar (2), common room, storage cellar, family dwelling (2) Tavern Size Modifier 4.
• Table 2: 6 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 4 = 10: Medium-Large Common Room (5), Commons Size Modifier 3
• Table 3: 4 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 4 + Commons Size Modifier 3 = 11: 6 large tables (seat 20 each); each is 27 sqr m = 300 sqr ft = 12 x five-foot sqr spaces; 6 x 12 = 72 five-foot squares. Use subtable 3e.
  • Subtable 3e: 15 rolled: L-shaped tables; 05 rolled: tables are made of wood
• Table 4: 7 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 4 = 11: Medium Stove, Large Ovens, Medium Grill (1.75); Food Prep: Medium (2.5); Total Kitchen Area 4.25
• Table 5: 5 rolled + Kitchen Size 4.25 = 9.25; minimum result 11, so use 11: Good Quality Food: hearty meal with bread and meat/fish 0-1 (d3:0, 1/2, 1) day old, costing 7 sp.
• Table 6: 7 rolled, Tavern Size Modifier 4 column: Walls are rough-hewn stone.

A second example: The Spotted Parrot

This was actually the first name that I came up with, and it’s so suggestive of pirates that it has definitely shaped my thinking – which is good in a second example, because it lets me illustrate the right way of shaping the generator results toward a predetermined outcome, which is to keep rolling until you get an outcome that fits. In this case, my thought was of a floating tavern, either a barge decked out to look like a sailing ship, or an unseaworthy vessel that has been recommissioned as a novel tavern or inn. The presence of a cellar would decide which. Meals would be served on the deck, and would have a definite seafood theme. If there are any accommodations – something I haven’t yet decided – these would be small staterooms, probably below decks, while the family would live in accommodations on the ship’s deck level, which is also where the kitchens would be located.

• Table 1: 55 rolled: Medium Tavern: Bar (1.5), common room, storage cellar, family dwelling (1.5), Tavern Size Modifier 2.
• Table 2: 2 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 2 = 4 Small-Medium Common Room (3.5), Commons Size Modifier 1
• Table 3: 5 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 2 + Commons Size Modifier 1 = 8: 12 medium tables (seat 6 each); each 7.5 sqr m = 80 sqr ft = 3.2 x five-foot sqr spaces; 12 x 3.2 = 38.4 five-foot squares; Use subtable 3b.
  • Subtable 3b: 13 rolled: tables are rectangular (2:1 proportions); 88 rolled, tables are made of stone.
• Table 4: 3 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 2 = 5: Small Stove & Ovens (0.75), Food Prep: Medium (0.75), Total Kitchen Area 1.5
• Table 5: 7 rolled + Kitchen Size 1.5 = 8.5; minimum result 5; roll is greater so use 8: Good Quality food: bread, small meal (soup, stew, or pie) AND meat/fish 0-1 (d3:0, 1/2, 1) day old; 6 sp per serve.
• Table 6: 8 rolled on Tavern Size Modifier 2 column: Walls are sawn timber.

One more example: The Robber’s End

I had no clear ideas about this establishment beyond having decided that either this or the Palomino and Fox should be a multi-story establishment while the other should be a more typical 2-floor choice. The determination as to which was the taller building would be decided by the tavern size rolled, i.e. on the basis of whichever seemed the more reasonable choice.

• Table 1: 09 rolled: Small Tavern: Bar (1), Common Room, Store-room (0.75), Family Dwelling (1), Tavern Size Modifier 0.
• Table 2: 6 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 0 = 6: Small-Medium Common Room (3.5), Commons Size Modifier 1
• Table 3: 3 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 0 + Commons Size Modifier 1 = 4: 12 small tables (seat 4 each); 6 sqr m = 65 sqr ft = 2.6 x five-foot sqr spaces each, so 12 x 2.6 = 31.2 sqr spaces; Use subtable 3a
  • Subtable 3a: 11 rolled: tables are square; 09 rolled: tables are made of wood.
• Table 4: 2 rolled + Tavern Size Modifier 0 = 2: Small Pit/Rack (0.5), Food Prep Area: Small (0.25); Total Kitchen Space: 0.75
• Table 5: 3 rolled + Kitchen Size 0.75 = 3.75; minimum result 2; roll is greater so use 4: Average Quality food: bread, soups, stews, broths OR bbq/smoked meat if grill, 0-3 (d4-1) days old; 2 sp / serve.
• Table 6: 17 rolled using Tavern Size Modifier 0 column: Walls are plastered/surfaced/rendered brick.

Four Walls do not a dwelling make: wrap-up and prolog to part 2

So far the reader has seen only the tip of the depths built into the tavern generator. I have employed just about every trick I know of in table mechanics and random die rolls, from weighted probability matching, to nested sub-tables, bias mechanics, stepped outcomes, and compound constructions. Somewhere along the line, I’ll explain those terms – for now, I want readers to focus on the mechanics that they have produced, and not on how these mechanics and the way they interlock have been designed. A supplemental article somewhere along the way sounds like the perfect solution.

But in the meantime, It’s time to turn our attention away from what the tavern or inn is made of, and look inside at those elements that create the atmosphere and ambiance…

Preface to Part 2, by Mike

This is the second half of Ian’s article on Vehicles.

The first half concentrated on the PCs acquiring a vehicle; this half is all about using one. I’ve also tossed in my two-cents worth here and there with the occasional aside and also jumped in with a few small additional sections.

In the meantime, here’s Ian…

Image from FreeImages.com/Ray Germain

Just Crewing Around

So, by whatever means, the PCs have a ship of their own. If the ship is small, they might be the entire crew. If the group lacks certain necessary skills, or if the ship is larger, then extra NPC crew is necessary.

Plenty has been written elsewhere about the creation and uses of NPCs, and I can’t add much to that. Except to say that there is one absolutely vital function they serve in a ship-oriented Party. I refer to “care-taking”.

Not every adventure involves the PCs sitting in their ship. There will be times when they have to leave for one reason or another, usually to do with the acquisition of wealth and/or XP. Given all that goes into the ship’s care and upkeep, a fear of theft is entirely reasonable. Having one PC stay behind means that individual does not fully participate in whatever the Party gets up to. So having NPC crew who can be trusted to stay in the ship, and make sure it isn’t stolen while the PCs are away, is absolute gold for any Party. If the PCs get into serious trouble, there is also a chance that these NPCs can assist – rescue the PCs or stage a diversion or even just call somebody else for help.

Note that these same NPCs are in that job because of their (alleged) reliability, so the possibility of there being “highjinks” whilst the PCs are away should be unlikely. But not impossible – especially if the PCs skimp on benefits, set a bad example, or just haven’t been very nice to their employees lately.

NPC misbehavior doesn’t have to be outright treachery or mutiny either (unless the PCs have it coming). It could comprise the odd prank or scam. It could even mean “harmless” ventures done entirely off the NPC crew’s own bat. Watch old TV shows like ‘McHale’s Navy’ or ‘Sergeant Bilko’ for ideas. So the PCs return unexpectedly, to discover their ship has been turned into a high-class gambling den, or the lifeboat is crammed full of contraband, or that some Super-VIP honestly thinks the Ship’s Janitor is the REAL Captain, or maybe all of these things at the same time.

Again, this is NOT about screwing the Players over. But comedic situations like this can make the game more entertaining. If the PCs are sufficiently clever, maybe they can find a way out of the mess that leaves them better off, and even have some extra fun along the way.

Star Trek ‘Away Team’ Syndrome

If the PC’s ship is large with a large crew (Star Trek), or is huge with an IMMENSE crew (WH40K), then there is a set of PC / NPC crew-related problems that need addressing. I refer to this as Star Trek ‘Away Team’ Syndrome.

You have probably guessed where this goes – that old old habit of regularly having the entire command crew leave their ship to do all the shooty-and-looty stuff. Much as I love Trek, the original was notorious for this; the later shows and movies less so, but not totally immune. For other SF shows, the tendency is mixed.

The PCs are typically a small group on a very big ship. They are usually the people in charge and the “stars of the show”, but that also means they can be, in a sense, too damn busy. A ship with hundreds or thousands of crew, and it always seems to be just these guys doing all the work. Or, rare but it happens, the PCs heroically stay on the Bridge no matter what, and send wave after wave of NPC “expendables” to fix their problems.

Either way, not good.

Many years ago, I ran a fairly successful ‘Star Trek’ campaign using the old FASA rules. It was set on a Star Fleet vessel (the USS ‘Axanar’, an Excelsior variant) circa the time of the Khitomer Accords (Star Trek #4).

An idea I tried was that each Player had three completely distinct and separate Characters. Everyone had one senior officer (Captain, First Officer, Department Heads) as the ‘primary’ character. Each Player also had a low-ranking ‘Red-shirt’ character (mostly Security, but a scientist, medic and techie were all in this tier as well); and, lastly, a Shuttle Pilot character (it was a carrier-type starship). Players used their senior officers most of the time. But when it came time for an Away Mission or special duties on-board (such as guarding a VIP guest), there would be a few minutes of “mix and match” as it was decided who was needed and where.

So, a typical ‘Axanar’ landing party would comprise 1-2 senior officers (selection based on known situation and individual preferences), plus Red-shirts (the remaining PCs), and maybe an NPC or two (to fill any skill gaps). If a shuttle was needed, someone’s Shuttle Pilot character would front up. If the situation called for a grouped shuttle mission, then everybody’s Shuttle Pilot characters would be on deck (with maybe a senior officer and/or specialist or two tagging along as “observers” or something). And so on.

A major benefit was that everybody had chances to be in charge of either Away Missions or (if the Captain was Away) the ship. Most Players got to do both at one time or another. It also encouraged intelligent play at both the command-chair and sapient-on-the-ground levels. When one of the ‘expendable’ Red-shirts sent planet-side is YOUR Character, you naturally take a bit more care about the landing party.

It led to interesting moments, such as the time one Player’s senior officer had to verbally reprimand the same Player’s Red-shirt over a minor misdemeanor. Then there was the time bad guys incapacitated the entire crew and tried to capture the ship (yes, unoriginal – but always an interesting problem), meaning it was up to the Shuttle Pilots (stuck in a remote part of the ship) to save the day.

(That last is the same bunch who used the Transporter to deal with bad guys, by re-materializing them UPSIDE-DOWN on the Platform, so they dropped on their heads from a foot or so up. Took a lot of fight out of said bad guys, though there was a mess afterwards .. )

I was fortunate in having a mature and very experienced group of Players, all with respect of the genre, and most of whom I had known for years. So this idea worked well for us and, for anyone out there planning a similar type of game, is worth serious consideration.

Since then, I have considered a possible variant of this idea, with each Player having a Senior Officer as their main character. There would also be a VERY ‘quick’n’dirty’ character generation system (probably involving templates with a choice of various overlays), whereby Players would create specialized low-ranking “extras” in just a couple of minutes. So, if ring-ins from Security (or Science, or Engineering, etc.) were needed for a specific part of the scenario, the Players just whip up suitable characters on the spot and carry on. These Characters could be kept and pooled for possible future use OR Players could opt to run a different Character the next time someone of that specialty was called for.

Image from FreeImages.com/Jeffery Vincent

Don’t Mess With The Mojo

Player-groups can have an unfortunate tendency to treat their vehicle-of-choice like a .. well, a THING. If a ‘better’ component (read: weapon) becomes available, they think nothing of tearing their vehicle apart to make the new item fit. If a ‘better’ vehicle somehow becomes available, they will scrap their old conveyance and switch up without a second thought.

Consider some of the heroes I mentioned earlier. If Captains Mal or Solo were ever offered the chance to swap to “better” ships, I am certain they would flat-out refuse. Sentiment would be a major part of this, but those Captains are also comfortable with their ships. They know all the peculiarities of their respective craft, how to look after them, what NOT to do, and so on.

FASA’s ‘Renegade Legion’ group of games included an RPG and tactical combat games set at the AFV, starfighter and giant starship scales. One game mechanic I quite liked was that crews of AFVs or starfighters could, as they got more familiar with their craft, gradually accumulate skill bonuses for use with said specific craft. The pilot / driver got better at steering, the gunner shot straighter, and so on.

The mechanics used in the RL games were based on successful enemy kills made by the crew in that vehicle, but there are other possibilities as well – eg. Simple travel time, or by passing specific challenges set by the Referee. A very experienced crew could build up quite solid bonuses – the downside being that if their craft is destroyed, the crew (assuming they survived) would then have to restart from scratch with a replacement.

The idea can be used in other systems. It could even be that the PC crew builds up bonuses / levels for use with both that specific craft and whatever standard class / type / category it is part of. That is up to the Referee to decide.

In short, this can be an incentive for PCs to hang onto and genuinely look after their ship.

This approach can also be used from the other direction: that eccentric asteroid miner and his obsolete scout-ship may not seem like a challenge .. UNTIL the Party finds out the old geezer has running his ship for over fifty-some-odd years, and has therefore built up a HORRIFIC skill bonus with it. Then they might actually give the guy some room . and respect.

These bonuses can be lost, either partially or completely, if too many changes are made to the vehicle in one go – the Captain loses his ‘Lucky Chair’, or the controls “don’t feel right”. Those changes may stem from renovation or repairing serious damage.

I must caution against arbitrary or capricious changes to these bonuses, however. Clear guidelines should be known to all as to how easily bonuses can be lost or damaged, how much of a bonus is transferable, and so on. And if changes to a ship proposed by a PC run the risk of harming the bonuses, the players should be warned of this (both in-character and out-of-character); if they still choose to proceed, on their own heads be it.

That said, we have all heard of vessels being upgraded or repaired but “never feeling quite right” thereafter. Too great a change might not only void the bonus accumulated, it might prevent that crew from ever regaining it for this vessel. – Mike

Image from FreeImages.com/Diane Groves

Destinations – an insert by Mike

Something the GM should always bear in mind when making a vehicle available to the PCs is the range of destinations to which that vehicle can travel. This should inform the choice of vehicle as well as how the vehicle will affect the adventures of the party.

Vehicle Choice

Think about where the adventures that you have in mind are likely to take the PCs, or even more broadly, about the types of adventure settings that you want your campaign to take advantage of. It is no good giving characters a luxury yacht if you expect them to delve into pirate dens and survive battlefields; it is no good giving the characters a land-based vehicle if there is no land-connection or reasonable facsimile such as a ferry service to get the vehicle (and its occupants) to the adventure.

Travel Time

The expected transit time between departure and arrival is also a very important consideration. In the Adventurer’s Club campaign, Ian’s character has the Antares, a tramp steamer, and may soon be expanding to a second vessel; when time permits a leisurely cruise from port to port in an adventure, this is the perfect conveyance, but often the press of events forces a different choice of vehicle on the party. The pulp setting is such that the players and GMs have this luxury; in a space-based campaign, things are not so simple. Sure, you could leave the deep-space freighter that the PCs usually use as a base of operations behind in a starport somewhere, unattended, for an indefinite period, enabling the PCs to use commercial travel arrangements – but the Players are not likely to be happy about it if they have invested considerable resources into obtaining their vessel.

Shaping The Campaign

It is therefore incumbent upon the GM to develop his campaign in such a way that the PCs vehicle receives the maximum use possible. That means structuring adventures accordingly, and possibly even changing the type of adventures that you tell. To date, in the Adventurer’s Club campaign, there have been five major uses made of the Antares:

• In two adventures reasonably local to the home port, the Antares was used in a there-and-back-again capacity.
• In an extended sojourn into Asia, the Antares provided transit from one location to another, each of which was the setting for an adventure.
• In addition, there were (as part of this extended sojourn) a couple of adventures set on-board the Antares itself while it was in transit.
• We have made extensive use of the crew as NPCs for delivery of plot hooks and side-adventures, even though little or no action actually took place on-board the vessel.
• Finally, we have used the Antares as a plot device for the discovery of information relevant to a plot that was underway, even though the vessel was on the other side of the world to the PCs at the time.

In this way, the Antares has been a crucial and regular element within the campaign even though its relative lack of speed (compared with air travel) has restricted its use in what would initially seem its primary function as a means of travel. It’s a recurring part of the “furniture” of the campaign.

Image from FreeImages.com/Bartek Ambrozik

Encounters – an insert by Mike

Something else that should receive careful consideration by the GM is the type of encounter that can derive from the vehicle, whether it is doing its job by providing conveyance from A to B, a setting for an encounter with a passenger, or whatever. The Antares has had encounters with Pirates, with a Ghost Ship, with weather, and with Deep-Sea monsters (well, it was a hell-spawned River Kraken, but the principle is the same). This has not exhausted our repertoire of ideas, but we are spacing them out so that we don’t shoot our entire bolt all at once. There have been encounters with crew and potential crew, with passengers (both officially and unknowingly on-board), and with officials. And those are all entirely separate from the ship simply transporting the PCs to the place where the adventure was happening.

We (the GMs of the Adventurer’s Club campaign) actually think of the Antares as a soap-opera/adventure (with sitcom elements) taking place entirely separate to the primary campaign, but which occasionally guest-stars the PCs. Even when it is not doing anything else, it provides sub-plots for what Captain Ferguson (Ian’s character) is doing when he is not on an adventure with the rest of the PCs. This makes the Antares more than just a vehicle – which makes up for the limited use to which we can utilize it as a vehicle in the campaign.

Whenever a PC obtains a vehicle, make a list of as many ways to use the vehicle in adventures as possible, no matter how big or how small. If you don’t get at least half-a-dozen, you should find a way to tweak the normal function of the vehicle within the campaign to add to the tally (and I was strongly tempted to make that standard a dozen, minimum).

In Transit – an insert by Mike

It always pays dividends to think about the entire journey that a vehicle is expected to take. I’ve already mentioned travel time (but will do so again); but there are also departure, arrival, and intermediate points in the trip to consider. Yes, travel can be hand-waved, and the vehicle used as nothing more than a plot device, but that’s hardly making the most of the opportunities that it represents.

It’s like making The Joker the villain and never having him do something funny. The character is always at his best when doing something humorous tinged with homicidal madness; without that edge, he’s just a murderer in clown makeup.

Departure

What procedures and routines should be performed when getting underway? Are there superstitions to ensure a successful trip? What needs to be inspected? What bureaucratics need to be performed?

For an automobile, before you go on an extended trip, the brakes and tires need be checked, the battery needs to be checked, the radiator water level and oil need to be checked, the vehicle needs to be fueled up, and you need to make sure that you have the required documentation in the glove compartment or on your person – license, insurance, registration. There’s packing the vehicle and making sure that you have everything that you will need at the other end of the trip.

All of this can be handwaved to accelerate the pacing of an adventure, or roleplayed in varying depths of detail to get more closely into the lives of the people using the vehicle and to make the trip itself seem more real. And, if the characters are in a great hurry, you can always assume that there isn’t the time to perform these checks, opening the window to problems along the way. Having a soft brake pedal is not what you need when engaging in a high-speed pursuit!

With an aircraft, you need to inspect various physical attributes of the aircraft, check the weather, file and have approved a flight plan, fuel the aircraft, and so on. You may need to route around various controlled airspaces. You will need to know what load you have on board, how that will affect takeoff speeds and flight characteristics, and so on. Your radio (or radios) and instruments need to working.

A ship tends to have less routine before departure, but there are common elements to both of the above. Cargo, provisions, visual inspections, radio and possibly radar and/or sonar, ammunition and weapons, fuel, notifying the harbor-master of departure, possible harbor pilots, etc.

Starships could be treated as more like aircraft or more like ships, or some blending of the two. The way such vessels integrate into your campaign world is something that you need to know.

Travel

Once you’re underway, what are the on-board routines? Are jobs performed in shifts, or do you pull over for the night? What are the sights, the smells, the sounds? What are the personnel interactions?

Along The Way

In road vehicles, modern fuel efficiencies mean that you usually need to refuel less frequently except on very long trips, even though the fuel tanks are often smaller than in past generations. Knowing how far you can travel on the fuel you’ve got is vital.

It doesn’t matter so much with motor vehicles, but freighters, aircraft, and probably starships face an added burden: the more fuel you carry, the more fuel you need to use in order to bring that fuel with you. There is always pressure to carry the minimum possible fuel because any unused fuel is overhead; but landing and taking off also consume fuel, and you always need a safety reserve. For any given vehicle-and-cargo-and-journey combination, there is an optimum point of economy which is substantially less than the absolute maximum range; planning the trip with refueling stops along the way permits more cargo to be carried, or a faster travel time, or better handling, or some combination of the three – and they are all good things to have!

It doesn’t take much in the way of a problem or delay for you to start eating into that safety reserve, something that those who operate these vehicles never like to do, because a shortage of fuel compounds with any other problem to limit options and increase the level of drama. GMs should take advantage of this!

Arrival

With road vehicles, arrival is not often a big deal. You get where you are going, end-of-story. In other forms of transport, it can be a much bigger deal. Once again, there will be bureaucracy to deal with, and reports to file, and so on. Think about the routines that are involved.

With ships, things become more interesting, especially in a pre-radio situation; essentially, you simply appear on someone’s horizon without warning, and they don’t know who you are or what your intentions are. You could be a pirate, a merchant, a passenger ship, a warship, a plague ship, or any combination of the above. They need to know before you get too close – and to be ready to do something about it.

It follows that the speed and availability of interstellar communications will have a marked impact on how a starship will be received on arrival. The slower and less efficient communications are, the closer the analogy with a pre-radio sailing ship. The faster and more reliable, the closer the resemblance will be to an international air trip; they will know you are coming, and who you say you are, and will have made preparations to receive you accordingly. Such a ship showing up without such notice would always be an immediate warning that something was wrong; depending on politics and local culture, the default assumption could be anything from hostile intent to radio malfunction or an incapacitated crew requiring rescue and/or quarantine.

Vehicles as settings

Sometimes, it’s not about the journey, it’s about being on a journey. Plots which take place entirely on-board ship have been a staple for many years; my impression is that they began with Star Trek finding a way to save budgetary resources but there were probably antecedents in early science-fiction, pulp, etc, that I don’t know about.

As a GM, you don’t have the budgetary restraints that caused Star Trek to devise entirely on-board plotlines, but just because you don’t have to go there is no reason not to have such as part or all of your adventure. The confined nature of the setting automatically adds intensity to some plots! Take advantage of it from time to time.

Seasoning and Flavoring

Every GM should think hard about what the look-and-feel of life on-board a vehicle will be like, and how to convey that. Furthermore, every recurring vessel should have its own distinct flavor, a seasoning that enhances the adventure in a number of subtle ways, and that makes the setting seem as familiar as it would be to the PCs. This is a very hard thing to do; I don’t know a single GM who has been able to really nail this aspect of gaming involving a vehicle, and I include both myself and Ian in this respect. To some extent, every vehicle has been interchangeable with another of similar capabilities.

Ian’s discussion of Quirks and Tweaks is the closest thing that I’ve seen to a method of achieving this, but even that is not enough to fully pull it off. Careful and consistent use of narrative technique would also be required, and that requires both some advance planning and remembering to use that prep when the time comes. Think of it as adding color and flavor to what is otherwise an ever-so-slightly bland dish.

I think a large measure of the problem is the assumption that such distinctiveness would arrive naturally, a blend of on-board memories and experiences coupled with vagaries of layout and individuality of crew. These contribute, certainly, but are not enough to do the job on their own. Each crew member should customize their workspace to some extent, and the GM should actively search out ways to engage sensory narrative in his descriptions of actions and events on-board the vessel; but even doing that is sufficient only to convey a sense that the PCs are on-board a craft of the generic type. Adding Quirks and Tweaks makes for a more unique vehicle intellectually and behaviorally, but not necessarily to the visceral sense of being on board this vessel as opposed to any other.

I can enunciate the difficulty, but have to admit that I don’t have a complete solution at hand, only the beginnings of one.

• Restrict your choices of language and especially adjective to only a few of the options available, and to synonyms of those terms.
• Incorporate dynamic and transitory sensory impressions using this restricted vocabulary frequently and carefully while avoiding repetition.
• Be careful to achieve consistency in your narratives using the restricted terminology. It’s not enough to mention a swaying deck; mention a character adjusting to that sway, using hand-gestures as accompaniment, and always remember who’s good at it and who isn’t.
• Prepare “canned partial phrases” that can be added to descriptions of locations on-board the vessel, and try to incorporate them in different ways every time a scene occurs there. Is there a particular sound that the carpet in the Captain’s Cabin makes? Is there a gangway or board that has a little more flex than others on-board? Does part of the ship have a unique but slight odor? Are there decorative flourishes here and there that are distinctive and with whom the NPCs (and PCs) can casually interact?

Image from clker.com/Piekar

“The Armor was How Permeable?” – an insert by Mike

In the Hero System, which permits the purchase of vessels (or anything else) with character points or with cash, I have a rule of thumb: if you pay points for it, it will be replaced, repaired, or restored if it is consumed or destroyed; but if you simply bought it, it’s fair game. That replacement may not occur immediately, but it will happen – or the character will be given his points back, with a little on the top for the inconvenience.

Things are a little trickier in games that don’t have a point-purchase system. The general assumption is that buying equipment (including vehicles) in in D&D, for example, makes them fair game at all times, and that there is no metagame mechanic for ensuring the re-provision of such equipment. The same is true of starships in various RPGs. This is something that the GM needs to think about quite carefully.

Is the metagame value of any particular item such that he needs to provide a metagame “guarantee” of replenishment – or replenishment opportunity to the players?

I think the answer becomes “yes” as soon as the presence of the item in question influences character development choices to any substantial degree. Putting a skill point into being better at using the item isn’t enough; but investing multiple skill points over several levels would be, or buying a feat that only has application on-board a vessel, or whatever.

Similarly, if significant in-game time is devoted to customizing or repairing of a vessel, it should not be treated capriciously by the GM; the players have invested themselves in the possession of the item. That does not mean that the characters should receive any such guarantee – from their point of view, the item should be at risk at all times, and as soon as they treat it as something that will always be there, it should be taken away from them!

It’s one thing to have an individual adventure in which Han Solo does not have access to the Millennium Falcon; it’s quite another to take it away permanently. Similarly, the absence of the Enterprise can raise the stakes on a particular episode of Star Trek but losing it for good would not be acceptable to a viewer.

Finally

Some might say that this is just another “How to screw the Player-Characters” missive. I disagree. Above all else, the Referee has to keep the Players engaged and entertained. Treat them badly, frustrate everything they try to do and they WILL leave, sooner or later. Whereupon the Referee becomes this dude sitting alone at a cluttered table, mumbling to himself – and that is just creepy.

Vehicles. They can be a useful addition to your campaign for a bunch of reasons, or – if you permit their abuse – a millstone around your neck. Give it some thought – before the next vehicle shows up in your campaign.

About The Author

Ian Mackinder is a long-time friend of Mike’s, and is almost as keen a gamer in his own twisted way. Over the years, he has been in several of Mike’s campaigns, and vice versa, but both seem none the worse for it.

In the past, Ian has refereed ‘Star Trek’ (FASA) and Classic Traveller. Currently, he is running a ‘7th Sea’ game, and resigned to apparently being the only Referee of that system in the entire Greater Sydney region – he would love to PLAY in a campaign himself some day. Ian regularly plays in various systems – including D&D4, Rogue Trader and Pulp HERO. He likes a lot of other systems but, after one bad experience, will NOT play ‘Runequest’ again – and if you aren’t careful enough, he will tell you why.

Ian’s other hobbies include history (Australian, military, weird, hidden, maritime, and combinations thereof), TV & Movies, Forteana, browsing the Internet, and SF in general (with occasional excursions into Fantasy). He is also a keen player of the ‘Fallout 3’ computer game, and currently writes a sort-of series about that called ‘The Walker Files,’ which can be found on the ‘Fallout 3 Nexus’. Happily, his amazing wife and brilliant daughter both manage to put up with all this.

I’ve been a fan of the Fantastic Four, off and on, since the halcyon days of Lee and Kirby. I was there, reading, when the being who would become Adam Warlock was first introduced. I was there for the first appearance of the Inhumans. I was there for the Silver Surfer and Galactus.

Through low-priced black-and-white Australian reprints, I saw Dr Doom shrink the Fantastic Four into the micro-world, saw the Submariner buy the Baxter Building, and saw the first appearance of the Mole Man. And there were what sometimes-seemed-to-be annual battles between the Hulk and the Thing.

Suffice it to say that I had high hopes for the rebooted film franchise, which appears to have been sucked into the Negative Zone in a cataclysmic release of overwhelming criticism since its release a few weeks ago. I’ve been reading other people’s opinions as to –

• what is wrong with the movie (Fantastic Four: Four Things They Did Wrong | Comicbook.com),
• what went wrong in the making of the movie (Was the Fantastic Four Reboot Doomed From The Start? | io9 and Why Hollywood can’t get the ‘Fantastic Four’ right | New York Post), and
• whether or not Marvel can and will buy back the franchise (When Can Marvel Get The Rights Back To The Fantastic Four? | Comicbook.com again).

And of course, I’ve been thinking on the subject and analyzing all this critique, and realize that there are a few lessons for GMs out there on handling their campaigns and adventures. Most of it’s reasonably obvious stuff, but – like an iceberg – there are some hidden depths to plumb.

I have to admit that for financial reasons, I haven’t actually seen the movie. Everything I’ve written has been based on other reports and reviews, and I don’t often see eye-to-eye with the judgments of movie critics. But I’ve spoken to people who have seen it, and outlined this article, and they seem to agree with my analysis.

Analyzing The Downfall

It’s clear that both studio and director started off in accord, or they would not have hired him. It was also pretty inevitable that a movie needed to be made and released around now or Marvel could take back the license rights. But it’s also clear that there were a number of items left off the negotiating agenda, and that usually happens when people take things for granted, rush to get a job done by an arbitrary deadline, or both.

In this case, the latter is fairly evidently a factor and the former is possible but unproven. What did happen is that there was a dispute over casting, with the Studio demanding “name stars” and the Director insisting on a cast of relative unknowns. Aside from giving the Director greater freedom to execute his vision with fewer concessions to a cast with more Hollywood clout, this would probably have allowed him to lavish more money on other aspects of the production. Director Josh Trank won that battle, but in the process got the studio off-side. They subsequently cut the budget (obviously feeling that if he wasn’t spending the money on an A-grade cast, he didn’t need to spend as much money at all), and the bad blood between them began to extend to clashes in other areas such as script approval.

Fans began having their doubts when the cast was publicly announced, especially about the choice of Michael B. Jordan in the role of Johnny Storm (with no disrespect to the actor intended) – especially given the fact that the role of his sister was given to Kate Mara, an actress whose work I had previously enjoyed on 24 and Zoom: Academy For Superheros – but who is Caucasian. This choice seemed destined to load the movie with unnecessary social baggage.

I thought at the time that it would have been better to have made Ben Grimm (the Thing) an African American, or even Reed Richards, if you needed a prominent minority representation among the cast. Either of those would have been credible; there have been a great many African-American scientists, Footballers, and Fighter Pilots over the years. Heck, even casting both Johnny and Sue as African Americans would have made more sense.

It felt like tokenism, and sloppily-executed tokenism at that.

Then came the news about the “gritty” slant, and fandom winced.

The news emerged that O’Mara and the rest of the cast had been told not to bother reading any of the source material, and fandom cringed.

About a month after the release date was shifted from a competitive one to a far softer target – always a bad sign – we got told about the radical re-imagining of Dr Doom as a hacker, and finally fandom knew that this movie was centered around a total disrespect for the source material, and began to complain. It was all downhill from there.

Additional sources:

• What True Fans Will Hate About ‘Fantastic Four’ | Looper.com
• A Timeline of Fantastic Four’s Terrible Buzz | Vulture.com

Analyzing The Disaster

This is a movie in which the director seems to have decided “characters don’t matter, it’s just a comic book movie”, and the studio seemed to have decided, “plot doesn’t matter, it’s just a comic book movie.”

Neither respected the source material or the fans of that source material – and those fans were always going to be the people generating the initial buzz, the core of the potential audience. Holding them in contempt is a sure recipe for a catastrophic reception.

Fans would have forgiven the casting, if the on-screen vibe had been right, if the Fantastic Four felt like a family first and a group of co-adventurers / superheros second. Instead, they felt like outcasts, first from scientific respectability and society, and then from humanity.

They would have forgiven the rewriting of the origins of the group as something that made a certain amount of sense in light of more modern physics – “there’s nothing we know of in space that could trigger these transformations, so have the group changed by an environment in which our physics doesn’t apply”. It works, and if they had called it The Negative Zone, fans would have lauded the concept as a plausible way to achieve suspension of disbelief in a more modern world.

Fans might have even forgiven – well, tolerated – the revision to Dr Doom if he had become a technological-genius-by-proxy, a brilliant hacker and robotics expert who stole technological developments by others and put them together to synthesize the iconic suit of armor and weapons systems.

Instead, what happened was this: the family vibe was thrown aside in favor of a pseudo-X-Men union of outsiders, forced to band together because they were ostracized and victimized by their transformations. That required a large part of the movie being set aside to establishing relationships between the title characters, and therefore always meant that the bulk of the film was going to be the origin story. Throw in Doom’s share of that origin story, and there was always going to be precious little screen time left for confrontations. Pacing was inevitably going to be a victim, and it was.

The kindest one-word review I saw on the opening weekend was “uneven”. The next best was “unbalanced”. Studio and director were both taking potshots at each other, making it clear that whatever unity was felt initially, the marriage between them had completely fallen apart early in production. The result comes across looking like a movie that was done for the sake of keeping the license because the potential for an X-Men scale franchise is still there, not because it was a good movie proposal.

It all showed at the Box Office. despite the “softer” competition, Fantastic Four failed to even exceed the week-2 earnings of Mission Impossible 5, which enjoyed a second week at the top of the box office charts. I’ve been told that some cinemas have already pulled the film from their schedules, suggesting that much of that opening weekend and subsequent negative reviews was generated by fans who went hoping for their worst fears to be misplaced, wanting to like the movie despite everything that they had heard – only to be freshly disappointed when the on-screen product was even worse than feared.

A few critics have subsequently emerged who laud the first half of the movie as an attempt to distance itself from the superhero genre. Unfortunately, those reviews come across as pretentious at best (at least the ones that I’ve seen). They attempt to show that there were nodding associations with the source material; there are suggestions that some scenes state that Sue was adopted, explaining the racial difference between siblings, and this can clearly be used to explain the lack of familial feelings between Sue and Johnny, for example. So, at least in the first half, some coherence and consistency in characterization can be found, if you turn over enough rocks looking for it. To me, all this shows is that the same mistake was made consistently throughout the movie.

There were no winners. The cast now have a turkey to live down. The director has lost the trust of a major studio, who are bad-mouthing him and have already pulled his participation in another big-name franchise movie. The studio have lost the trust of the public and yet more stories of “studio interference creating a flop” are doing the rounds, discouraging others from pushing the envelope – and look certain to take a loss on the movie. I don’t agree with those who are suggesting that this means the death of superhero-movie genre, though! The fans miss out, too – it will be years, if ever, before another attempt is made. Marvel might well look to buy back the rights, but their production schedule is full.

In fact, it’s Marvel who are the biggest losers in all this. They had no say in the casting, the script, or the production, but this is still being touted by some as “Marvel’s first stinker”. So it’s possible that they will reclaim the rights, or try to, purely as damage control.

Additional Sources:

• ‘Fantastic Four’ Review: This Marvel Reboot Is Doomed | Movieweb
• The Crushing Disappointment of “Fantastic Four” | English, With A Minor In Creative Writing
• The Numbers Are In, and Fantastic Four Bombed at the U.S. Box Office | Comicbook.com

An alternative vision

And yet, the potential for success is still there; it simply has to be unlocked with the right script and producer, with the right vision for what it could be. Someone is sure to ask what I think should have been done, so here’s a look at what might-have-been:

First, make it a TV show, not a movie. Not a sitcom, but a family drama that doesn’t take itself too seriously, with the plots largely a sci-fi action/adventure. Make it about the characters as a dysfunctional family who fly apart all the time but come together whenever they have to. Not The Simpsons with superpowers, but leaning a little in that direction. A lot like the first couple of seasons of Buffy but with an SF bent instead of a supernatural one.

Dispose of the origins of the team in five or ten minutes – tops – of the first episode. Keep the “Negative Zone” origin. Make Ben a decorated pilot from the Gulf Wars who signed up post 9/11, abandoning a promising football career, newly retired from the Service. Make Johnny a garage mechanic, make Sue a computer security student, and Reed a scientist. Reed develops machine designs but has trouble building it, so Sue calls in Johnny to help with the more practical elements of the fabrication. Johnny, in turn, knows Ben (who used to be one of his customers) and so does Reed (they went to school together, Ben several years ahead of Reed, but Reed was given early admission into senior classes and Ben protected Reed from bullies). Between the two of them, Johnny and Reed persuade Ben to ditch the airline job he’s taken (it’s boring) and sign on as the pilot and commander of the Transition Vehicle they are building. They finish the machine, and the quartet take it into the Otherworld, where it is attacked and damaged by the monsters that inhabit it; they get exposed to strange energy fields that rewrites and morphs their DNA, and become the FF, barely escaping in their crippled craft.

Then we go into flashback mode for the origins of Dr Doom, or of whatever our menace of the week is. Again, keep this to 5-10 minutes or even less. Look to Dr Who for inspiration – we get just enough of a hint of whatever the menace is to intrigue us, but then discover the specifics at the same time as the FF do.

Keep Dr Doom more or less as he was in the comics – though you might lose the Latverian Ruler element to keep budgets down. In particular, keep his desperate attempts to rescue his mother from Hell (or someplace similar – I’ll get to that in a moment). Make him a brilliant hacker and roboticist, who is first rate at taking other people’s ideas and putting them together to achieve something new – not quite the same as the Julian McMahon version, but similar. Here’s the story: Doom, as a young man, cobbles together some bits and pieces and creates a dimension-lock or teleport field or whatever you want to call it; something starts to come through from the other side, Doom tries desperately to shut down his creation, and then to smash it, but before he can do so, his mother (wrong place, wrong time) is captured by the emerging big bad and pulled back into the other-world. Doom tries to mount a rescue mission but can’t get his rebuilt device to work. He needs further education in higher physics to understand what happened the first time.

Reed, a student at university, is studying the theory and exploring the potential of creating a dimension-lock, work that will eventually lead to the origin story we have already witnessed. He and Doom are fellow students, and have several run-ins. Doom recognizes Reed’s work as exactly what he needs, and steals his designs and unfinished research paper, but Reed discovers the theft because Doom didn’t completely erase his tracks, and Reed’s girlfriend, Sue, is studying advanced computer security and is no slouch at this stuff, either. Reed goes to confront Doom, discovers Doom’s half-built replica of Reed’s machine, recognizes that Doom has made a dangerous mistake, and puts aside his own anger to warn Doom – but Doom won’t listen, and fires up the half-built machine believing Reed is about to alert the university authorities. Explosion, Doom scarred both physically and mentally, blames Reed, expelled from the University.

Unshown on screen at the time, Doom becomes a “professional” hacker, living an underground life, perpetrating various cybercrimes for cash.

Shifting our point-of-view back into the modern day, he cracks Sue’s security and discovers that Reed finished his machine and that he and the others were transformed. He tries to get the plans, but Sue is still no slouch at this stuff and discovers the hack while it is still in progress, tossing Doom out. He realizes that if he wants the machine, he’s going to have to take it by force. He uses his money and expertise to construct his armor and build in various experimental weapons systems and defensive gadgets, first to enable him to steal the device from Reed, second to enable him to survive the transition to Other-space unharmed, and third to enable him to defeat the evil monstrosity and rescue his Mother at last.

Instead of seeing this, we see the FF coming to terms with the impact of their transformations on their everyday lives. Reed is searching for a way to undo Ben’s transformation and is worried about the psychological effects of what happened on them all. They are recluses for the most part. It’s been a year or more since their transformations, so a lot of the adjustment has already taken place, and they have already had a few adventures together that have made them a group.

Doom, using robots, attacks as a distraction, then invades their lab to get the device – but Reed needs it for his attempts to cure Ben. Conflict. Doom gets the device, activates it, and bad things start trying to get through into our world, something he doesn’t care about. He prepares to go after his mother, but the FF arrive and Reed smashes the machine to prevent the mass escape of horrors into the world – sacrificing Ben’s chances at a normal life, something Ben finds hard to take. Doom escapes.

Reed realizes that he can’t build another machine, the risks are too great; he will have to search for a cure the hard way. Doom is now obsessed with the concept of Reed as his enemy; twice (in Doom’s mind), he has been denied by Reed. All the (imagined) pain that his mother suffers from now on is on Reed’s head. However, even above revenge, his goal henceforth will be to force Reed to rebuild his machine – by force, by deception, by blackmail – by whatever means it takes. End episode one, and away the series goes from there.

In subsequent episodes, a 30-second recap of the origin story leads into the menace teaser, which leads into the title sequence, which leads into the main plot, starting with the ordinary lives of four extraordinary and slightly dysfunctional people who have been forced together by continually-strained bonds of friendship and love. Johnny can invent things, build things, etc; Reed can discover strange phenomena; Sue can investigate curious happenings reported on the net; and Ben can try and build a life around his unique disfigurement. And every now and then, Doom will emerge from the shadows to try again, moving further away from the one strategy that might succeed with every defeat – admitting that he needs Reed’s help, and why. His ego, already wounded and maimed by his disfigurement, won’t bend that far.

The Lessons

Okay, so moving on from that piece of whimsy. There are some definite and fairly important lessons for GMs from the crash-and-burn Fantastic Four, 2015 version. Some may be obvious, others subtle, but they are all important and useful.

Respect the characters

The character concepts need to respect, and work in harmony with, the theme of the campaign. The central questions are always, “why are these people together? What’s their motivation? How does that motivation express itself in their relationships, and in the plotlines?”

Define interaction modes between the characters

Each character should have one or more subjects or activities or “interaction modes” which bring them together with one of the other featured characters. They don’t have to agree, or have a mutual goal in terms of that interaction mode – they simply need to have a relationship with each other that manifests within the domain of that subject. Two of them might have an interest in sport – but like wildly different sports, or back opposing teams. Two of them might be interested in politics, but one is conservative and the other progressive – and neither of them is completely right, or right all the time. One might be a conspiracy theory buff, while the other enjoys debunking conspiracy theories. One likes dance music and another likes ballet, or opera. One’s mischievous, and another’s a straight man (and perpetual easy target).

This sort of thing rarely happens by accident, and even more rarely happens without deliberate encouragement by the GM. There are two ways to achieve it: before the fact (during character generation) or after the fact (post-play). It’s easiest during character generation, when you can tweak designs and personalities to create the desired interaction modes; after the fact, it’s more square pegs into round holes, though it’s still possible. The best approach is to get the players to talk to each other and the GM about their characters, actively looking for interaction modes.

Once the modes have been defined, the GM has to make room in his plans for their expression; he needs to use them to give the players space in which to roleplay each character relating to the other characters. He needs to plant barbs and subplots and conversational or activity hooks that populate the interaction modes with topics of conversation, or accord, or disagreement.

Respect the genre

Players, Characters, and the GM need to all respect the genre and the conventions that go with it. These should be violated only with great care, and usually because some sub-genre element overrides the central genre in this particular respect. The campaign and characters should fit comfortably within the scope of the primary genre.

All this comes down to the GM understanding both the Genre and the campaign, and ensuring compatibility between the two. If your campaign is a spy drama, don’t make Cthulhu the chief villain. If Sci-fi is your game, don’t involve too many inexplicable phenomena – magic doesn’t fit very well. If you’re running a Western, leave out talking dogs. High Fantasy should emphasize the fantastic.

Good plots

An awful lot can be forgiven or ignored if you have good plotlines. James Bond in a high-fantasy setting in which rival deities are continually plotting against one another? It can be done.

On the other hand, no matter how well-matched characters and setting might be, no campaign will survive if the plots are dull, insipid, boring, or confused. An awful lot of campaign planning and development is aimed – without actually saying so – at creating an environment that inspires you, as GM, to come up with interesting plots.

Style pointers

Be especially wary of contradictions. “Home Alone” doesn’t work as “Grim and Gritty”, the Fantastic Four don’t work as outcasts, the X-men don’t work without the political and social issues over “Homo Superior”.

Don’t try to make anything into something it’s not

Most of these pointers can all be summed up in this one statement. If some element is desired within your campaign, your style, your characters, find a way to make it fit naturally. There’s usually a way, if you look hard enough.

Respect Your Audience

Last, but by no means least, don’t ever – ever – take your audiance for granted. Don’t look down on them. Don’t assume that they are not as smart as you. Don’t assume that they don’t matter.

We all know these things, but sometimes, we get caught up in our own cleverness and forget it.

If the characters are your cast, the players are your audience. And they will forgive just about anything – if you don’t take them for granted. That is the most obvious and most important lesson to be learned, and it doesn’t matter if Fantastic Four is as bad as everyone says, or if it is a gem that no-one else appreciates but you; no matter how good or bad a film it is, it can remind you of this most important lesson. And that makes it pretty Fantastic in my book.

Preface, by Mike

Today, I’m providing the first half of a guest article by my long-time friend, Ian Mackinder. Ian’s been nuancing this article for quite some time, and that shows in its depth. Part one deals with acquiring and designing vehicles, part two with using and abusing them. I’ve also tossed in my two-cents worth here and there in asides, and in a few short extra sections that I’ve added to part 2. But we’ll get to that in due course; in the meantime, here’s Ian…

Image from FreeImages.com/Paavo Leinonen

Introduction: The rantings of an ‘old school’ gamer

In role-playing games, I lean towards being a “vehicle junkie”.

My characters tend to acquire them, blow them up, or both. As a GM, I like having vehicles around as convenient plot devices for my victi… er, players.

But if you ask many RPGers about transportation in their campaigns, one of two things happens:
 

1. Minimal awareness that vehicles (in which category I also include riding beasts, wagons, canoes, planes, etc.) exist in the game;
2. The PCs indeed have a vehicle, happily detail its “improvements”, and list achievements (read: kill scores). But ask a trick question like “What color is it?” or “What’s its name?” and the response is “Um, er….”

These situations bother me. For me, gaming is all about characters trying to be heroic, and a lot of heroes have transportation indisputably theirs – James Bond and his Aston Martin, Kirk and various ‘Enterprises’, The Doctor and the TARDIS, Mal and ‘Serenity’, Jack Sparrow and ‘The Black Pearl’, etcetera. Creating a kick-@$$ character for an action-adventure(-ish) campaign and NOT giving that worthy a suitably personalized transport seems …. well, a missed opportunity. But a character’s vehicle used only as a combination gun emplacement and storage closet is a terrible waste.

What follows are my thoughts on the use and misuse of vehicles in role-playing games, plus a few semi-related side issues. Being a long-time devotee of things Trek, (Classic) ‘Traveller’ and ‘7th Sea’, I think mainly in terms of ships and starships, but most of these ideas can also be applied to other conveyances in varying genres.

Why Do We Need A Vehicle?

The main purpose of an in-game vehicle is to move the PCs and their stuff from place to place. More specifically, to get the Party from one adventure to the next – or from one part of an adventure to the next. Sure, they could beg / borrow / hire / steal something to make each trip, but owning a vehicle suitable for the job gives feelings of being in control, rather than being subject to the whims of the GM.

The vehicle may represent the Party’s common purpose, their means of travel as a group, and even be their living space as well. From the Referee’s standpoint, it is also a great way of encouraging the Party to stay together. Where do the Characters all rest and recuperate? In the vehicle. Where do they keep all their stuff? Same answer. How do they get into / out of trouble? Same answer, again.

There are also the role-playing aspects.

The vehicle can represent a Character’s back-story. The scion of a rich’n’powerful family, sent off to “make his own fortune” with his personal yacht. The disillusioned warrior who takes (steals?) a vehicle when she has finally had enough and quits (deserts?) whatever organization she has been serving. The down-on-his-luck scavenger who finds a wrecked vehicle of uncertain origins. Many possibilities to, as always, to be hammered out by the Referee and Player(s) involved.

Being part of the vehicle crew also provides sound reason for diversified PCs right from the start – PC #1 is the Captain, PC #2 the Engineer (and employee of PC #1), PC #3 the Steward (and minority shareholder), and so on. Rather than a bunch of thugs with the only visible differences being personal choices of weaponry, each PC has a very specific role in the team. Think of the ‘Firefly’ TV series. If your Character is The Captain, she’d better have some idea how to make decisions and operate the ship. For the Engineer, knowing how to make repairs is essential. And if the Party has no one who can do either, then they better find people to fill those jobs before the trouble starts. Arguably, perhaps, it already has…

Money, Money, Money..

A vehicle can be a solid source of income, whether the Party is honest and law-abiding …. or not. A sturdy ship and crew can always find (or be found by) lucrative opportunities.

And again, there is the other side of the financial coin to consider. Vehicles are a helpful means of earning cash. But they are also an excellent means to lose money. Whatever they do, whether earning $$$ or blowing things up or sitting idle, vehicles will need upkeep (maintenance, parking / docking fees, fuel, licenses / bureaucratic ahhh “support”, ammo, and so on), which means money spent just to keep the status quo – in turn, meaning that the Party treasury can be kept at a manageable level.

(Ideally, the Referee avoids having PCs throw around ridiculous amounts of cash to blow up his meticulously planned, deep and meaningful scenario. The endgame is the epic confrontation the Ref aimed for, instead of the PCs bribing all and sundry to have the Complex Villain put away on trumped-up charges of sheep-worrying.

In Act #1.

Never happened in any game I was in, but surely this has happened SOMEwhere, to SOMEone.) – Ian

Caveat Princeps (“(Game) Master Beware”)

It is easy for Referees to overdo measures thought sensible, such as siphoning off the Party’s excess money. But Players get frustrated if their efforts are blocked too often, and react poorly if their Characters’ hoard is “arbitrarily” messed with – either of which will lead to trouble. The best move is to keep the in-game cash-flow highly variable and mobile in both directions.

(E.G.:

GM (in the guise of an NPC, addressing a PC: ”Yo, Harry. Good news. The client paid up, and he even added the full bonus! But the Port dues have just risen another 10%, they say because of the war.”

“AGAIN with the Port costs?!? Dangit!!!! Oh well, could be much worse. We now have the cash to finish repairs AND refuel, right?”

“Errrrr. Refuel, you say?.”).

Acquisition – The ‘Traveller’ Way™

In most versions of the ‘Traveller’ RPG, certain career paths provide starships as part of a Character’s mustering out / pre-adventuring benefits. Strings are often attached – such as bank loans to be paid off, or the ship is a ‘loaner’ with the Character having certain obligations to the rightful owner.

Within the system’s constraints, this usually works well, but there are things the Referee should watch out for.

1. “Let’s Be Bad Guys”

The PCs want the ship, but not the obligations. So they dodge the latter, either actively (eg. “skip out” on making payments, and basically go on the run) or passively (e.g. they “somehow” never seem to be any place where the ship’s rightful owner can contact them).

But – any interstellar empire in which organizations routinely loan out starships and/or large sums of money, should have scary ways of dealing with abusers of this trust. That means not only law enforcement (bad enough), but professional skip tracers and bounty hunters – stubborn, mean-spirited, inventive people who do not play nice OR fair (in short, act just like Player-Characters). Besides which, once word gets out, Character benefits such as Pensions or TAS Memberships or valuable properties or even average-plus Social stats are all going to vanish or at least be frozen. Point out all this to the Party before they get started. Odds are they will reconsider.

Not to mention the potential for built-in technological solutions, the starship equivalent of the immobilizers built into modern autos – Mike

2. Multiple Ship Benefits

I’ve had this happen to me a few times in my Traveller refereeing days. Different PCs ALL roll up ship benefits (very easy to do, there being several career paths with this). Instead of a bunch of adventurers on one ship, you get a bunch of adventurers with their own frackin’ navy.

A fun game can still be had. But it tends to be an administrative horror as everybody struggles to keep track of where everybody else is and what their own ships are up to, etc., etc.. But there are ways:

• Amalgamation. – IF those involved are OK with the idea, have one large starship jointly-owned by the PCs (with suitable adjustments to their respective backstories) instead of a bunch of lesser craft. To this end, one of exactly 2.3 things I liked about ‘Traveller: The New Era’ was the table in it specifically for amalgamating ship benefits. Like most things TNE, it left much unstated, but it is a basis from which to start.
• Conversion. – Allow “excess” starship benefits to be turned into either other benefits on the Mustering Out tables, or into improving skills or stats. One-for-one works well in both cases, I have found. Warning: Converting excess ship benefits directly into their cash equivalent might SEEM fair, but the PCs will then be awash in money, so be warned (see above).
• Separation. – Most of the PC “fleet” is kept out-of-game elsewhere (rented / loaned / leased to NPCs), and busily generating a steady income for the owner. Many PCs aren’t keen on this, NPCs being an inherently untrustworthy bunch after all. But the idea is worth consideration and, if the Referee is seen as trustworthy enough, is a possibility.

• Inconvenience. – Arrange circumstances that make being separated across multiple shops inconvenient for the PCs. Economies of scale invert with inconvenience – so a berthing fee for one, larger, ship might be considerably lower than the berthing fees for many smaller ships in aggregate. Ditto loading fees, double ditto admin fees, etc. And when three of the ships need the same replacement part and there are only two available because supply is governed by demand, let the PCs fight it out. Skilled Manpower is another limited resource – there’s only one “best maintenance crew at the starbase” and if they are already busy on the first PC’s ship, the others either wait, or accept second best – and then third best, and fourth best. Then there are the problems with secure communications between multiple ships at the same time, which makes coordination of plans, and changes in plan, logistically difficult – unless the PCs are willing to have their discussion very publicly. – Mike

Acquisition – The Usual Ways

There are several more generic means of acquiring a vehicle.

1. Purchase

The mechanics of Purchase depends on the circumstances. Think of buying a used car today. If buying from or through an organization with a solid reputation, expect hard bargaining (they know their item’s worth) but the buyer will (usually) get exactly what s/he paid for (just be sure to read the fine print before signing). If buying super-cheap and/or in a hurry from a stranger in a bar, then the buyers deserve everything they get – and I do mean that. Really.

2. Theft

Theft is exactly what it sounds like – the Party taking a ship away from its prior owners without their consent. Maybe the previous users had it coming (eg. pirates or other hostiles), or maybe they didn’t (in brief: “Nice ship. We’ll take it.”). Other than the likelihood of running afoul of law-enforcement and bureaucracy as a result, a big problem is that you are never certain of the vehicle’s true condition until it’s too late.

Not to mention that any enemies the previous owner had will think they are still operating it. This can be anybody from organized crime to debt collectors to law enforcement. The PCs may well find themselves on wanted posters for being stooges of the person they boosted the vessel from! Always ask yourself, when transport is being stolen, how and from where did the previous “owner” acquire it, and what did they do with it before the PCs took possession? And maybe it was just a little too easy to steal….. – Mike

3. Salvage

There is Salvage, the recovery and restoration of a wrecked or otherwise lost ship. The key word here should be “fixer upper”, since whatever befell the ship and its previous owner / crew was almost certainly dire. Noting also that the line between “Salvage” and “Theft” can blur – especially if the ‘previous’ owner is still somewhere in the picture.

4. Gift

A Gift may seem the least likely way to get a ship but, from a Refereeing point of view, might be the most direct way to get the game started. No obfuscating – the ship is flat-out given to the PCs, “inherited” from a relative, or handed over as payment for something (refer PC back-stories) – or in expectation of services yet to be provided (Heh, heh, heh).

based on “tie fighter” from FreeImages.com/aksoy, background by Mike Bourke

Vehicle Back-stories

However acquired, a second-hand vehicle will have back-story, with varying repercussions for the PCs.

Consider where, why and for whom the vehicle was built; what previous users did with (or to) it; where it has been; how well it has been looked after; what enemies, rivals and allies may have been made along the way; and the circumstances under which the PCs acquire the ship.

Any of these may be a factor at some point.

Take the time to create a few minor details as part of the backstory, as complete or as cryptic as the Referee wants. Note that working out all details to the last percentile place beforehand is not the best move. Let Players speculate about the “clues” and decide for themselves which will be followed up on, and how. Odds are at least a few good ideas will come from this, and the Ref’s Grand Plan can be amended accordingly.

So, maybe…

• the Ship’s Log has a hidden list of mysterious coordinates.
• the Galley has the complete set of ‘Souvenir Of Altair VI’ coffee mugs.
• there are ‘odd’ fittings in the Hold, suggesting haulage of ‘unusual’ cargo at some stage.
• the Captain’s Cabin is decorated entirely in mauve and puce stripes.
• the PCs happen to meet an “interesting” NPC with a story (accuracy indeterminate) to tell about the ship.

Some of these things will be lead-ins to adventures involving the ship’s past, others will be just .. there for possible use in the future, or to simply mess with the PCs’ minds. Very few should actually affect the ship’s stats or functions (more on that later).

Custom-Builds

There are times when PCs have the resources and inclination to build their own vehicle from scratch. Or to revamp an existing vehicle beyond all recognition.

In either case, consider this project a Custom-Build. Oddly, not being up on construction techniques of the far future, the best we can do is relate it to vehicle building in the present.

(For all we know, 24th century vehicle builders will all be gigantic replicators / 3-D printers, with financial details and individual preferences entered at one end. The buyer then relaxes and waits for the new conveyance to emerge from the other end. Efficient but, from an RPG point of view, perhaps not very exciting.) – Ian

There are ways around that problem if you really want to go down the 3-D printer route. Intelligence/Police Forces surreptitiously incorporating tracking/monitoring devices in the designs, organized crime monkeying with the specs to create hidden compartments on all ships of a given model for use in smuggling, turning the PCs into “mules” without knowledge or profit-participation, heck even a ship-maintenance union who employs hackers to add interesting “new ship issues” (design/manufacturing flaws) that have to be fixed with a very expensive service before the vehicle will work – until the next built-in fault manifests, of course. It doesn’t even have to be malicious – think of this as the equivalent of constructing a PC from the basic components and circuit boards; sometimes, it’s as easy as inserting tab “a” into slot “b”, but sometimes it isn’t – and the problems can be a nightmare to solve.

A friend was telling me the story of a relative who bought a new laptop a little while back, and who attempted to upgrade the device to a later version of Windows. Unexpected, inexplicable, error. Contact Microsoft, who advise returning it to the vendor for assistance. Vendor advises a complete reset and reinstall of the Operating System. Install fails – new unexpected, inexplicable, error, a variation on the original problem. Telephone the vendor, who suggests contacting the manufacturer. Manufacturer says to take it back to the vendor, the process may not have been completed properly. So, back to the vendor, coincidentally at a time when a manufacturer’s representative just happens to be in-store. Attempted fix produces the same result, ending in a conference call between the manufacturer’s head office, the vendor, and Microsoft, at the conclusion of which it emerges that there is a design incompatibility between the hardware and the new operating system, a known issue for which there is no known solution. I’ve encountered similar problems in the past and know that sometimes, you can’t even reinstall the old operating system successfully without completely scrubbing hard discs to remove files overwritten by “newer” versions. In this case, the problem was eventually solved by choosing a different Operating System – with the attendant hassles of learning to use that new system.

So, get creative, but don’t hit the PCs with both barrels at once – wait until you can reload the first before firing the second shot…. – Mike

”Design”

The first thing the Party will do is trawl through the game’s design system, and produce a wish-list or “plan” of what they want. In-game, the PCs take these requirements to a designer (naval architect for ships and starships). After perusing the PCs’ list of demands (and probably laughing hysterically), the designer converts this into a format that the prospective builder can use. The PCs make payment, sign things (with or without lawyers present), and arrange to pick up their new toy on a specific date. At which time the PCs climb aboard, run a quick systems check and sail off into the sunset. Cue music.

It should be more complicated than that. Watch TV shows like ‘American Chopper’ and it is clear that custom builds are NEVER as simple as they first seem. Start with the designer and builder. We‘ll take an obvious shortcut by assuming the people selected for these jobs are both competent and honest. Even so, individual designers and builders will have their own methods, specialties and preferences.

For example:

• Shipyard Capability: Specific shipyards may specialize in certain designs or types. If PCs expect a shipyard known for its freighters to build what amounts to a major warship (or vice versa), then hesitation on their part might be understandable. Not to mention that various groups will take an interest in anyone building such warships outside of the normal manufacturers!
• Component Specialization: Both designers and shipyards may specialize in the use of specific components and not necessarily the SAME components at that. If specifications are outside comfort zones (eg. The designer likes LSP hulls, the yard ‘always’ uses General Products hulls, and the Party wants a Yoyodyne frame), then adjusting to this change in routine may take extra time, introduce failure modes, and will inevitably cost more.
• Skills: If going with a designer / builder team renowned as the absolute BEST at what they do, expect higher prices and, very probably, being on a long waiting list. At the bottom. And, being expensive and well-paid, thoroughly immune to bribes to change this status – except in the negative.
• DIY: Maybe a Party member invested in the necessary skills to do the design work themselves. Well and good – chance for role-play there maybe. A possible downside is that said designer will have to severely curtail other activities for a while, if s/he wants to make a proper job of it. Another downside is if the designer makes any serious errors – the rest of the party may be faced with the choice of suing their teammate OR ponying up extra cash themselves to put things right.

Construction

Following that is the build process itself. Components are built, or shipped in from other sources, then fitted together. Simple, in theory. Except that there are always complications – shipments delayed or gone astray or even stolen outright; errors such as wrong items being sent (“These are Mark 4A Wossnames, we NEED Mark 5Vs.”); surprise compatibility issues between components (necessitating extra work); accidental(?) breakages and ‘incidents’ on-site, shenanigans within the business itself (“… Ehhh. Haint seen Bob OR the comp’nee payroll since Wensdee.”), and so on.

Even local or national politics can have a part.

Quick Historical Example: Just prior to WW1, the Ottoman Empire paid for two large cruisers to be built in British shipyards for their navy. When war broke out, the Royal Navy promptly took over both near-complete vessels for its own use, leaving the at-that-time-neutral Ottomans nothing except promises of compensation “after the war”. Needless to say, the Ottomans were ticked off about it. – Ian

So, how are the politics wherever the PCs’ new ship is being built? If local authorities get in a jam, then “borrowing” the tricked-out and semi-complete ship in their jurisdiction (or even just certain of its equipment) may seem like a solution to their problem(s). The nature, amount and timing of any compensation promised the owners (not to mention actual return of the borrowed items) will largely depend on the final outcome, the honesty of the borrowers and their ability to make amends.

Shakedown

The next phase in the build is the test drive / shakedown cruise. In the movies or on TV, there is a tendency for heroes to grab an untried vehicle literally straight out of construction and go directly into action. The reality is that going this path should equate with shooting oneself in the foot. The entire reason for shakedowns is to make sure that everything works properly in a safe and controlled manner. “In combat” or during “The Big Race” are NOT the times to discover defective components, design flaws, sabotage, or manufacturer errors. At least not from the PC’s point of view, heh!

And then comes the real shakedown, as the people who can fix it tot up the bill for parts and manpower – and try and fix the problems that have been spotted this time.

Caveat Princeps again:

Unless the Party fully deserve it, then dropping most of the above on them just for trying to custom-build their own ship is a dick move. If, as Referee, you don’t want them doing that stuff, then just say so up front and offer other outlets for their time and their cash. But, to shake up PCs and stop them from being complacent, the threat of a few of the things mentioned here (plus maybe some “minor”(?) incidents) provides plenty of scope for interesting scenarios.

Creating Your Own

Build Your Own Vehicle is not a common choice for PCs, but is doable if they have access to all that is needed. Note, when I say “Build Your Own”, I am not referring to having a bunch of NPCs do the job, with the PCs looking in now and again. I’m thinking of a couple of ‘MacGyver’ episodes, many episodes of the ‘A Team’, and the movie ‘Flight Of The Phoenix’ (the original is well worth watching). The PCs are stuck someplace, and their survival depends on building a means of escape using items immediately at hand (a junkyard’s contents, remnants of a crashed aircraft, local raw materials, etc.).

Unless the PCs get overly ambitious (read: silly) about whatever they build, it is fair to give them some breaks on this particular idea. Whatever the PCs build should be a one (or limited) use item and, as long as they treat it as such (Ie. carefully), they deserve special consideration for their ingenuity.

Quirks And Tweaks

Both Quirks and Tweaks are ways of giving a vehicle extra “character”. When working out details, the Referee should consider assigning a few of these.

Quirks

Quirks are something that owners of any complex device / system should understand fully. The production run for a specific vehicle design could run anywhere from “several” to hundreds of thousands, but there can still be little oddities making each of said vehicles more of an ‘individual’. Maybe the PC vehicle only starts after the third try on cold mornings. Maybe opening or closing a specific door requires jiggling the lever “just so”. Maybe the left-side reading light is the only one that ever breaks, or there is that faint rattle under one seat whenever the brakes are hit TOO hard, or the Lighter sometimes gets stuck in its mount.

All of these things may technically be malfunctions, but are so trivial that effects on vehicle operation are almost always non-existent. There may be rare exceptions – difficulties getting started or in using a specific function can be entertaining complications in-game. But usually, the removal / eradication of individual Quirks are very probably much more trouble (and expense) than it is worth.

Of course, some PCs get downright obsessive about their vehicle being in perfect running order, and will go to extreme lengths to ‘cure’ anything that threatens this belief. My advice to GMs in this instance is “Let them” – let the PCs spend time, money and effort to put the ‘problem’ exactly right, then allow them a little time of apparent perfection before another Quirk eventually surfaces in another part of the vehicle. Rinse and repeat as necessary.

One last bit of advice regarding Vehicular Quirks is this. NEVER allow the PCs to make up their own. That way lies abuse of the system, as the vehicle’s Quirks almost certainly become an el cheapo anti-theft system (do such-and-such to open the door, do such-and-such to turn on the ignition, and do such-and-such to put the vehicle in gear),

Image from FreeImages.com/Steve Knight

Tweaks

Tweaks are quite distinct from Quirks. They are alterations intentionally made to the vehicle in order to improve specific capabilities. For a sufficiently-skilled technician, it should be possible to make minor improvements to any of a vehicles’ stats. However, there should always be trade-offs, a price to be paid, which may be direct or indirect.

The direct trade-offs are obvious. For example, trick out the engine so the vehicle can go faster, and this probably means fuel efficiency changes for the worse and/or the engine reliability suffers. How big the trade-off should depend on how major the change is.

The indirect trade-offs, are, strangely, inobvious. For example, one might tweak a vehicular weapon so that it has a higher Rate Of Fire. Due care is taken beforehand, so the weapon mount is up to the job and the weapon itself can withstand the additional stress. However, when fired for long enough, side-effects crop up in unexpected places. Maybe the extra vibration from firing damages adjacent components, or the additional heat keeps triggering the fire alarm. They may not be noticed immediately, and dealing with them may call for further tweaks. Noting that there is a slight possibility of additional problems being spawned.

The GM and Quirks & Tweaks

In either case, the administering of Quirks and Tweaks should be at the discretion of the Referee. The complexity of the vehicle, the extent of any changes made to it, the skill of the person(s) making the changes and the quality of the tools / equipment used for the work should all be factors. Allow for chances that the work being done will go wrong – and remember that most of it will probably void the warranty.

Naming

“The naming of cats is a difficult matter,
It isn’t just one of your holiday games…
But I tell you, a cat needs a name that’s particular,
A name that’s peculiar, and more dignified,
Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular,
Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride?”
— From ‘The Naming Of Cats’ by T S Eliot.

Mr Eliot has the sense of it, and not only for cats. The name of a Party’s vehicle (indeed, of any vehicle encountered) deserves proper attention from both GM and Players. If pre-used, the vehicle should already have some kind of designation as part of its back-story.

Otherwise, the name can be a unifying symbol or badge of honor for the Party. “I’m the (Insert Rank / Job Description Here) of the (Insert Ship Name Here)” always sounds more impressive than “I’m the (Insert Rank / etc.), but I dunno what our ship is called”. I have witnessed games where Players said the latter. Ack!!!

Commonly, the ship name simply isn’t something that the Referee or the Players consider at all. Which, as you might reasonably guess, bothers me,

There are Players who think that, if their Character can’t be ‘The-Man-With-No-Name’, then being Captain / Crew of ‘The-Ship-With-No-Name’ is comparably Bad-@$$. Commonly, these are also the ones who put their Characters in Darth-Vader-with-chrome-trim outfits, and cosmetically alter their ship to resemble a Stealth Bomber (which is a terrible look if said ship is a 16th-century Galleon).

In a technological genre, vehicles will have an ID number at absolute minimum. Maybe several, including the one(s) allocated when it was built. A lack of even this should attract unwanted attention from people well-known for not having a sense of humor – law enforcers and bureaucrats and anyone who might hear about it and have a use for such a ship.

In a not-so-technological genre, there may be no ID number, but naming of vehicles could be a deadly serious matter of tradition and/or superstition. A lack of name may be commonly regarded as extremely unlucky (and, in certain genres, may actually BE unlucky).

There is also the chance that other people eventually give said ship a name, but this is unlikely to be anything any PC will like (“That @#$%^ Psycho’s Ship” being one likely favorite).

A few guidelines:

• Most important, Be able to say the name out loud in polite / mixed company. It might seem hilarious to have the name be an obscenity or unpronounceable, but the novelty wears out quickly.
• Set Cuteness On Low. In one ‘Stargate SG-1’ episode, Colonel Jack O’Neill wanted to name the SGC’s new starship ‘Enterprise’ because “he liked that show”. That’s fine, on the face of it – we all smiled, and it was very much in character for Jack. But overdoing cross-genre references (Trek in an SG-1 game, Star Wars in WH40K, etc.), can break immersion and even get annoying. If you must, then keep it at one or two, tops, and move on.
  

  How many people have ever tried to get cute when assigning a user-name for some website or another? How many people have found that the name is already gone? Websites solve the problem of needing a unique user-name by forcing people to attach numbers to the end of their chosen name – or make a new choice. GMs should use this as a way to “censor” excessively cute names by appending twelve-digit numbers to ensure “uniqueness”. When a reasonable name is chosen, miracle of miracles, the name is available. – Mike

• Make Up Your Mind. Depending on the genre and the campaign, there may be times when it is appropriate and even necessary to change the ship’s ID / name. That time will not be every session and/or at the whim of the PCs. If nothing else, overdoing this should attract the wrong sort of attention from others. Also, if superstition is at all a thing in the game, changing a ship’s name is traditionally regarded as unlucky.
  

  Of course, if changing a name is bad luck, there will usually be a difficult, expensive, inconvenient, and/or time-consuming ritual to prevent the bad luck. Use NPC behavior to enforce the ritual, escalating to a new Quirk if necessary. – Mike

• Respect The Background, (or DON’T Be An Obnoxious @$$). Look at what other ships in the game background are called, and get ideas there. Deliberately obnoxious names (eg. someone in a WH40K game who insists on naming their ship ‘The God-Emperor Is An @#$%^&*s’) should be smacked down hard.

But, Seriously, What Do I Name It?

After considering the above, anything you want. Originality is not required – eg. feel free to check how many ‘Enterprises’ there have been in the world. Check the game background for ideas. Otherwise, inspiration can be had from the names of people, animals, places, things, events, tactics, colors, mental traits, famous quotes, catch-phrases, puns, word-plays, literary references, jargon from specific sub-groups / sub-cultures, and combinations thereof.

More suggestions can be found in the “Ships and starships” section of With The Right Seasoning: Beyond Simple Names, part of the “A good name is hard to find” series. – Mike

We Can’t Agree On A Name…

Make a short list, eliminate any choices that some people really don’t like, then determine randomly from whatever is left. Whatever comes up is irrevocably final. Or just invoke your Ghod-given powers as Referee. Honestly, do I have to tell you EVERYTHING?

I agree with Ian’s first two steps.

There are two approaches to use: #1, In-game – in which case NPCs should not get to vote except to break a deadlock, and then in favor of the GM’s choice from the player-provided shortlist (see below); and #2, Metagame, in which case the GM may exercise veto authority but should not vote except to break a tie.

So which shortlisted name should the GM choose? After excluding any names that he really doesn’t like, I would choose the most evocative name – evocative being measured by the predicted fun factor of the adventure idea that the name inspires. After all, a ship with no name may be bad, a ship with a name may be better, but the best of all is a ship with a name and a story to go along with that name! – Mike

The second part of this article will appear next week. This article will be ever-so-minutely revised to replace this text with a link to it when that happens.

About The Author

Ian Mackinder is a long-time friend of Mike’s, and is almost as keen a gamer in his own twisted way. Over the years, he has been in several of Mike’s campaigns, and vice versa, but both seem none the worse for it.

In the past, Ian has refereed ‘Star Trek’ (FASA) and Classic Traveller. Currently, he is running a ‘7th Sea’ game, and resigned to apparently being the only Referee of that system in the entire Greater Sydney region – he would love to PLAY in a campaign himself some day. Ian regularly plays in various systems – including D&D4, Rogue Trader and Pulp HERO. He likes a lot of other systems but, after one bad experience, will NOT play ‘Runequest’ again – and if you aren’t careful enough, he will tell you why.

Ian’s other hobbies include history (Australian, military, weird, hidden, maritime, and combinations thereof), TV & Movies, Forteana, browsing the Internet, and SF in general (with occasional excursions into Fantasy). He is also a keen player of the ‘Fallout 3’ computer game, and currently writes a sort-of series about that called ‘The Walker Files,’ which can be found on the ‘Fallout 3 Nexus’. Happily, his amazing wife and brilliant daughter both manage to put up with all this.

The Backstory

Michael (aka @TheRPGAcademy on Twitter) has been a supporter of Campaign Mastery and an occasional conversationalist on the subject of gaming for several years now. He is also one of the people behind the RPG Academy podcasts. Several months ago, he flattered me outrageously with an offer to be interviewed for the show as one of their “Show & Tell” guests; a technological handicap prevented me from accepting at the time, but I was chuffed nevertheless (anytime the circumstances change, he’ll be the first person I tell about it)!

Acadecon and the Kickstarter Campaign

Last week, he invited me to take a look at his Kickstarter fundraiser for AcadeCon and possibly promote the event if anything struck a chord. They are fully funded already, but there are some cool stretch goals that he would really like to see happen, so I took a look.

This will be the third AcadeCon (which I would pronounce “Akkaddakon”), a gaming convention in southern Ohio; the first two were limited by venue space, and so were invitation-only. The 2015 model will take the convention into Hueston Lodge, located in the Ohio State Park, a picturesque location just north of Cincinnati. That carries several advantages – more space, 24-hour gaming, and no real worries about disturbing the neighbors with gaming noise! The Con is scheduled to take place on the 13th, 14th, and 15th of November, 2015.

To quote Michael, and his partner-in-gaming-crime, Caleb, “Our only goal this year is to have fun. We are not making a profit from this convention. All funds received will go towards improving the quality of this event and preparing for a bigger and better convention in 2016.

“But, more than anything, remember to play more games and follow our motto: If you’re having fun, you’re doing it right!”

So check out the Kickstarter by clicking on the AcadeCon logo above, or on this link – you have until September 7th. If you want more information, you can also look at the convention page at .

There is some cool swag up for grabs, and most of the stretch goals are all about adding to the swag, so don’t miss out if you have any interest whatsoever! That deadline again is September 7, 2015.

Meanwhile, At The Blog Carnival

This month’s Blog Carnival is being hosted by Mark Clover at Creative Mountain Games, aka CMG.

Mark Clover (of CMG) (@MarkCMG on Twitter) is another long-time supporter of Campaign Mastery, often promoting my articles on social media, so I was eager to participate if I could – but as has been the case for the last couple of months, I was drawing a blank when it came to subjects (for reasons that will become clear a little later).

That was, until Michael extended his invitation, and a key phrase from the Kickstarter write-up (quoted above) leapt out of the woodwork to inspire me: “…preparing for a bigger and better convention in 2016…” and I asked myself, “what would I do to use one year’s first public convention as a springboard to a bigger and better convention the following year?” What strategies could I devise?

What would I do?

If I were designing a convention to grow into something bigger and better in future years, what would I do? How would I organize it? What would I like to see?

What would I do?

Ideas began to tumble forth, as though my subconscious had been thinking about the question for simply ages, and just waiting to be tickled in exactly the right way…

A Caveat: My limited gaming convention experience

Up front, I have to confess to an extremely limited experience when it comes to Gaming Conventions. I’ve been involved in the organization and running of two conventions – one Sci-Fi and one Tolkien-themed. I’ve been peripherally involved in one World Science-Fiction convention, co-hosted the official (and successful) bid party for another, and was a member of the organizing committee bidding to host a third – but not a lot of that is relevant. I’ve attended two gaming conventions, sitting in on one game session in one, and keeping a vendor in the huckster’s area company in another. And that’s the full extent of my convention experience.

So my ideas (as opposed to a couple of war-stories I’ve shared during the discussion to follow) have to be viewed in the context of being strictly theoretical, with no certainty that any of them are at all practical. I think they are both good and workable, but I have no grounding in expertise to give that opinion any credibility.

A further caveat: Organizer Surprise

I wouldn’t expect to see any of these ideas forming part of the structure of AcadeCon 2015, even if they are viable in the longer term, for the simple reason that organization of the convention is obviously already well-advanced, and Michael won’t have seen or heard any of them prior to the publication of this article. He’s going to be as taken by surprise as any other reader.

A reasonable expectation

Rather than expecting any of these proposals to be accepted, or even directly relevant, what I could reasonably hope to achieve is to spark a discussion of the proposals and their underlying thinking. Many of them relate to topics that don’t often get a public airing, for one reason or another, either because they might seem boring to outsiders, or there may be dirty laundry involved, or to preserve the mystique that organizers always know exactly what they are doing. There’s no university degree or even college class that I’m aware of that teaches you how to run a gaming convention! Most people learn from bitter experience, from assisting in the management of other people’s conventions, or – if they are lucky – from other organizers with more experience.

Some of the advice is potentially stating the obvious. I make no apologies for that; it’s better to have it said publicly than not said at all.

Sessions

Gaming should be organized into sessions or units. Each should leave enough time for a meal and some shopping in the huxter’s area between games, plus transit from one to the next. In addition, each should have a “margin” built in in case they run long. My original thinking on this didn’t allow for 24-hour-a-day gaming but that makes little difference; if the day is 12 hours long, you get two sessions a day; 15-18, three; 24, four. Alternatively, you could use 8, 16, and 24. I would also recommend an in-the-middle-of-session break of 15 minutes.

Meal allowance: 30 mins should be long enough, given that more can be appropriated from other functions. Shopping: 15 minutes. Movement from one event to the next: another 15 minutes. Margin: 30 minutes.

That means that if the session plus extras are 6 hours long, each play “unit” would be four and one-quarter hours in length, which doesn’t include the 15-minute break somewhere in the middle. If the sessions are 8 hours long, each play “unit” would be six and one-quarter hours in length, not counting the 15-minute break.

Some of the games should be three units long, some two, and some single-sessions. These should occur on different days if possible, encouraging a variety of games for the attendees.

Experience Ratings

Gamers should be able to rate themselves on a four-step scale, and games of each length should be targeted at each of the steps. The terms I’ve chosen to refer to these ratings are Beginners, Apprentices, Journeymen, and Masters.

Beginners

Growing a convention necessarily has a sub-context, at least in part, of growing the hobby. And that means encouraging new players to take it up. Beginners are those with less than 10 sessions of gaming under their belts. Playing once a month would get you out of Beginner standard in about a year; playing every week would get you there in about three months. In other words, this category really is reserved for those who don’t know exactly what they are doing yet, who still need the occasional reminder of what 4d8 means, and so on.

Apprentices

Apprentices are those who have started learning how to play, but have not yet really mastered it. If you have played or GM’d more than 10 game sessions, but have been at it for less than, say, three years, you would fall into this category. A journeyman probably only has experience of one or perhaps two game systems. One unresolved question is to what extent further breadth of experience should mitigate against the three-year boundary; while every different game system adds experience and variety to the gaming CV, it also limits the depth of expertise in any one of them. So there are factors to consider in both directions.

My gut feeling is that each extra game system (over the expected two) in which you have at least 4 months experience or 20 game sessions should add about 6 months to your experience, over and above the actual playing time, until you get to more than 6 in total. On a three-year basis, that would mean that you averaged 5 months to a game system – which at 4 weeks in the average month, is 20 game sessions. Beyond that, each extra should count for minus 1/4 of a year, with the final verdict to belong to the GM of the game.

Journeymen

Journeymen are probably the largest group – if your gaming experience is anywhere from three to fifteen or maybe 20 years, this is where you belong. You would be expected to have experience in at least 3 game systems over that long a period, and probably a great deal more. At this level of expertise, you should be able to learn a new game system as you play and with minimal instruction.

Masters

Masters are the real pro’s. Anyone with 15-20 years at the game table, in any capacity, is not likely to need a whole lot of hand-holding; on the contrary, they are likely to need a whole new order of challenge in order to test them.

Why Discriminate?

First, “Discriminate” should be viewed in the sense of choosing or characterizing, and not be understood in any pejorative sense. Nevertheless, I deliberately chose the term for its shock value.

I think that expectations of ability and difficulty of game would be different at the different levels of expertise, that the reward that you receive is more likely to be satisfying if those demands are in line with the level of expertise you posses, and that the presence of someone without the appropriate level of experience at a game table can interfere with the fun of other players, inducing frustration. In my first game, I played a first-level character amongst others ranging from 5th to 12th level, with challenges geared accordingly. I died very quickly – and if I had payed to participate, would not have been very happy about it. A game targeted at my level of expertise, possibly even with slightly higher character levels than first to give scope for making a mistake without the consequences being immediate death, would be a lot more reasonable – and fun.

So it’s to the benefit of the participants to rate the games for expertise levels.

As you’ll see a little later, it also permits the convention organizers the capacity to target each level of customer with benefits, inducements, and encouragement to grow both the hobby and future versions of the convention. So it’s a win all round, while the alternative can be a source of trouble.

I’ve seen convention modules published in magazines before, and (in general), they pay more attention to character level than they do to the level of player expertise, as though assuming that if you have a 9th level character, that your character has earned all nine of those levels in play. I think that’s an unwarranted assumption.

Hucksters & Advertising

Every convention should have an active hucksters area. Invite local game stores, local book stores, regional publishers. If there’s a store in the region that handles gamer-style t-shirts, invite them, too. Try to think outside the box and invite someone who normally doesn’t get a table at an RPG convention – DrivethruRPG or Amazon or Netflix. Even if they don’t accept the invite they might be interested in a promotional tie-in.

INVITE THE LOCAL MEDIA, and have a professional press-kit distributed to all local and several major national media outlets. You want first-time gamers – because a year from now, if you’ve done it right, they will be back, beginners no more.

Most conventions charge vendors for the privilege. That’s all well and good for the convention, but it doesn’t grow things very much because it imposes an additional overhead that must be met before the vendor can make a profit. There should be a better way of doing things, but short of imposing draconian accountancy, I have to admit that I can’t think of a general solution. My best idea is to charge customers an entrance fee into the huckster’s area, giving them a pass that’s valid all day – but that’s too easy to cheat. Maybe stamping hands the way they do at nightclubs is the answer. By charging each potential customer a small fee you can reduce what you charge the vendors for table space, and the convention makes money whether the customers buy or not.

The best that I can suggest is that you permit vendors to pre-book table space for the next year’s Convention right up to the end of this year’s con – and get a discount on that booking and a partial refund on this year’s con if they do. You want to generate word of mouth through these venues, and having their customers hear that they will be attending can help make them your customers. I would further offer a smaller discount on this year’s fees if a flier for the convention is displayed in their stores and/or websites prior to the con.

Food

Do a deal with a local vendor – free space (ie payed for by the con) but if they do a certain amount of trade over the whole convention, they have to come back for the next one – at an agreed-in-advance fee based on huckster table rates. That’s assuming that the venue isn’t catered, of course.

Access to the food area should be through the huckster’s area. You want to encourage impulse shopping and the buzz of “look what I just bought” as people pass.

One of the first two conventions that I attended provided tea and coffee for A$1 a disposable Styrofoam cup (it was in the 80s, and this was comparable to vending-machine prices at the time). It was my responsibility that weekend to ensure that as each panel ended, a fresh supply of hot water was available, milk was restocked, etc. The convention was being held on the first-floor convention facilities of a city hotel, and the milk came from a store across the road with whom the convention organizers had done a deal – down two short flights of stairs and then back up them with the milk. It all sounds fair enough, doesn’t it?

The grab-a-quick-cuppa proved so popular that over the course of the 4-day convention, I carried more than 3,000 liters (3170 quarts) of milk up those two flights of stairs, 20 liters at a time (in 4 liter plastic bottles that are still in use today). It seemed like I no sooner got back than I would have to turn around and go back again, but carrying more didn’t seem to be a viable solution either. It caused panic attacks at the supplier, too, who went through their stock for the weekend – even though they had arranged to have extra – in just 6 hours. The convention made about A$1800 profit from the hot-drinks-between-sessions alone (and I’ve taken my coffee and tea black ever since).

Now, I haven’t looked up November weather in Ohio, but I suspect that the seasonal position (early winter) would have been comparable, if not a little warmer here in Sydney. There are valuable lessons in this story for any convention organizer!

“Corridor Space” and other mistakes

I’ve seen at least one convention that seriously underestimated the amount of space needed in the aisles between huckster tables, forming bottlenecks that resulted in a lot of problems – everything from theft to an entire display accidentally getting knocked over and injuring the knockee. I’ve also seen a convention which tried to organize them by type of business, so that you had all the vendors of second-hand books together, and all the people selling toys together, and so on. This facilitated price wars and ill-will between those vendors. At the same time, I’ve also seen vendors take advantage of greater distance between them and their rivals to secretly undercut those rivals. Finally, I’ve seen a convention that didn’t think that the Huckster’s area needed security. None of these worked out very well for either the con or the vendors, and one convention was almost sued by a Vendor as a result, claiming that the convention had made promises and failed to deliver on them, costing the vendor trade.

If I’ve seen these problems with my limited convention experience, how commonplace must they be?

It’s always worth investigating the price of insurance against damages claims by vendors. This includes event insurance in case the Con gets canceled for some reason.

Finally, I’ve seen one convention which seriously over-estimated the available space in the huckster’s area, only discovering the error the night before the convention; they had to set up the overflow in a separate space, and that caused considerable ill-will.

If you must charge a table fee, I suggest making it a sliding scale – one table for X, a second table for Y, a third for Z, and so on – and specifying the maximum size of each space considered a “table”.

First Aid Stations and other necessities

You need at least one of these, preferably two or three. At least one of them should be outside the huckster’s area, and at least one inside. You should notify the local police and ambulance services that there is going to be a convention going on, as a courtesy.

While I’m on the subject of telling people, warning any local merchants that there may be people in strange costumes wandering around and possible shopping in their stores can save a lot of trouble – one fellow almost got arrested, possibly shot, because he was in a (pre-movie) Starship Troopers ensemble, complete with dummy rifle, and went into the local 7-11 equivalent to buy snacks. The clerk thought the convention-goer was there to rob the store and hit the silent alarm…

Weapons policies are always a headache – both getting people to agree on what the policy should be, communicating it to the attendees in advance, and enforcing it.

You want to keep your convention-goers safe and you definitely don’t need the negative publicity that can result.

Panels

Of course, there should be panels and workshops and discussions between guests. But what should these be about? This was actually my initial thought of all those presented in this article, the stone that got the ball rolling, as it were.

While pre-registration for panels is possibly a necessity, with participating numbers limited, attendance of one panel that I immediately thought of should be encouraged as widely as possible: How to write, prepare, test, and run a convention adventure!

The more people who can contribute and run adventures, the more players can be serviced at the next convention. Attendance should come with all the paperwork that people will need to fill out in order to offer a game at that next convention – fill out the form, mail it by the date stamped on it, and it’s over to the organizers. If you can get 150 GMs, who have never run a convention game before, attending such a panel, and only one in twenty take the next steps and actually sign up to run their first convention game in a year’s time, that’s an extra 7-8 GMs next year. If you can up those numbers to 300 and one-in-ten, that’s 30 extra GMs. 600 and one-in-five, and that’s another 120 GMs!

You want bigger and better in twelve months time? Give your attendees the tools to make it happen! Work out what you will need to accommodate double or triple this year’s expected attendance and use this convention to achieve those requirements!

Everything else that I propose in this article has flowed from this one starting point.

Panels and related activities should be between 60 and 120 minutes in length. That means that in a single “game session” you can attend two or three panels instead of playing.

Admission vs Game Entry Fees

There are those who might argue that one fee, up front, is the better approach. It certainly has the virtue of elegance and simplicity. But I think there’s something to be said for a more pay-for-what-you-play approach.

First, it would enable you to keep general admission fees down – and that, in turn, encourages a strong turn-out. Young gamers in particular, by-and-large, are not the wealthiest of individuals. And the vast probability is that if they save money on admission, any extra will get spent in the huckster’s area, enhancing the reputation and likely future attendance of the next convention. It’s a snowball effect.

Second, it doesn’t mean any more work if you require pre-registration for events (other than those for beginners, perhaps). It simply means that instead of one item on the receipt, there are several. More, it means that convention goers who might not otherwise have the financing to attend will do so at least part of the time (NB: my thinking on this was, at the time, that the convention would be held in a city hotel), enabling participants to come and go.

Once I had this general thought, opportunities to encourage participation began to occur to me, mostly of the cross-promotional variety. The general principle was that most participants should pay for about 2/3 of the activities they are involved in, with the remaining 1/3 being subsidized by the first two-thirds or by convention-supporting activities.

Beginners

A Beginner’s first session should be free with admission, and they should get one other session free. They should also get admission to one panel of their choice, free. The costs of running these should be subsidized by the convention because if their convention grows the hobby, the hobby will grow their convention.

Apprentices

Apprentices should also receive one session’s entry free with admission, plus a rebate of 1 other session free if they buy the appropriate core rules for that game from an on-site vendor, and an additional session free if they GM 2 sessions for beginners (subject to availability of convention space). (They should also get entrance to 1 panel free with their general admission). Finally, of course, GMs don’t pay entrance fees for any session that they GM.

This encourages the sale of product, keeping the vendors happy, and provides an incentive to game producers to feature their latest products – possibly in return for a partial subsidy of the cost – a reasonable marketing operation, especially in conjunction with the “How to GM a convention game” panels. Between this policy and the panel, you are giving young GMs everything they need to step forward and become the future backbone of the hobby.

Journeymen

Journeymen get 1 session free with admission, plus 1 other session free (via rebate) if they spend $100 (or $75 maybe?) in the huckster’s area, plus 1 free session of play for every 3 sessions they GM (subject to availability of convention space), and 1 panel free. I’ve already indicated that I expect this to be the most populous group of attendees, and this policy is aimed at persuading them to attend at a discount if they spend part of their time helping to make the convention a success. The “subject to availability” is an important point, because it means first in, best dressed (in terms of getting the discount) and prioritizes the most organized GMs. This settles the convention games roster ASAP.

Once again, GMs don’t pay entrance fees for any session that they GM.

Masters

Masters get their last session of play free with admission, plus one other session free for every 3 sessions they GM for others of Master or Journeyman level or 4 sessions they GM for Beginners or apprentices (subject to availability of convention space), and attendance of one panel free. This encourages those with the greatest mastery of the art of GMing to stay the course for the whole weekend.

And, as usual, GMs don’t pay entrance fees for any session that they GM.

Panel Presenters

Panel presenters and special guests should get free general admission and 1 free game session for each panel or workshop they participate in (subject to availability of space). This combines two principles: “all work and no play” and making contact with a potential fan-base. The assumption is that these are professionals, semi-professionals, or otherwise substantial figures within the industry. Of course, they would not pay entrance fees for any session that they GM, but on top of that, I would give them one session free for each session that they GM – encouraging them to bring and demonstrate their latest products, and enhancing the contribution they make to the convention, overall. Ideally, this should mean that a guest has his entire weekend filled with gaming and related activities without having to part with a dime, simply by staying with the optimum mix of activities – but affording them the flexibility to vary the convention’s idea of “optimum” to suit themselves.

Panel registration

If panels are to be about 1/3 of a game session in length, they should cost about 1/3 of the session fee. At least two different panels should be underway at any given time simultaneously, so that convention-goers have a choice of what to attend.

Videos/DVDs

If possible, panels should be recorded on videotape and sold on DVD on the final day, so that if you wanted to attend a panel but couldn’t, you can do so retrospectively. “Profit” levels on these should be as near to zero as possible – because every time the resulting DVD gets played, the convention is promoted. Next best would be to upload the panels to youTube.

Furthermore, if the DVDs / videos are made more generally available (at a slight premium), it provides a mechanism whereby those who can’t attend the convention can still support it. That’s a win all round, in my book.

How to get these made on the cheap? Make contact with a school, technical college, or university in the area that is offering classes in video production, and try to do a deal – you supply the event, they supply camera, lighting, and sound crew and equipment. You want these to be reasonably impressive, because this is how those who didn’t attend will see your convention – and maybe decide it’s worth going to in a year’s time.

In Reality

I started by saying that I have no evidence to suggest that any of these ideas would work in real life. In fact, I can see practical difficulties that would need to be overcome in many cases. These are not insuperable; for example, I can see how a tailored SurveyMonkey “survey” could be used to pre-register attendance at different events. I don’t think any of the practical issues are insuperable.

Having them be practical for the particular convention under discussion is a whole different kettle of fish. But hopefully, they – or someone – can glean some advice of merit from my ruminations and recollections.

At the very least, as I stated earlier, I would hope to kick-start a discussion of these ideas. Heck, that would even make an interesting and useful panel at a gaming convention – “How to make next year bigger and better, or what you want from future versions of this convention”….

I was recently invited to review the Morgalad Starter Book by John McNabb, available through DrivethruRPG.

Publication of Morgalad is the result of a successful Kickstarter campaign which, like the result, is an interesting mixture of flawed ambition and success. The initial attempt at funding Morgalad sought to raise $20,000 and was a dismal failure; John reassessed his plans, setting his sights considerably lower, and succeeded in reaching the smaller target.

Morgalad is essentially a simplified version of the d20 rules built around a roll of 4d6, and aimed at generating an old-school flavor while incorporating the best aspects of the more modern game mechanics. Furthermore, character development paths can include increasing those dice to 5d6 or even 6d6 without altering the targets to be achieved.

The 4d6 mechanic

Morgalad’s game mechanics are quite straightforward. Roll dice, add any bonuses, and succeed if you achieve a defined total. This same principle is employed for skill checks, for attack rolls, for spellcasting, and for damage, where you need to better the armor of the target to damage it. There is, of course, more to the story, but that’s the central mechanic.

Using 4d6 is very interesting. Quite obviously, that produces a classical bell-curve, as shown below,

4d6 roll, base graph generated using AnyDice (http://anydice.com/). Click the image to visit the calculator.

The red line shows the 5% mark, ie the chance of a result on a d20, for comparison purposes. Clearly, your chances of rolling any number between 10 and 18 are higher than the chances of the same result coming up on a d20. This becomes significant when I tell you that the target for an Easy task is 10 or better (assuming that you have the requisite skill) while the target for an Extraordinarily difficult task is 19 or better – if you have the skill.

vs 5d6, 6d6

While the capacity to improve a character with experience by adding a modifier is clearly significant, the capacity to add another d6 or two is even more so – but not always in the way desired. That’s because 5d6 bunches the probably results even more closely toward the average (so fewer results are above the 5% line), and 6d6 is even more extreme. However, the increase in the maximum possible result more redeems the situation.

The graph below shows the results for all five target numbers:

Chances of achieving target or better on 4d6 (graphed), 5d6, and 6d6 (numeric percentages for comparison). Base Graph generated using AnyDice (http://anydice.com/). Click the image to visit the calculator.

With the standard 4d6 roll, there is almost a 10% chance of failure at an Easy task; with 5d6, that chance is less than 2%; and with 6d6, you would feel quite aggrieved at the world were you to fail such a check.

Looking at the other extreme, with a standard 4d6 roll, you have a slightly less than 10% chance at succeeding in an extraordinary task; with 5d6, that rises to almost 40%, and with 6d6, the chance is over 72%.

Spell Use

Spell use is kept within manageable limits by means of a simple energy points system – and the same points can be used by non-spellcasters for other special abilities. Most spells have an energy cost of about 15 points, while other abilities can be anywhere from 0 to 30 energy to use. Starting characters usually have something in the vicinity of 70 energy points to expend, and those are recovered after resting.

The Flaws

Morgalad is not without its flaws, I’m afraid.

The Writing

The syntax is often strained and the text that I saw, as a whole, needs a good editor. You can usually work out what is meant, but the absence of adequate punctuation is something you have to constantly struggle against. A typical example:

“Players are limited to 3 actions a standard action, a minor action, and a movement action.”

This is not the worst example I could have chosen, nor is it the best; it’s fairly typical. John knows what he is trying to communicate, and usually gets it across, but you have to decipher the text to understand it. If it were only occasional, this would probably be more forgivable, but it occurs at least once in almost every paragraph.

The Typography

My graphics design teacher once told our class, “there are more crimes committed with typography than could be accommodated in all the prisons in all the countries on earth.” I suspect she was exaggerating slightly, and employing a little hyperbole to boot, but the typography in Morgalad is appalling in places.

Some of the text is rendered in a quite legible font. Some is rendered in a fancy “handwritten” font that is also reasonably legible, but becomes visually tiring after a while, and achieves little beyond padding the page count. Chapter headings are in a singularly-inappropriate “Riverboat” font that should not be seen anywhere near a fantasy document, but at least it’s legible. Major headings are in two fonts – a fancy and totally-illegible drop capital and a fancy but more legible “handwritten” font for the rest of each word; Minor headings and some text are purely in the second font of those two. You can usually guess what the illegible letter is – a section labeled “[something]ombat” is clearly meant to read “Combat”. But it’s all totally unnecessary.

I would use the legible sans-serif font from the tables for virtually all the text, reserve the fancy “content” font for minor headings, the legible “fancy” font for the major headings and, in a larger size and greater weight (bolded), for the chapter headings. And be consistent about it. If you really want to use a hand-written font from time to time for the flavor, use the fancy “content” font in a size more visually similar to that of the plain text for the first line of each major section or each Chapter.

Repetition

A large section of the introduction simply repeats and rephrases material from the “How To Play” and is redundant. The language used is so strikingly similar that it is off-putting; I would move the introduction to precede “How To Play” and cut the second and third paragraphs from the introduction completely – more than half a page is wasted on redundant information. It would also be quite acceptable to simply mention the subject of those paragraphs in the introduction and then refer the reader to the “How to play” section.

The Terminology

The text is full of terms that have different meanings to the ones that I am used to. For example, “Cinematic” is used to describe “tactical” combat in which every blow and detail is individually resolved, instead of describing the most visceral combat structure. I could probably live with that, but there are a number of terms that seem different to standard for the sake of being different.

Dying?

It might be there somewhere, but I could not find where the rules tell players or GMs how characters get killed. Being reduced to zero Health leaves a character unconscious and incapacitated, not dead; the rules elsewhere specifically warn that characters can get killed, but there is no definition of how that happens.

Originality?

In a game system so strongly reminiscent of D&D 3.x / Pathfinder, I kept looking for the originality. There isn’t a lot of it on evidence, but what there is has been used quite cleverly. The level progression system is simple and straightforward; the combat mechanisms and spellcasting, ditto; and the alignment infraction system is both more sophisticated and simpler to administer than many others that I’ve seen. The use of 4d6 instead of a d20 has been cleverly used to good advantage, as shown by the graph above. And the way different weapon and armor materials have been applied to the mechanics is excellent.

The Success

Maybe it’s because I’ve been writing the series on Beginners lately, so it’s on my mind, but throughout my reading of the Morgalad Starter Book, I was continually struck by how similar it all was to a vastly simplified form of 3.x / Pathfinder – albeit one that uses different terminology for key concepts without changing the substance and basic principles overmuch.

The Morgalad Starter Book is the ideal vehicle for teaching new players, especially younger ones (ages 5+, perhaps?) how to play. It would also be a more than acceptable system for a novice GM to cut his teeth on. When ready for a more sophisticated approach, the full Morgalad Core Book would (I expect) provide a natural stepping-stone and progression path to the more complex systems. But I can’t help thinking that players and GMs making such a step forward would find themselves thinking that the bigger systems at least call a spade, a spade.

Convention games, in which the priority is a playable game over the full sophistication of a robust and complex rules system, would also be a very apt application of the Morgalad rules, making it easy for any player to drop into the game without hours spent studying the rules.

In many ways, the very “shortcomings” of the starter book can be an advantage. When dealing with children, even the absence of defining a “death level” becomes a benefit, making the game suitable for smaller children. All this book really needs is simpler typography and a half-decent editor to become something exceptional, an asset to the entire RPG community.

Value?

If it were priced appropriately for such purposes, I would recommend it – flaws and all – unreservedly. I would certainly keep a copy on hand for introducing family and friends to gaming for the first time. But the price is two-to-three times what I would expect to pay for a game that I expected to leave on a shelf (or a hard disc) against such a need; and that represents a caveat.

If you know that you are going to be introducing players who have never gamed before to the hobby, then it is still a worthy purchase, but if that is merely something that might happen in the future, it is probably priced out of the range of casual purchase. Similarly, if you know that you are going to GM a convention game targeted at novice players, it is a choice well worth considering – but if that’s not the case, the price is probably too high.

It is available in softcover for US $25 from Amazon in 8×11 page size or 6×9 page size and for US $9.95 from Amazon (6×9 Softcover) or DriveThruRPG as a PDF. However, the latter seemed also to be offering their “Pay What You Want” option; if that is really the case, then I would withdraw all reservations and recommend purchasing!

An Update

I offered the author, John McNabb, a preview of this review, and the opportunity to respond to my criticisms and comments.

He states that the high price on Amazon is the result of the product listing being made by the printing company that he used, and that he disagrees with it so much that he has created his own shopfront to sell copies directly at the lower price being charged on RPGNow.

I’ve updated the article above to link to both, so be careful which link you click on!

Johnn also tells me that many of the other issues I have identified are either in the process of being rectified, or have already been cleaned up relative to the version that I’ve seen, but I can only review what’s in front of me. I have no reason to doubt him, so the version you get might well be substantially improved over the review version discussed above – something to bear in mind!

The bottom line: The Morgalad Starter Book is well worth considering if you have need of it.

Frame: Freeimages.com/Billy Alexander;
Dice Image: Freeimages.com/Armin Mechanist;
Numeral & Compositing: Mike Bourke

I’ve been asked a number of times what advice I have for a beginning GM. This 15-part series is an attempt to answer that question – while throwing in some tips and reminders of the basics for more experienced GMs. This will probably be the last in the series for a little while, I don’t want to exhaust myself (or reader’s attentions) on the subject.

There’s always a danger when you write big, comprehensive articles like those that appear at Campaign Mastery that you will say all that there is to say on a subject, and I have to admit that I was concerned that I might have already said it all on the subject of Prep. After all, and setting aside articles on specific types of game prep, I’ve already given my best advice on the subject – and linked to the articles in question in the course of this series, to boot.

In a nutshell, that best advice would be:

• Know how much time you have available for prep;
• Know how much time each element to be prepped will require to achieve the minimum possible satisfactory standard;
• Know how to prioritize the elements that are most important for the next session of play;
• Know which prep will have a life beyond the immediate session of play, rewarding an investment of time in achieving a higher quality of result; and
• If necessary, plan and schedule prep sessions before the results will be needed.

Most of this advice is incorporated into two articles, as I said in the last post: the first is Fire Fighting, Systems Analysis, and RPG Problem Solving Part 2 of 3: Prioritization and the second is Game Prep and the +N to Game Longevity. Choice number one is simpler, and so easier for a Beginner to use, but makes no distinction in terms of quality of prep; choice number two is more useful because it does incorporate those different standards of prep. Try them both, choose the one that suits your best, and learn when each of the techniques is going to be most useful to you.

On top of that, this is a perennial favorite topic for RPG blogs, making it still harder to find new insights to offer. Nevertheless I’ve found that I do have a couple of insights to share. Some of this applies specifically to beginners, and represents practices that I explicitly don’t recommend for experienced GMs attempting to improve their games (unless they feel a need to go all the way back to the basics, which does occasionally happen). Other points will be equally applicable to everyone.

The intimidation of experience

It’s an inevitable fact: being a beginner GM means that you are inexperienced at being a GM. That inexperience can seem overwhelming in the face of greater expertise. There are two ways that experience can intimidate, so let’s get them out of the way up-front.

The intimidation of experience: Players

I’ve seen a number of potential GMs who lacked the confidence to even try getting behind the GM’s screen, simply because the potential players were all far more experienced than they were. Experienced players can take over your campaign if you let them, it’s true; but you will learn more in a single session, even if that happens, than you would in a year of playing with people closer to your own level of expertise.

But the intimidation of experienced players goes beyond even that concern; you might even question why experienced players would even be interested in playing a campaign being run by a novice GM. I have three answers to that:

• First, gaming is a social activity, which means that most players feel a certain level of responsibility to the activity and the society that has grown up around it; this is not only why GMs are almost always thrilled to introduce new players to the hobby, it is why they are enthusiastically in favor of giving a new GM their start. See my article, Bringing on the next generation, Part Two: Gamemaster Mentors.
• Second, you might be brilliant at it, and no GM worth his dice would pass up the chance to have fun gaming – whether they were behind the screen, or not; and
• Third, an awful lot of advances are achieved not by the experienced, who know all the reasons why something won’t work, but by the amateur who doesn’t know any better – and who then finds a way to make it work. GMs join other campaigns, especially those run by beginners, for the chance to discover something new that they can expropriate and add to their own toolkits.

And, of course, there’s the ego-boost of being able to show off your experience, which is just the cherry on top.

Seek out the most experienced players you can find, and offer them a one-off game (so that it doesn’t matter if it goes off the rails or you find yourself out of your depth, and learn. Soak up as much second-hand expertise as you can find. (If you do this, make sure to leave plenty of time for a session debriefing after the game, ask these experienced players what they would have done differently, and why, and what they found original or interesting about your game so that you can feature it more prominently in the future).

Don’t let yourself be intimidated by experienced players; treat them as a compliment and opportunity.

The intimidation of experience: GMs

But don’t expect to run before you can walk. I was mortified when one of my players once told me that he didn’t think he would ever be a GM because he didn’t think he could live up to the standard that I set behind the metaphoric GM’s Screen (as well as being greatly complimented); no beginner should ever expect to have to compete with someone who’s been investing time and effort into an activity for decades.

I’ve known five other GMs for about as long as I’ve been gaming; One spent long periods as a player, even though he was a published game author; one stepped away from gaming completely for a solid 20 or more years. We’re all pretty set in our ways, to the extent that we can read each other’s playbooks fairly well even before we sit at the table, we know each other’s strengths and weaknesses and styles. New ideas enter those playbooks from three sources: New game systems that emphasize something different to what we’ve mastered – a minor but regular source; New campaigns – if we’re open to letting them take on a life of their own, and simply learning from the experience, which happens less often than you might think; and new Players and GMs, that show us the old things from a new perspective.

Don’t try and compete with experienced GMs; learn from them! Enlist their help from time to time; ask them to join as a player; give one a difficult or complicated NPC to run as a “guest player” every now and then; even get one to co-GM. (My article, An Adventure Into Writing: The Co-GMing Difference spells out how the co-GM of the Adventurer’s Club campaign and I collaborate). Use the expertise of an experienced GM to enhance and supplement your originality.

Over-committing

A common mistake that results from the intimidation effect of experience is to try and make your campaign more complicated and richer than you are able to handle at your current levels of expertise and time. This is always a recipe for disaster; game prep requirements always grow, and grow far faster than improvements in skill and technique make room for more. At least initially, aim for a four-to-one ratio between play time and prep time, including time invested in creating the campaign. Don’t try and do it all in advance; leave things flexible and let them grow with your skills.

Find a child and play a game of “let’s pretend” – aside from the very basic initial premise, how much creation happens in advance, and how much on the spot? Zero and 100%, right?

More mature game-play requires a little more than that, but only a little. Avoid over-committing; no-one expects a first adventure to be on the scale of The Lord Of The Rings.

There are also advantages to choosing a genre that both interests you but in which you are NOT an expert. If your primary experience as a player is D&D, explore Pulp, or Sci-Fi, or Superheros, or whatever; the fact that you aren’t an expert means that you won’t be too entrapped by your past experiences as a player.

Your biggest and grandest concepts will always derive from the genre that you know best. This is a trap, because you will usually know just enough to get yourself trapped, bogged down in detail, and over-committed. Save your grand ideas, develop them in the background even while you are cutting your teeth on something else. This minimizes the intimidation effect.

If you feel you absolutely have to stay in-genre, look for a simpler set of rules than those of the game you usually play. That way, you won’t be as tempted to use your best material right away, before you are ready to execute it to the standard you want to achieve.

Starting with an RPG based on a TV show, novels, or a movie can also help by giving common frames of reference between players and GM.

Start with improbable media mash-ups and develop the resulting ideas until they are neither of the original sources. For example, what if the Stargate team emerged into the world of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, or the Charmed Ones teamed up with Sabrina in a Scooby-doo adventure? Make sense of the results and you’ll have something original and different.

Core Prep

Most of the advice that I’m offering today doesn’t actually derive from the best practices or practicalities of generating prep, it comes from the subsequent usage of that effort. Too often, it seems that game prep becomes viewed as this activity that is necessary in its own right, and while there is an element of truth in that, it sends the wrong message to the beginner.

Most prep is strictly unnecessary, performed either because it will (potentially) enhance the game experience, or yield dividends at some point in the future. The number of beginners I have encountered who thought that NPCs needed to be prepared to the same standards of completeness and game mechanics as a PC is astonishing. No, no, no, a thousand times no!

Characters need only to be built to the minimum standard possible, abbreviating and abstracting as much as possible. How is an NPC going to be required to interact with the game mechanics? Prep those aspects, and give them a personality, and move on!

Similarly, adventures and plotting – something that I’ll deal with in more detail in a later article in this series – all you Need to spend time on is the central, essential, core; anything beyond that is simply window dressing and polish. Is the game improved by doing so? Yes, if it actually manifests within the game in a favorable way; but the more you invest in an idea, the more you subconsciously push towards that idea manifesting, even if you have to force that path onto the players. This is the road to disaster, paved with the best of intentions!

At its core, all you need to know is:

• Who is participating in the plot;
• What is their personality;
• What they want to achieve;
• What is stopping them from achieving that goal;
• How they are going about removing or overcoming those obstacles; and,
• Where is it happening?

On top of that, and purely as a convenience during play,

• What key metrics and values will the character use to interact with the game mechanics?

If you are building a villain for a Hero System -based campaign, that means that you need to know what powers the bad guy has, not how much that power costs to buy according to the appropriate character construction mechanics, nor where they got the points to build it.

Here’s why this principle is important: time is a precious and very limited commodity, and there is always more prep that you can do. It follows that aside from the absolute essentials, you need to focus your expenditure of time on the areas that will yield the best rewards for your efforts; and those rewards are measured by the quality and entertainment value of what happens at the game table. The problem is that every GM is different; every Campaign run by that GM will be different; every adventure within that campaign will be different from all the others, and just a little different even from similar adventures that may have occurred in other campaigns by this GM. Even changing the players or PCs without altering a single word of the adventure will take it in a different direction. That, in turn, means that no-one else can tell you what is going to be needed for a particular game session, no matter how much experience they may have; and that poses a genuine problem for the beginner, who has not yet found his “voice” and style, and so doesn’t know, either.

Deciding what prep you need before you have the tools and experience to make that determination is not a case of chicken and egg; it’s a case of cart before horse. At best, you might make a lucky guess or two; at worst, you will unknowingly force yourself down an unproductive path of personal development as a GM, continuing through inertia and enthusiasm for a while until the whole thing grinds to a halt. I’ve known some quite promising GMs who have simply given up when they have hit rocky ground that was entirely self-inflicted.

Identify your core requirements; see to them, to a minimum acceptable standard; and learn from actual play what areas you can most profitably spend time enhancing.

Applying The Central Core

Your goal is to make sure that the adventure is as much fun as possible; to some extent, that means that characters have to be consistent in the pursuit of their goals, and that when players go off-script (as they inevitably will), you need to adapt your adventure to suit. Once you have the adventure Core, as spelt out above, use it as a guideline to assessing what happens in the game, and how you – and your NPCs – will respond.

It doesn’t matter whether your players take the high road or the low road from A to B; you simply need to ensure that each step along the way leads to a satisfactory resolution of the current plotline. If the next vital piece of that plotline is at C, that’s where the players ultimately need to go.

So, let’s say the players decide to go to “F” instead, for reasons that seem good to them. That might be a matter of deciding to investigate something that seems superficial or even irrelevant to you; it might be undertaking action against a side-issue that they feel is more important than you considered; it might be that they have swallowed whole a red herring that you expected them to see through; or it might simply be pursuing some goal of their own, ignoring the plot completely.

Or it might be that an idea occurs to you for something an NPC might do.

Whenever this happens, there are four possible responses for you to choose from.

The A answer: Yes

If the point is for the PCs to get an important piece of information, say “yes” if you can rewrite the adventure on-the-fly to let them earn/acquire that information from whatever they are trying to achieve. If the PCs are chasing moonbeams, put a signpost back toward the plot. If they don’t think whatever is going on is as important as it should seem, look for a way to make the plotline matter to them. If there is an opportunity for the villain to advance his plot by doing something, say yes to the opportunity presented.

It’s always important to remember what’s been established as fact within the campaign, and what is merely “potential fact” in your core notes. Be prepared to completely reinvent an NPC if you can see a way to do so that keeps the main adventure on-track and the established facts are not contradicted in a way that cannot be explained away.

Always let the players do whatever they want to do, and find a way to make that choice deliver the adventure to them (or vice-versa) in a completely natural way, as a consequence of their choices. Rewrite the adventure a little to achieve that result if you have to.

The B answer: No

If there is no way to connect the plot’s next stage to whatever the players have chosen to focus on, or if the opportunity doesn’t advance the villain’s plot, the answer will be no. That doesn’t mean saying “no” to the players, it means linking the adventure with some obstruction to them achieving their immediate goals – so that completing the adventure becomes a stepping-stone to the PCs succeeding.

In other words, never use a straight “no” to a player. Instead, use an implied “no” with a qualification: “No, but…” or “Not yet…” or “Not until…”

Oh, and never ignore the possibility of the villain making a mistake or a misstep. Consider: the villain has identified the PCs as a threat to his plans, and has some reason to suspect that they know what he’s up to (they are often a paranoid bunch). because in the plot set-up, they stumbled across part of his operation, and shut it down. Instead of pursuing that operation, they have chosen to head for a nearby city (the “F”) – in pursuit of their own goals, though the villain doesn’t know that. Instead, he suspects that they have identified some advantage against him that they can gain from there, even though he doesn’t know what it might be. He will then act accordingly: Sending agents to disrupt whatever the PCs are trying to do, sending other agents to simply try to stop the PCs, slowing activities that might be vulnerable to exposure as a result of assuming the worst, while hastening other preparations in case the plan has to be brought forward and implemented prematurely. A perfect plan has to be baked perfectly in order to succeed, just like a good meal; without realizing it, by ignoring the plot, the PCs have disrupted it slightly and earned the direct attentions of the villain, exactly as they might have done by pursuing the plot!

The C answer: Maybe

Choosing “yes” or “no” on purely deterministic grounds is all well and good, but what do you do when the right answer is “maybe”? If this occurs, tactical considerations and goals are no longer relevant to the GM deciding what happens as a result of the in-game development; instead, we’re in the province of personality. If the villain is the obsessive, driven, type, he will probably just go about his business. If he’s the vengeful type, he will risk disrupting his entire plan just to be sure the PCs don’t interfere again.

If there’s no obvious path from what the PCs are trying to do to the next part of the plotline, create one. For example, if the PCs are chasing a red herring, at least consider the possibility that the red herring is the real plot of the villain, and the two simply got mislabeled in your adventure planning – remember, if it’s only a “potential fact” than you can rewrite it completely as necessary, so long as you don’t conflict with an established fact in a way that you can’t explain away! Or perhaps the goal doesn’t need to change, just the means by which the villain is going to achieve it.

If that doesn’t work, due to such a contradiction, let the villain adopt a tactic of feeding the PCs enough rope, expanding on the red herring, and playing games with them at the expense of pursuing his goals – which will only make the players angrier at the NPC when they eventually discover the truth.

None Of The Above

And if none of the above gets your plot back on track, invent a new one and insert it. Perhaps the villain’s plans conflict with the plans of some new enemy (that you are inventing purely to advance the plot) – and that second villain plans (whatever they are) are going to be thwarted by whatever the PCs are doing. “The enemy of my enemy” then comes into play – with the original villain discovering the existence of the second through the PCs actions, and perhaps even trying to manipulate them into dealing with the unforeseen problem.

In the past, I’ve even had a Villain become a hero of a plot, and a hero become the real villain of the plot, because the PCs backed the wrong horse or skewed off in some strange direction. No-one ever expects the Spanish Inquis – err, the Spanish Pimpernel!

The Index Snippet

When you synopsize a story, you do so by extracting selected snippets. These key excerpts “index” the story. I use this process in reverse to write (refer One word at a time: How I (usually) write a Blog Post, but you can also use the concept in other ways to benefit your game.

• Every adventure should have an iconic moment that encapsulates and brings to mind that entire adventure.
• Every game session should have an iconic moment that encapsulates and reminds of events.
• Every adventure should also start with some memorable moment relatively early on.

Investing extra time and effort in these “moments” has cumulative, sometimes intangible (but nevertheless very real) benefits for the overall adventure and for the campaign as a whole. Sometimes, though, the real key moment will come as a surprise.

In a Zenith-3 adventure from a year or two back, the “iconic moment early on” came as the PCs were going through a list of stolen property – wealth and collectibles in various forms – and one of them discovered the following on the list (transcribed from table form into narrative): “Stolen in 2029, police report 2029598407, from Mrs Adela Evangelina Love, property valued at £44.5, one hand-puppet: the original “Kermit The Frog” manufactured by Jim Henson for the Children’s Television Workshop.” This so outraged one of the players that to recapture the moment, I simply had to mention the theft and the player’s motivation to solve the crimes was instantly renewed. There were many items of greater value on the list, but it was that personal reaction that became a capstone to the entire adventure.

To show the power of them, here are a few iconic moments that should be immediately recognizable:

• “Darth Vader. Only you would be so bold!”
• “Vader betrayed and murdered your father.”
• “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for…”
• “We’d like to avoid any… Imperial entanglements.”
• “That’s no moon, that’s a space station!”
• “No reward is worth this!”
• “Use The Force, Luke!”
• “You’re all clear, kid – now let’s blow this thing and go home!”

I would lay odds that each of these snippets of dialogue brought a key scene from Star Wars to mind – and between them, they synopsize just about the entire movie. They were so memorable to me that I was able to create the list from memory (hopefully without errors) – which is, of course, the point that I’m making.

Movie trailers use this technique all the time, to sell audiences on the idea of seeing the film. To maintain suspense, you might leave off the last two, but you get the idea.

The writing process that I use generates these all the time. I look for them, and spend a little extra time enhancing, and (where possible) illustrating them. This helps cement them in place – so that showing the image while relating the synopsis of past events helps recapture them in the mind of the players.

Because of the compounding effect on immersion, look-and-feel, and verisimilitude, these amply repay a little additional effort.

Let The Prep Take Care Of Itself

Aside from these few items, I would advise beginners to let the prep take care of itself, at least initially. That isn’t to say, do no prep beyond the minimum – but don’t obsess about it.

There will always be prep that you consider necessary for any given adventure, whether its a map or a diagram or whatever. Learn what gives you the most bang for your prep time “buck”, and don’t try to do it all; it can be an advantage to be under-prepared, encouraging flexibility and experimentation.

So long as you have a broad outline of the adventure and the Core taken care of, everything else is window-dressing – nice to have, but not essential. If there’s one tendency that almost all beginners have in common, it’s being too invested in creating prep, considering too many things to be essential that really aren’t. Develop your improv skills and articulation and the other fundamentals of delivery first, or when you find yourself caught short by real life with your normal prep unfinished, you will be at a loss.

I also strongly recommend leaving some prep time in reserve – you never know when you’ll need it!

Find Your Campaign’s Own Style

As you develop your own style as a GM, you will discover strengths and weaknesses. Use prep to compensate for the weaknesses and to enhance the strengths. Keep track of the time it takes for each type of prep and each item of prep, be it a prop, a handout, a detail, a passage of canned dialogue, or whatever. Pay attention to what your players respond to – and to what prep lies unused at the end of each day’s play.

Over time, a campaign develops its own playing structure, the equivalent of the format of a TV show. Teaser or not? Cliffhangers or not? Tight continuity or a more episodic approach? Synopses at the beginning, or reminders as they become necessary? Quick cuts between scenes or a more natural progression?

Support these with the use of prep to enhance. Prep is never as important as play, and beyond a certain minimum, never as important as GMs think it is. That changes with time, as the complexity of the campaigns that you run grows; but unless you over-commit, running a campaign should never take over your life.

With three parts now under my belt, it’s now time to take a break from this series. While I feel like I’m just hitting my stride (Part 3 took half the time that each of the first two needed to write), and I therefore expect no real trouble in writing parts 4, 5, and 6, I’m concerned by the possibility of getting up to, say, Part 9, and running out of steam – with half the series still to write.

Fifteen parts is a LONG series!

Next week, then, expect to find something completely different! But fear not, if you’ve been enjoying this series so far; it will return. Parts 4, 5, and 6 are already scheduled – and while I might tinker with that schedule, any change will only serve to bring them forward in time.

Those used to the regularity of my usual publication schedule, or to whom I promised that this post would appear at a certain time, may have noticed that it is a little late in going public. I regret this, which is the result of internet connectivity circumstances beyond my control.

Image courtesy of Freeimages.com/Pontus Edenberg

I originally intended to present the Tavern Generator that I promised on Monday as today’s post, but it will take longer than I initially thought. Probably one more day of designing the tables and two days to format them – largely because what I am offering is far more robust and advanced than the basic version outlined in the Beginner’s series. With any luck, it will be finished next week! But in the meantime, I needed a quick fill-in article to plug the gap…

When the time came to post it, I realized that it deserved to be the first part of an occasional series analyzing conflicting points of view at the gaming table from the perspective of actual “battlefield” experience. I have no idea at the moment when there will be another, but the time will come…

I have to admit that of all the 3.x rules constructs, the Initiative system was the hardest to get my head around, for two reasons: first, the player who is best at building efficient and effective PCs seemed to focus on achieving a high Initiative Score, making the value seem more important than it was; and secondly because my thinking was contaminated by considerations of real time.

Distributions Of Time?

Rather than making an Initiative total an abstract measure that signified nothing more than who went first, I tried to synchronize them with distinct in-game passages of time, so that a character with half the initiative score of another took his action half-way through the latter’s action round, and was half-way through his action when the character with that higher initiative total took his next action.

This gave a character with a substantially different initiative score an opportunity to see what the first character was doing and act to block or counter them – something that was especially important in terms of giving one character the chance to counter a spell being cast by another.

Furthermore, the concept lent itself to the distribution throughout a character’s round of multiple attacks – in other words, if you had two attacks, the second took place half-way through that character’s combat round. It also means that character movement did not have to happen instantaneously, but took a measurable real-time interval to get the character where he was going.

On the face of it, an interpretation with far greater verisimilitude – or, perhaps, the interpretation which placed the least strain on my suspension of disbelief, because that was the issue – no alternative interpretation seemed credible to me.

The diagram above illustrates my thinking. It depicts 3 characters – one with 3 attacks, one with 2 attacks, and one with a single attack, with Initiative Totals of 20, 18, and 15, respectively.

If Character #1 had a movement rate of 60′, movement of more than 1/3 this, or 20′, would mean that he was not in position to attack with his first attack, so he would only get 2 attacks in that round. Character #2 doesn’t try and pack as much into his combat round; he could easily move that 20′ and still get both attacks in, so long as he had a movement rate better than 40′.

Assuming that Character #3 is a spell caster, and cast a spell on Initiative Count 15, any spells with a casting time of Instantaneous would go off before the first event in Initiative Count 14 but after the last event in Initiative Count 15; any spells with a casting time of 1 round would go off as the last event in the next round’s Initiative Count 16, leaving him free to do something else in his next combat round. If he consumed 1/2 his movement getting into position to cast the spell, he would actually get to cast it on initiative count 15-(1/2 of 20)=5; an instant spell would go off prior to Initiative count 4, a full-round spell would activate just prior to initiative 15 next round, as usual.

Anyone who wanted to attempt to prevent the successful casting of a 1-round spell would have a whole round in which to do so, either by attacking the caster or casting an appropriate counter-spell; if you wanted to counter an instantaneous spell, you either had to be in striking position and with the appropriate Initiative Total to do so, or to have specified that you were waiting for someone to begin casting a spell (effectively changing your Initiative Total).

Maximum realism, minimal complication. And it very closely reflects the rules and explanations given within the 3.x rulebooks. The player I mentioned earlier hated it, and wouldn’t or couldn’t explain why.

The Practicalities: How It Works

The highest initiative total defines both the starting point of the Initiative Count each combat round and the number of slices the combat round is broken into. In the example given, it was 20, but it could just has easily have been 26, or 32, or 41 or whatever. Half a combat round is half of this value, rounded off, 1/4 is 1/4 of the value, rounded off, and so on. Lower initiative totals change the starting point of a character’s combat round, but not the length of the round.

Half a character’s full round movement takes half a combat round.

If a character gets multiple attacks, they are spread as evenly as possible throughout his combat round. 3 attacks means that the 2nd attack takes place 1/3 of a combat round after the first, and the 3rd, 2/3 of the way through his combat round.

The Hero System Connection

It’s ironic, given that I later adapted the 3.x initiative game mechanics to the Hero System, replacing the subdivided turn with multiple actions per turn that those rules have, but a lot of my thinking on the subject was clearly influenced by the Hero System, which I had been GMing (in one incarnation or another) for nigh-on 20 years at the time.

It uses combat Turns instead of Combat Rounds as its foundation, and defines these as a standard 12 seconds long. Characters get as many combat rounds as their Speed stat within those 12 seconds, spaced as evenly as possible. In each combat round, a character gets his movement and gets to attack, to use a power, or whatever.

In the standard Hero System mechanics, you get a situation in which everyone acts on Segment 12, with the consequence that this segment frequently took as long as the rest of the turn put together; one of the first house rules that I instituted in version 2.0 of my campaign House Rules distributed the actions more evenly, eliminating this bottleneck. If you only had a Speed of 1, you got your action on Segment 7, for example.

The similarities between the approach to the two different systems should be obvious.

Why did Initiative matter?

So, what’s the real value of a high initiative score? From a position midway through a combat, it makes no difference whatsoever, because the initiative count rolls through the characters one after another in the sequence in which they get to act and then restarts; the difference between one combat round and another is purely a matter of labeling. Nor does it help you if your character is surprised, because you are then caught flat-footed and don’t get to act in the surprise round, anyway.

It took me a long time to work out why this particular player obsessed so much over a high initiative total, and why he disliked my interpretation of the combat mechanics so much.

The answer lies in those occasions when the character is not surprised; a high initiative score lets the character act first, and if all three of his attacks take place instantaneously, he has the best possible choice of both taking one or more enemies out of action before they even get to act, and of taking tactical control of the battle. Furthermore, as the character rose in levels, not only did his increased combat effectiveness make this a more likely outcome from a first strike, but it became harder to take the character by surprise, enabling the resulting advantage to come into play more frequently.

What he wanted was a rules interpretation that supported his entire round’s actions taking place on the one initiative count (or on his fraction of it should someone else match his initiative total), and anything else was detracting from the design philosophy that he had employed in creating his character. This less-realistic interpretation is, furthermore, implied by the rules as written.

Adapting

Once the light had dawned, I was able to “get lazy” (because his interpretation was less work to GM), accept his desired interpretation, and design my encounters accordingly – either configured to withstand his massive first-strike capability, or with targets present to do nothing but soak it up before the real threat showed itself. Placing mages out of his reach, or invisible foes that he could not target, for example.

It’s not even clear that he gained all that big an advantage, even without these tactics. Spell use becomes much harder to counter under his preferred interpretation, and by ruling that spell-like abilities etc worked the same way as spells in terms of combat mechanics, I was able to take advantage of this fact on a number of occasions.

With these tactics, I was able to let him have his fun without his high Initiative score totally overwhelming the game, and that’s the important point to be made. I still disagree with his interpretation, but purity of game concept is, and should always be, compromised if that’s what it takes to make the game fun.

Frame: Freeimages.com/Billy Alexander;
Dice Image: Freeimages.com/Armin Mechanist;
Numeral & Compositing: Mike Bourke

I’ve been asked on more than one occasion what advice I would have for a beginning GM. It’s a question that troubled me; I’ve been GMing for so long that I thought I might have lost contact with the beginner. I have also resisted the topic because Campaign Mastery is more targeted at experienced GMs. It was only when something reminded me that the basics and fundamentals never go out of fashion that I found the touchstone to both problems. This 15-part series (which won’t run as a continuous block of articles) is the result.

Creativity

I was once told by a veteran player, of more than ten years experience of weekly play, that he wasn’t creative enough to be a GM. I thought this a load of nonsense – anyone with enough imagination to roleplay has sufficient creativity to be a GM – and dug deeper. As it turned out, he wasn’t so much doubting his creativity as he was his ability to think quickly enough to be creative whenever things departed from a prepared script.

There are therefore three separate issues that were holding this player back: Ability to improvise, creative speed, and a lack of self-confidence resulting from awareness of the first two problems.

You Don’t Have To Be Creative (but it helps)

He wasn’t alone. Based on my experience, if you were to poll a bunch of GMs, you would find that more suffer from overconfidence than self-doubt (at least from time-to-time), but that an almost equal number suffered from weak self-confidence, a conviction that what they were doing was adequate for a bunch of friends but nothing that would stand up to independent outside scrutiny.

You see the same thing in all sorts of creative endeavor; everyone from writers to artists to musicians. So let me clue you all in on a little secret (read it in a whisper): creativity is overrated as a necessity for being a GM.

It may be more important when it comes to being a great GM, but not everyone needs to aim so high – and even there, I’m not fully convinced. Your job is not to be inventive, or creative, or original, though those are all assets; your job as GM is to facilitate entertainment. Heck, you don’t even need to be entertaining, so long as your time behind the screen enables others to be entertained by what they are doing.

There’s one GM that I know who has been behind the screen for longer than I have (and I started back in 1981) who, to the best of my knowledge, has not run anything but canned modules for that entire time period. His campaign still gets players. I’m not one of them for other reasons of GM style, but that doesn’t invalidate what he does.

In the meantime, if you can’t make it, fake it. Let’s look at how:

Faking Creativity

There are all sorts of ways to fake being creative, or to make yourself sufficiently creative to get by. I’ve broken creativity down into eight categories – there’s a lot not covered, but these eight are the essentials, and in this section I’m going to show you how to cheat at being creative in each of them. I’m not going to go into exhaustive detail in some cases because they will be dealt with in greater detail in a subsequent part of this series.

1. Monsters

There’s an easy way to fake monsters – get them from a different sourcebook. If it matches your game system, so much the better. There are parts of Fumanor where magic ran wild, and a substantial number of encounters are drawn from Creature Collection I and II, published by Swords & Sorcery Studios. There are parts of the game world where things are just different, and over half the encounters are drawn from Monster Manuals II-V instead of the Core Rules Monster Manual.

Beyond this simple remedy, there’s something called “Re-skinning” where you take an existing creature’s stats and clothe it in a new description to suit a new environment, and maybe swap one or two of its abilities for something that is more appropriate. For example, Golden Lizard-skinned people from the Tuorn Desert might be Goblins with different skin color and something about them that’s been changed – maybe they’ve got Troll Regeneration or they burrow underground or something.

If that’s too far for you to go, try your hand at Mashups. Pick one creature and extract it’s description, and then pick another creature and extract its abilities and stats, and then get rid of any contradictions. An Example from the Pathfinder Bestiary: A Medusa is a “slender, attractive woman” with “strangely glowing eyes” and “a full head of hissing snakes for hair”. A Night Hag is ugly (implied by the name), has Damage Reduction, is immune to various spells, has Darkvision, has an array of spell-like abilities including Invisibility, Magic Missile, and Ray Of Enfeeblement, has a bite that causes the disease “Demon Fever”, and can haunt the dreams of chaotic or evil individuals. So why not a “Moon Medusa” who is pale yellow in color but otherwise matches the description given above, and who has all the abilities of the Night Hag – except maybe that it’s not her bite that causes “Demon Fever”, it’s a bite from one of the Snakes. That implies that the snakes can attack independently, so look up Snake, Venomous, and add a dozen of them to the package – maybe losing the Magic Missile for the sake of Game Balance. You then give this creature an environment to inhabit and amend the description to suit: “Moon Medusas” appear to be completely normal (and rather attractive) humans during the day, with their true form only being revealed at night. They spend their days appearing to be ordinary citizens or travelers amongst a population, and selecting a male to prey upon at night. The snakebites cause temporary paralysis as well as “Demon Fever”, enabling the Moon Medusa to feast on the victim; this feasting mimics the effects of a Ray Of Enfeeblement. By the time the victim recovers, the Moon Medusa has feasted and moved on, possibly taking his money as well. Moon Medusas are rare, and are usually encountered either in an urban environment or in transit between such environments.

There’s one completely original beastie, with minimal creativity involved – but you’d never know it from the result.

2. Maps

Draw a blob on a piece of paper. Draw a more-or-less straight line through the blob leading to the other end of the paper. Somewhere on that line, put a dot. Crossing the first line at the dot is a more crooked line (no sharp corners). Congratulations! You’ve just made a perfectly serviceable map. You have a forest, or a swamp, or a mountainous region; you have a road going through it; you have a town on that road; and you have a river crossing the road at the town.

Anything more than this level of complexity in a map is merely a “nice to have”, not essential to a game. But if this is still beyond you, there’s an even simpler solution: steal a map from somewhere else. A canned module. A module from a different game system. A map that you bought on RPGnow. A screen grab from Google Maps. A map that you’ve found through a Google image search.

Maps are no problem.

3. Places

Locations need to be a little more detailed. Reinvent real buildings for your layouts if you don’t feel confident in creating one from scratch. For example: This building is about 60′ x 40′. The doorway is in one corner. 2/3rds of the way down the building from the door is a counter. Behind the counter is a kitchen and storage area. Between the door and the counter are several windows, and a large number of small tables and chairs. Immediately in front of the counter is an open area railed off from the tables, but the rail does not extend the entire width of the room.

This could be a bar or tavern. It’s actually the Kentucky Fried Chicken near my place.

Once you have one location of this type, all you need to do is add or change one detail to get a different one. Instead of windows, there are shields, or weapons, or stuffed heads on the walls. On one side there is a set of stairs going up to lodgings. Instead of a lot of little tables there are two or three large communal ones. To one side there is a dartboard, or an alcove for the playing of Horseshoes, or a poker table, or a stage with a musician, or a comic. Change the look of the timber – reddish stained wood, or purplish, or dark-stained wood, or pale stained wood, or gray wood, or raw dark wood or brown wood or pinewood; planks or halved trees or whole trees or panels or seamless wood; visible grain or invisible or painted in any of a whole spectrum of colors; grain swirling, or vertical, or horizontal, or inclined.

Use a “critical element” checklist – vary each item on the list and you have a whole new location: “Walls, Lighting, Tables, Decorations, Barman, Entertainment, Clientèle, Accommodations” would be my checklist for a basic tavern. I might also add “Behind-the-Bar”. “Accommodations” covers where the rooms are, how big they are, and how you get to them. Eight or nine variables – even if there were only two options for each, that gives 512 combinations, but several of those variables have many many more options than a mere two – so the number of options is many many thousands, maybe even many tens or hundreds of thousands. How many different taverns will you need in the course of a campaign? Fifty, one hundred? A minuscule fraction of the varieties on offer, no creativity required.

You could even create a set of tables – I’ll offer such a set in the next week or two (I’ve already started working on it).

Again, there are alternatives. Instead of a map, search for an illustration. Look on RPGNow for a map that you can use. Get a map from a canned module. Look for blogs and websites that offer free maps for RPGs.

There are two essential skills to master, though you can work on both as you go:

• Using Google Image Search; and
• Adapting Period details to Game Climate.

Google Image Search

I started to write up a section on how to use Google Image Search but it quickly became clear that this one section would be as large as the rest of this article put together – not that it’s very complicated, there’s just a lot to say on the subject. In fact, it threatened to derail any prospect of getting the article done on time. I’ve solved both problems at the same time by excerpting the entire discussion into a separate article, also to be published in the next week or two.

Adapting Period details to Game Climate

So you’ve found an image using Google (or some other source) that you like the basic feeling of, but it has a rifle on the wall, and photos of WW2, and electric lighting. This is the skill of taking those details that belong to a different time-period to the one of your game, and replacing them with some equivalent from your game’s era without damaging the overall ambiance that appealed in the first place.

There are two aspects to doing this; the first lies in knowing what to change so that what you don’t want to change remains unaffected, and the second lies in taking into account other aspects of the description that do change as a result, and you need to be able to do both in order to be successful.

There’s a simple creative writing exercise that develops this skill. It only takes a few minutes a day, so if you aren’t sure this element of your toolkit is up to standard, it’s worthwhile.

Get an image from somewhere. A building interior with people doing something mundane and ordinary in it is the best choice. You’ll be working with this image for most of the next week, so save a copy of it.

• Day 1: Write a description of the image, exactly as you see it.
• Day 2: Imagine what the same image would have looked like if it were set in the 1950s, or 1960s, or even the 1970s, changing the details without changing the overall “feeling” that the image conveys, i,e, the emotional context and associations. Now, without referring to the text you wrote on Day 1, write a description of that scene. When you’ve finished, compare the two descriptions, making mental note of what’s different and what is essentially the same in both.
• Day 3: Imagine what the same image would have looked like if it were set in any time period from the late 1800s through to World War II, your choice, again changing specifics that don’t fit the time period without altering the overall “feeling” that the image conveys, i,e, the emotional context and associations. Now, without referring to the text you have previously written, write a description of that scene. When you’ve finished, compare with the Day 1 description, making mental note of what’s different and what is essentially the same in both.
• Day 4: Imagine what the same image would have looked like if it were set in a fantasy (i.e. pseudo-medieval) setting and write a description, in the same way as on previous days. Compare with the Day 2 description, just for a change.
• Day 5: Imagine the same image set in some distant future. It could be in a Star Trek universe, or a Star Wars setting, or the sort of future that was imagined in the 1930s-40s-50s, whatever you like; it could be 50 years from now or 500 years from now. Write a description, same conditions as previously. You can keep it simple, or throw in a zero-gravity environment, as you want. Compare with the Day 4 description.
• Day 6 (optional): Imagine that the image is a painting and not a photograph. How might different art styles/materials – water colors, oil painting, tapestry, charcoal sketch – alter the way the image is presented? How can you retain the ambiance while changing the overall look of the scene so profoundly? Don’t bother writing anything, just spend the time imagining it in different ways.
• Day 7: Compare all five written versions. What’s consistent over them all? What’s different? How have the differences changed the overall scene? What could you have done better on Days 1 or 2 that you know how to do on Day 5?
• Day 8: Pick a new image and start over.

Two or three weeks of this – no more than 5 or 10 minutes a day – and you’ll be astonished at how quickly you build up those mental “muscles”. Then destroy all your written drafts – never let anyone see these baby steps!

There is only so far you can go without an independent assessment, so don’t keep this up indefinitely. Nor is it necessary for you to seek creative writing reviews or classes; your goal isn’t to become a novelist or poet, it’s simply to get good enough to convey a scene or setting to the players in words. Efficiency, economy, concision, and poetic nuance – these are all things that will either come of their own accord with experience or they won’t. Good enough is good enough, and your players will make it clear when your descriptions are vague or unclear simply through the questions they ask, the clarifications that they request, and the misinterpretations that they make, so they will provide sufficient review and feedback as a byproduct of the process of GMing.

4. Adventures

Faking adventures is easy to do and hard to do well. I’m not going to go into detail about how to do so, for two reasons: First, there’s an entire article within this series to be dedicated to the subject of advice on adventures for Beginner GMs, and Second, I’ve already written articles on the subject – and linked to them in part 1 of this series. So it’s already been covered.

5. NPCs

It’s the same story here. Quick-And-Dirty NPCs are so valuable to a GM, of any experience level, that I’ve offered several techniques in the past for creating them, and linked to those articles in part 1. So, while I have some advice for beginning GMs to offer on the subject of NPCs, I’ll save that for the dedicated chapter on the subject.

6. Dialogue, & 7. Expression

Dialogue is what an NPC says, Expression is how they say it – content and style, in other words. Dialogue itself can be divided into three subtypes or Modes: casual conversation, info-dumps, and statements for effect. While an NPC will have an overall style, that style may be modified slightly depending on which dialogue mode the NPC is engaged in.

Training

The first piece of advice that I would give beginner GMs is to wrap their head around this principle thoroughly, then watch TV and note how different characters will change their “verbal expression” depending on the mode they are in. TV is a better choice than a movie because you see many different programs and characters in a relatively short time. Avoid documentary, news, and reality TV for this; stick with dramas and sitcoms. An evening or two of watching and analyzing what you see on-screen will thoroughly ground you in the theory and application of the principle.

Next, it’s time to learn how to use this theory to your advantage. This requires you to watch TV shows that you know reasonably well. Before you do, make a note of one or two major characters in each show that you are going to watch and describe their personality in a nutshell. Then summarize their general manner of expression in a word or two, and note the relationship between the character and the overall style of Expression. You can then watch the TV shows and note how the general style of expression impacts on the different Modes of the character’s dialogue, and how each Mode derives from that overall personality. Again, an evening or two’s TV watching – with the right preparation – is enough of a foundation.

Application

When you create an NPC (as opposed to using an ad-hoc NPC), in addition to specifying the personality, think about how that personality and background will give a particular general style of expression, and then how you are going to refine that into the three modes. Write it down, both in your character notes and in the adventure. Highlight it. Then make sure that you check it each time the NPC appears.

It’s important that you choose a style of expression that you can deliver. Change the NPC if necessary. If you have any doubt, practice by watching your favorite TV shows, once again, and substituting your character for the character on-screen; work out how he would say each line of dialogue, then say that dialogue out loud (it’s probably best to do this when you’re alone, or everyone else will both think you’re being strange and will get annoyed for disrupting their ability to watch the show). Using a DVD that you can pause after each line of dialogue can also be very useful.

Focus not on what they are saying but on how they are saying it. Once you have that down pat, you can work on changing the content to what you want the NPC to say.

Overact. Outrageously.

Actors have body language and camera angles and lighting and sets to interact with. Writers get to add as much descriptive text as they want in between verbal statements. You’re in what is effectively a radio play or a “naked” (without props or costumes) stage drama – you have to do 95% of it, or more, with nothing but your voice. And you often have to do it in a noisy environment, or while being disrupted by game admin, dropping in and out of character at the drop of a die.

At the same time, use your hands and body language as much as you can; it’s astonishing how much of a difference it makes to your vocal performance.

Improv NPCs

When you have an NPC that you haven’t built in advance. identify the NPC with someone that you’ve practiced on from a TV show. Don’t worry too much about racial or gender or profile stereotypes; think about character and personality. If Adam from Mythbusters is right for the Captain of the Guard, if Wolverine conveys the sense of danger that you want for a bartender, or Abby from NCIS has the frenetic energy that you want in a shopkeeper, use them.

Here’s another exercise for you to try: For a week, watch as many different TV shows as you can. Don’t watch more than one episode of any given show – switch from COPS to Bones to The Simpsons to The Blacklist to whatever – and just mentally catalog as many different characters as you can. You aren’t watching these shows for fun, this is research. Make the assumption that you already know most of the characters in your favorite shows, so ignore them and watch things that you normally wouldn’t and just stock up on characters.

8. Description

You have to describe all sorts of things when you’re a GM. Strange Objects, Haunted Longboats, Funeral Pyres, Throne Rooms, Exotic Books, Weird Creatures, Frenetic Action, Faces, Mountains, Tunnels…. the list is endless.

Some of these you can prep in advance, and only think about improvising when you have enough GMing experience under your belt. You can practice simply by reading descriptions from your core rules to yourself – while thinking about why the things you’re reading have been described that way.

But there are some things that you can’t prep in advance and will have to describe from day one, whether you like it or not: Outcomes, responses, and reactions to player (and independent NPC) actions.

When a character attempts a skill check, you have to describe the outcome (including attempting to hit an enemy in combat). When events – or random chance – provide an unexpected opportunity or setback, the emotions of the NPCs affected have to be described. And when those not under the control of the NPC act, you need to describe how the NPC responds and reacts.

The first of these is qualitatively different to the other two; while these all have simple solutions, those solutions are not always easy to implement on the run.

Outcomes

In theory, it’s simple – you visualize the situation prior to the action, visualize the changed situation as a result of the skill check, and then determine what might account for the differences in in-game terms – then describe what you are imagining.

If only it were always as easy as that makes it sound, but complex situations can be difficult to see in your imagination. There are three tools that I use to get me through such problems, and these are all tools that the beginner can use as readily as an experienced GM. (NB: these presume that you have already determined whether or not the outcome is a success or failure).

1. use the die roll as an index for the difficulty faced in achieving whatever the outcome is, regardless of the eventual success or failure of the check;
2. imagine positive or negative intermediate stages en route to the success until you come up with a combination that you feel reflects that index of difficulty;
3. construct your visualization starting with the character acting and enlarge your view of the overall changed situation one variable at a time.

The first means that if the character rolls a “15” (in a system in which low is better), then regardless of the eventual success or failure of the check being carried out, any success will be achieved despite things going wrong in a fairly bad way. Not as bad as if the character rolled a “17”, but pretty close to it. The second means that the events that you describe have to reflect those difficulties, so I think about what might go wrong without altering the actual result of the die roll, and keep coming up with more until I find one that fits. Quite often, it will be possible to go directly to something appropriate, but occasionally you may have to think about it for a few seconds, and with practice and experience this will occur more and more frequently. If necessary, take a five-minute break, telling the players that you need time to think about the way the situation will play out. It’s better to GM slowly than badly!

The third one means that in a complicated situation where a lot hinges on the outcome, determine one effect at a time – taking notes if necessary – and then think about the next consequence of the outcome, and then the next, and so on.

For example, consider a bar in the wild west, and an accusation of cheating at poker that has everyone leaping to their feet and pulling out their guns. The first person to react rolls to hit – and misses, badly. Unknown to this person, a third party suffering from shell shock is also playing cards at a neighboring table, and a fourth is about to throw a dart, and a heavy (the fifth party) is menacing the barman, and there’s a whole bunch of drunken onlookers ready to blow off steam. So, when the attacker misses quite badly, what happens?

• Primary effect (explaining the failure): when the person being shot at leapt to his feet and drew his weapon, he also knocked the card table over, disturbing the aim of the shooter, whose bullet goes wild.
• Second domino: the shell-shock victim leaps up from the table, screaming.
• Third domino: the dart thrower is distracted by the sound of the shot and his dart flies wildly, hitting the bar right next to the heavy, who’s distracted by it for a moment.
• Fourth domino: the bartender jerks in surprise, involuntarily throwing the shot-glass of whiskey he was about to try to use to mollify the heavy into the heavy’s eyes, momentarily blinding him.
• Fifth domino: a member of the crowd grabs a chair and breaks it over the back of the screaming shell-shock sufferer.
• Sixth domino: another member of the crowd breaks a bottle over the head of the intended victim of the original shot.
• Seventh domino: half the rest of the crowd dive for cover, the other half grab improvised weapons or throw punches at whoever’s next to them.
• Eighth domino: the bullet from the missed shot ricochets off something – a stone fireplace, perhaps? – and severs the rope holding the chandelier overhead, which comes crashing down into the middle of the room.

By breaking the scene down into smaller elements, and determining how each in turn will be affected by everything that’s happened as a result of the original action, the complicated situation in the bar advances a round. The next person to act might be the heavy, or might be the intended victim of the shot, or it might be the sheriff hearing the fracas as he walks to the saloon doors, or it might be the bartender; it doesn’t matter who it is, you determine what they are doing, determine the success or failure of the move, then work through the list of people present dealing with the consequences.

Responses and Reactions

The one technique works for both of these – getting into the head of the NPC who is to respond or react. But, like the Outcomes technique, that can sometimes be easier said than done.

To help me through such problems, I use a checklist – any one of which can either determine the way the NPC behaves or can pass the question on to the next item on the list.

• Does the character have a prepared or planned action that is appropriate? He will attempt to carry it out.
• Does the character have an instinctive reaction that is appropriate? He will attempt to carry it out.
• Does the character have a trained reaction that is triggered? He will attempt to perform it.
• Is the character primed to react by an extreme emotional state? He will do so, or attempt to do so.
• Is the character shocked, stunned, or surprised AND not a quick thinker? He will gape or otherwise display this emotional reaction.
• Is there a way for the character to (attempt to) take advantage of the situation? He will attempt to do so unless there is a compelling reason not to.
• Is the character facing potential imminent harm, and if so, what is the best move he can make to protect himself? He will attempt to perform it.
• Does the character have anything that he wanted to do? He will attempt to do so unless there is a compelling reason not to.
• The character will continue to do whatever he was doing before the triggering event, or will hesitate.

Again, by breaking the question down into smaller, more specific, possible responses/reactions and considering them one by one, in the sequence “Prepped – Instinct – Training – Emotion – Self-preservation – Surprise – Intelligent response”, you can quickly decide what the reaction is – then all you need do is work out how to describe that reaction.

Note that in some cases, it is plausible for training to come before instinct, and that training can include non-professional life experience – a character who was bullied at school might react in the same way as he did back then, if it worked, a character who was a bully might react violently, and so on. These can be considered conditioned responses as much as military, police, or other emergency training.

Creation Guidelines

Transitioning from player to GM for the first time involves a major mental shift, and one of the first places that needs to manifest is when you are creating things for your campaign. There is an overwhelming temptation to put in place everything you ever wanted as a player. Fight that temptation with all your strength of will.

There is also a temptation to be even more hard-line than past GMs that you’ve played under “because they must have known what they were doing” and because they were the ones you’ve learned from. Don’t do that, either.

If there was ever anything in a game you played in that you, or another player, wanted something but the GM denied the request, study that decision and understand why it was made. Only then can you decide whether or not it was the correct decision, and let that be your guide. And don’t rule out the possibility that the decision was an error.

GMing is a tightrope between keeping players happy and keeping the game world in one piece so that they can be happy again, tomorrow (or smashing it into a million pieces if they will have fun putting it back together again!). There will be mistakes made – accustom yourself to that fact before you ever get behind the screen. Try not to second-guess yourself too much, but when it does become clear that you’ve made a mistake, own up to it and try to set things right – and above all, try not to let that particular mistake happen again.

These lessons and principles are especially important when it comes to creating things for yourself – new magic items, new monsters, new enemies, new characters, new campaigns. I once saw a new AD&D GM offer a first-level character a +10 longsword of Vorpel Dancing with Flame Tongue (younger readers might not know what all those terms mean – don’t sweat it, I’ll explain). Most columns would focus first on how inappropriate it is for such a powerful magic item to be in the hands of a relative novice character, or in the sheer wrongness of making such a powerful item in the first place; they both miss the other half of the story. A weapon this powerful – capable of independent action, self-targeting towards severing heads from bodies, burning with fire, and with a greater attack bonus than anything in the sourcebooks – not only shouldn’t exist in a campaign, but if it does, it should be the ultimate quest item, recovery of which ends the campaign because no opposition can stand against the possessor. (The GM’s excuse? He thought the item was “cool”).

I have also seen a GM hit a first-level party with a 20 hit-dice blue dragon with spellcasting abilities and two heads so that one could breathe “blue flame” at the same time as the other is spellcasting or using its breath weapon because the monster was “cool”.

It is all too easy to enter a Monty-Haul death-spiral with your first campaign. You make the PCs too powerful, and find that the encounters are too easy, and so they grow even more powerful. So you make the monsters powerful to the point of being ridiculous, overcompensating for the consequences of the original mistake – but doing so and following the standard guidelines for treasure placement means that as soon as the PCs win one battle, they again overtake even the overpowered monsters that you’ve created, and so it goes. Or perhaps the first mistake was making the monsters too powerful, and then “fixing” that mistake not by dialing the monsters down but by boosting the characters up in power level; the results are the same.

Self-censorship is one of the hardest skills for a GM to master. When you come up with one of these really “neat” ideas, show it to someone else and ask their opinion.

Character Classes: trouble of a greater magnitude

But the examples I’ve offered above are relatively easy to spot and fix; the real time-bombs lurk in character-class creation. There are so many combinations of character class and magic items that are possible that it’s almost impossible to ensure that a new character class, or more specifically, new class abilities, will not go out of control and unbalance the game. Quite often these problems won’t manifest until the character and class have been well and truly established – perhaps not until the character is quite advanced in levels – and it’s always messy changing them.

Thus is revealed a second balancing act that GMs must routinely negotiate: the dichotomous need for originality and the necessary conservatism required when it comes to creativity. To make your campaign distinctly your own, you need to be original, but at the same time, the creativity you employ has to be tightly controlled.

Here in Australia, as in many countries around the world, we have had problems with introduced species; any country kid down-under knows about the rabbit plague. Such things are always the result of introducing a species into a new environment without also introducing a predator or other control mechanism. And that is also the solution to this particular balancing act: Never introduce anything without also introducing a countermeasure of equal effect and slightly wider availability.

Monster Guidelines

I’ve touched on this a little in the previous section. RPGs in general don’t describe balanced ecologies; a game system that incorporated a rules structure for doing so would be more than a little interesting. Instead, most of the entries describe the apex predator of one or more environmental region or ecological niche (or a creature that can at least lay plausible claim to such status), and assume that there is enough food available for them to live on.

Balance is generally assumed to result from the conflict between competing claimants, a compounding of lifespan, breeding rate, and competition for resources. One creature may be more powerful than another but its numbers are inherently limited for some reason; another is less powerful, but exists in greater numbers and can unite into social organizations.

By maintaining this basic principle, most creatures that you can imagine can be accommodated. Consider the many variations on Trolls in my Fumanor campaign, for example, as described in Traditional Interpretations and Rituals Of Culture. Beginner’s problems with creature creations generally stem from one of two sources:

1. a failure to respect the balanced-population principle; or
2. under- or over-valuing a creature in terms of its power levels relative to the PCs at the time when it is encountered.

The first can be solved by introducing a new population-control measure – it might be a disease, or a shortage of some unusual dietary requirement, or a rival species competing for resources. The lesson of the cuckoo, an example of a brood parasite offers a wonderful solution – if not overused – for example. To a certain extent, this mimics what happens in nature from time to time as a consequence of overpopulation; in a nutshell, if there are too many of something, the population will eventually collapse in some form as a result, either as the result of a growth in numbers of some animal that learns to prey on the overpopulated species, or the gestation of a disease of some sort that spreads throughout the population, or simply out-consuming the available food. Such plagues are naturally self-limiting – eventually.

The second problem is more common and frequent. Over-rating a creature means that it is weaker than expected, and hence represents a reward give-away; under-rating a creature means that it is more powerful than it should be, which makes players unhappy about the size of the reward on offer.

My approach

When I create a new creature, I always start by listing what I want it to be able to do, and what is going to keep the population from excessive growth. I then locate in the official publications some creature that I deem to be roughly equivalent in combat effectiveness. From there, I apply the principles described in FFG’s Monster’s Handbook* to convert my comparison creature into my new creature.

* Limited numbers available through Amazon, I also found 5 copies on Ebay (search for “Legends & Lairs Monster’s Handbook”. Unfortunately, while RPGNow has listings for much of the Legends & Lairs series, Monster’s Handbook is not one of them.

The result not only helps keep the new creature’s abilities in balance relative to the target effectiveness, it helps me track what the end creature’s correct CL should be, which in turn enables me to determine what the correct reward levels will be.

Map Guidelines

I have two pieces of immediate advice for beginner GMs under this heading: Near enough is good enough; and don’t reinvent the wheel. Maps take quite a lot of time to produce if you are doing anything more than the most rudimentary job, even using some of the mapping software that’s out there, and there will almost certainly be better things that you can do with your time.

Of course, if a map is to be reused repeatedly within the campaign, you may be able to justify that expenditure of effort – but, quite often, maps simply lock into place things that you haven’t fully thought through yet, forcing future compromises onto your campaign.

I’ve offered two different approaches to the correct prioritization of game prep, I suggest Beginners try them both and pick the one that suits them best. The first is Fire Fighting, Systems Analysis, and RPG Problem Solving Part 2 of 3: Prioritization and the second is Game Prep and the +N to Game Longevity (ironically, they were published in the reverse order, almost a year apart). Choice number one is simpler, and so easier for a Beginner to use; choice number two is more effective and nuanced because it incorporates different standards of prep.

Beyond that, here’s a simple checklist that I use in creating area maps:

1. Plan before you start – make a list of requirements
2. Start with a rough sketch – I always make a rough sketch before I start, using pencil so that I can erase and correct
3. High Ground – where are the points of elevation
4. Direction of drainage – which way to the coast? Which side or corner of the map has the lowest elevation?
5. Follow the water – 3 and 4 tell me which way the water will flow. Desired geology tells me how convoluted the path will be – there will be lots of twists and turns through rocky ground, and more gentle, sweeping bends in softer soils
6. Nearby settlements & other edge elements – What do I know about the areas just off the map? Is there a settlement, ie a likely source of a road? Is there a forest or something known to be there from other maps? etc
7. Water the forests and fields – thinking about what I want the land use to be, I ensure that those usages that need more water have enough, even if I have to add extra watercourses to achieve it. Once I’ve done that, I can put in the actual land use.
8. Defensible positions – where are the most naturally defensible positions on the map? These are the most likely first choices for settlements.
9. Desirable Resources – where are the natural resources; the nearest defensible position will have a settlement, and, if more than an hour or two away, there will be a smaller settlement at the resource itself.
10. Resource Usage efficiency – the closer to the point of extraction a resource can be utilized, the more efficient (and profitable) that resource will be. Minimize overland travel, but extend river traffic because nature “does the heavy lifting” of transporting the extracted resource. There may be another small settlement at the embarkation point of the resources.
11. Trade Routes – the larger the total size of any two communities linked by road or navigable river, the more important the trade route will be. Use the knowledge of the settlements identified already to plan the roads and paths. Remember that, as much as possible, passes will be through low ground between peaks, and that the rockier the geology and greater the elevation changes, the more twists and turns roads will have.
12. Settlements exist for a reason – Most settlements will already have been placed, but where trade routes intersect or cross a defensible point, there will be another. Add additional settlements accordingly – then create a list (using map references) and for each settlement, list all the reasons it has for existing.
13. Separation depends on travel times and traffic – small settlements tend to spring up a whole-number of days travel apart, perhaps even a half-day apart if there is a lot of traffic – and subject to the relative danger levels. These can be little more than a guarded caravan rest-point (charging a toll), or something more substantial. Since river travel tends to be faster (and comes with it’s own built-in campgrounds both on the river or at any point along the banks) there will be greater separation between communities.
14. Size is proportionate to reasons and inversely proportionate to separation and danger- the more reasons people have for residing there, the bigger the community will be, but if there are a lot of communities close by, this effect will be diffused over several of them – and if the communities are attacked regularly, they will be smaller than would otherwise be the case unless there are a LOT of reasons to justify the higher cost of security and defenses. Use these facts to decide the relative size of the communities and their basic natures, adjusting the map appropriately.
15. People transform landscapes – people need to eat – set up farms and farmland appropriately. Look at the other effects people might have on the landscape over time, as well.
16. With all that design done, you’re ready to produce the map in its final form.

Place Guidelines

A place is anywhere something interesting might potentially happen. There are three considerations when thinking about places: what the GM wants to have happen there (potentially or definitively); what should logically be there, based on the settlement/community size; and the broader and local society. I employ the same one-thing-at-a-time mentality that I described earlier in addressing these competing factors. For more information, I direct the reader’s attention to Location, Location, Location – How Do You Choose A Location? and People, Places, and Narratives: Matching Locations to plot needs.

The starting point should always be, “what do I need?”. The second stage should always be, “what should logically be there?”. If you keep those two points in mind, you will be well served.

Concluding Advice

There’s a lot more that I could have written about creating other elements of a campaign, but they all have specific articles in this series dedicated to them, the length of this one is really getting to start getting out of hand, and much of the advice would simply be variations on the principles outlined above; so I’m going to boil everything else down to two final pieces of advice for beginners, and call it an article.

The Players come First

The first of those pieces of advice is this: Always remember that you aren’t a GM to indulge yourself or your own desires; you are there to facilitate the fun of others. In return, you can reasonably hope for their respect, and the vicarious thrill of watching them have that fun, and – as a fringe benefit – there will be parts of the process that you find enjoyable (there had better be, or you won’t last).

There are those who don’t enjoy GMing, even though they may be good at it. There are those who want to GM for the wrong reasons, whose games won’t last. There are those who want to do so for the right reasons but simply lack the ability or the self-confidence, or who simply cannot dedicate the time and effort required to do so – and, as I pointed out in the first article of this series, it will all take longer when you’re a beginner.

Keep It Practical

Being a GM requires dedication and making a commitment to those who sign up to play in your game – to do the job to the absolute best of your ability and circumstances. Your social life, your television viewing, your independence and freedom – all will suffer. If you aren’t careful, so will your health, if only from exhaustion and a shortage of sleep. For about a decade, I invested an average of roughly 60 hours a week into my campaigns.

It is incumbent on you to make sure it’s worth it. Always remember that your players have limited recreation time available, and they have chosen to expend it playing your game.

Not everyone can do the job, and do it well. There’s no shame in that – every game needs players. But these considerations are not black and white, yes or no; there is a gray area in the middle, where most GMs reside, the gap between the ideal and what can be practically achieved. Failing to keep the scope of your campaigns manageable is one of the most common mistakes GMs make – experienced or not. Keep your ambitions practical, and you are more likely to find yourself in the gray zone inhabited by a successful GM; as your expertise grows and develops, you will discover the capacity within yourself to do more in the time available.

Be aware, too, that your goal posts will have to move and change over time. Life is change, and what is practicable will have to change with your circumstances. Aim to start with small-scale success and grow from there; don’t attempt to be too ambitious to start with, or you will never get the chance to be a success as a GM, at any scale. Save those big ideas for when you are sufficiently experienced to realize them. And make sure that everyone has fun!

Wow, that was a big one – much more so than I expected when I started, or I might have split it into two! Hopefully, Part 3: Preperation will be a little more succinct! (After that, the series will probably take a break for a while… variety is the spice of life, as they say!)