This entry is part 1 in the series The Secrets Of Stylish Narrative

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What’s the real difference between game prep and a lack of game prep?

I think the most overt differences can all be summarized as felicity of style: better-presented maps and illustrations, better thought-out plans, better characterization of NPCs, better depiction of that characterization, and more stylish Narrative.

Better-presented maps & illustrations

Although this article is going to focus on the last of the differences, I thought it worth at least synopsizing the others. While you can get by with quick-and-dirty hand-drawn maps and sketches, investing some prep time makes it more certain that nothing important gets left out, and enables Google image searches for photos that help place your players mentally within their surroundings.

Better thought-out plans

Clever NPCs require better plans. You can argue that prep-time should be proportionate to the quality of the NPCs being encountered in the game. Not saying I agree with going that far, but there is an argument to be made in support of such a position. It’s a sure bet that some NPCs will supposedly be smarter than the GM, and the only way to simulate that is either to fake it or to do some of the NPCs thinking in advance, preparing plans, contingencies, and alternatives. Just because a scheme or response is off-the-cuff from an in-game perspective, it does not mean that it has to be so in the real world.

And then there is the case for characters who are simpler than the GM. That generally means having simpler goals – but that requires the character to have simpler priorities that derive directly from their personalities and ambitions. Which brings me to the next point:

Better Characterized NPCs

When people improvise, they usually employ one of a small selection of stock personas, perhaps modified to accommodate different ambitions or priorities. These are quick and easy and very cardboard in texture. There’s all sorts of advice and tools for creating more individual personalities that are available, and many more that can be adapted from traditional writer’s guides and the like. But they all take time and a little thought, and not every approach will suit every character. Prep time creates personalities.

Prep time also permits the GM to find or create effective ways of expressing those personalities through everything from costume to speech patterns to photographic or artistic expressions (including a little theme music, if your style accommodates it). The better your NPCs present themselves, the more the players can relate to them as they would “real people”, producing a better, more immersive, and more realistic game. Further, the more successful the NPCs are at stealing scenes by being more “real” than the PCs, the more it challenges the players to lift their own games, in effect laying off some of the burden of creating a better game onto their shoulders. Many hands make light work, as the old-time homily goes.

And still another benefit of game prep is that canned dialogue can be prepared and polished to better express the personality of the character. Don’t just tell the players that the NPC is nervous, find ways to reflect nerves and edginess in your performance as the NPC at the game table.

Finally, within this category, dialogue can be a tool for the NPC to achieve their goals, to show what they care about and how deeply they care, and to show what they know and can speak about with conviction and sincerity. This isn’t easy to fake, you need to be able to get inside the NPCs heads – and that often means reading up on a subject and on real people with similar beliefs. It can mean watching youTube videos of such people, or documentaries. It means game prep.

More stylish narrative

And finally, it means more stylish narrative to employ when describing people, places, and events. Concise, communicative, flavorful words can create a whole greater than the sum of their parts while being more easily assimilated as a result of their brevity. The narrative can flow naturally instead of being disjointed and fragmented.

Writers of the highest standard strip their narrative back to the barest essentials to make room for characterization and then polish the result until it gleams, They search for ways to convey dry narrative into dialogue, giving the characters something to talk about. They may draw up checklists of things they want a stretch of dialogue to convey and agonize over each and every word.

Great writing imparts setting information through description of scenes, and people and sounds perfectly natural in doing so, It imparts characterization through dialogue and behavior. It imparts a sense of time through dynamics. It builds a tone and a mood through choice of words employed, and ensures that no word is used that contradicts that tone and mood save when explicitly necessary for contrast. And it does all this while telling a story with emotional buildup and release. These are skills that no writer ever feels they have completely mastered; they never say that narrative and dialogue are perfect, they simply accept that the result is the best they are now capable of achieving with their current standard of expertise and within the constraints that have been imposed by deadlines, financial status, and editorial/publisher’s guidelines.

Well, you don’t have to make your narrative Great Writing. But you should aim for a “good” to “excellent” standard. And that takes time. And that’s the subject of today’s article.

What this article is not about

There are lots of articles and good advice out there on making efficient use of your prep time, on scheduling and prioritization and squeezing 150% out of every available second. I’ve written what I hope is some of it (a Google search within the Campaign Mastery site finds 190 articles that refer to “efficient” and “prep”, some redundant. Perhaps more usefully, a search using the site’s own search box selects those articles and presents them in four pages, ten or twelve articles to a page).

This article is not about efficiency of prep, it’s about effective use of prep in one particular field within the skillset of preparing adventures. It assumes that you can spend as much time as it takes, however unrealistic that assumption may be. However, efficiency is always a consideration and the technique eliminates as much wasted time as possible.

The other thing this article is not, at this point, is complete. It’s just too darned big for one post. So I’m going to split it up. I hope to be able to get it done in three parts, but length might necessitate a four-part split – and the real world, in the form of a subpoena to appear as a witness at a court case next week, might interfere in completion by the time of my normal publishing deadline, pushing the length out to five parts. Because it’s especially important that these be viewed as a whole in order for the technique to be effective, I don’t intend to interrupt the sequence with articles on other subjects, and the final part will include a PDF of the entire series as a complete e-book. I’m also going to put together a checklist for people to use in implementing the process, to appear towards the end of the series.

Here’s the anticipated breakdown:

  • Three-post version:
    • Part 1: Introduction, Example, Analysis.
    • Part 2: The prep-time process (8 stages).
    • Part 3: Full-process checklist, The consequences of the process for an RPG, Recycling discarded work as a GMing resource, Improv Narrative, and the full article as a PDF.
  • Four-post version:
    • Part 1: Introduction, Example, Analysis.
    • Part 2: The prep-time process (Stages 1-3).
    • Part 3: The prep-time process (Stages 4-8), A Full-process checklist, and The consequences of the process for an RPG.
    • Part 4: Recycling discarded work as a GMing resource, Improv Narrative, and the full article as a PDF.
  • Five-post version:
    • Part 1: Introduction, Example, Analysis.
    • Part 2: The prep-time process (Stages 1-3).
    • Part 3: The prep-time process (Stages 4-8).
    • Part 4: Full-process checklist, The consequences of the process for an RPG, and Recycling discarded work as a GMing resource.
    • Part 5: Improv Narrative, and the full article as a PDF.

Right now, the smart money would be on the 4-part version. But I’m shooting to get it done in three – so let’s get to it!

What is Narrative?

Bullet points break a narrative into bite-sized chunks. They are a great way to organize your material into smaller tasks. Here, for example, is a rough breakdown of a novel:

  • Synopsis of the story
    • Breakdown of the synopsis into chapters
      • Breakdown of each chapter into sections
        • Breakdown of each section into scenes
          • Breakdown of each scene into location/context passages, dialogue passages, and/or action passages

Location/Context passages are collectively considered Narrative. Some people might also include Action passages, and certainly within any context other than an RPG, they would fall within that category. This is because they are all described from some omniscient perspective (in the visual sense), even if the actual writing is from a first-person perspective (in the literary sense). The writer is communicating directly with the reader.

  • Context Passages – are either equivalent to a voice-over establishing the context of the action or dialogue that is about to take place, providing historical narrative or synopsizing events that have taken place between chapters, or describing/identifying the participants in an action or dialogue passage that’s to follow. They place the action or dialogue that is to follow into context, attaching meaning and significance; hence the name.
  • Location Passages – describe the environment within which action or dialogue will take place.
  • Action Passages – describe a series of events taking place within a location as a result of the context.

These are all different to some degree when applied to an RPG.

  • Context Passages – now include information for the GM to use in adjudicating roleplay and player choices, as well as making the players aware of anything they need to know in order to make those choices. This includes describing any NPCs. They still exist to place the action or dialogue that is to follow into context, attaching meaning and significance.
  • Location Passages – describe the environment within which action or dialogue will take place. Again, this is essential information for the players to make appropriate choices for their characters.
  • Action Passages – These detail the game mechanics of the situation and may include prompts for mandatory tests for environmental consequences. Most action is implied rather than being explicitly described; for example “Chest, locked, DC 22, contains…” implies the requirement for lock-picking or physical intervention, and is never required (beyond use as superficial description) if the players choose not to investigate the contents of the chest. If we assume that such descriptive elements are extracted into a context or location passage, Action sequences will no longer count as narrative because in an RPG they are interactive instead.

The Bullet-point Description

One of the big advantages of nested bullet points with appropriate highlighting of key terms is that they enable the GM to locate the relevant passages that convey the information necessary to interpret whatever is occurring as they needed – assuming they are concise enough. Sometimes they are used simply to index more detailed sections of text.

In a novel, passages are presented in a completely linear fashion – passage B follows passage A, and are always read in succession. You don’t read one paragraph, then skip to a later paragraph, then to another, and then go back to the paragraph that follows the first,
In an RPG, passages are explicitly non-linear, and the determination of which passage is relevant is the result of interpreting choices made by one or more of the participants (including the GM if the passage deals with a reaction to the PCs). In order to find what they are looking for, passages need to be organized in a relatively-rigid structural manner.

Bullet-point descriptions and numbered lists are the perfect ways of organizing such material. While these text arrangements would be highly unusual within a novel, except when being quoted verbatim, they – or analogous approaches – are very common in RPG adventures.

Law-firm example

For example, here’s a description of a Law Firm that might appear in an RPG:

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  • A central elevator opens to the main reception. Corridors are in a H pattern, but are broad enough for secretarial stations to line each side.
  • Central reception area with company logo in Gold against splashes of red, white, and blue on frosted glass.
  • Luxurious soft carpets, custom-designed & fitted.
  • The walls are polished wood panels.
  • >Walls are never empty, each has something – usually a portrait or photograph of a past or current partner. Some date back to the firm’s founding in 1863. They are all exactly the same size and hung at the same height in identical frames.
  • The ceiling is vaulted and molded with paint used to suggest greater depth (it has darker tones in the center). Lighting is from tasteful brass cylindrical chandeliers with a slightly-modern design which illuminate the offices clearly but leave the ceiling in shadow. Almost-invisible apertures in the moldings conceal security cameras with at least two observing every point within the office.
  • Light switches, etc, are all concealed behind plants of various kinds in polished marble pots. Each has a small spotlight which also illuminates a label identifying the plant and certifying that it is pollen-free. All plants are in perfect health.
  • Private waiting rooms so a client can’t see any other client.
  • Each partner has at least one secretary’s desk next to the waiting room allocated to that partner and oriented at right angles to the central corridor, facing the partner’s waiting room. Each secretary has a polished wood desk with a glass panel embossed on the underside showing the company logo. Each desk has a nameplate, a computer terminal, a keyboard, and a pen holder. Filing cabinets are located beside each desk, also made of polished wood to blend in. They are all inset into the walls.
  • All the secretaries have custom-built and upholstered ergonomic chairs with plush blue velvet linings. Other chairs are constructed of leather and must be changed regularly because they all have that distinctive “new leather” smell.
  • Brass nameplates on the polished wooden doors in enameled black letters are beyond each secretarial station.
  • At regular intervals between the secretarial stations, water fountains in small alcoves of polished wood dispense drinkable water chilled to exactly 4 degrees centigrade. Each water fountain is backed by a small water feature.
  • One side-wall of the H is given over to a huge fish-tank full of large tropical fish. Lights are strategically located inside the tank to illuminate the fish.
  • Running along the corridor that runs alongside the fish-tank are four large conference rooms. Beyond these rooms at the bottom of the H are doors to the typing pool and switchboard. Between these two areas is a staff dining room which can be reached directly by means of an almost-invisible corridor running up from the bar of the H which has no other purpose. On the far side of the central reception, an identical corridor running in the opposite direction leads to a Partner’s Dining Room. Each Dining room has a small kitchen attached. These are relatively unused and the equipment is at least 10 years out of date.
  • Doorways at the top of the H lead to a large law library.
  • No windows are visible save one that fills the wall opposite the fish-tank. On closer inspection, that “window” is actually an electronically-controlled series of 40-feet-wide panoramic photographs capturing the city skyline at four points in time – midday, sunset, sunrise, and at night – as they would be seen from the point of view of the window. These photographs have been printed on a belt and are automatically rotated to synchronism with the outside world.

This description is great for supplying details of various elements of the law firm’s offices. There could be still more details – what color are the carpets? How many partners are there? Where are the Associates, who do the legal grunt work, located? Unfortunately it’s lousy in a couple of other ways, like giving a general impression the place before the PCs focus on the details. You could simply read the whole thing out, but that brings another problem – retention of details. Quick, without looking, when was the law firm established? I can remember because I just wrote it (and changed the date about three times before settling on my final choice) but a week from now? I wouldn’t put long odds on it. You’ve just read it, which is better than having it read to you according to neurological studies, but not by much – I’d be surprised if one in ten could answer the question.

You could draw a set of blueprints from the description, and even do a sketch or two of the place. But this will certainly never work in a narrative sense.

The Structural Problem

Some of the problems with this approach are inherent to the bullet-point approach, which lumps everything together in one place for the GM to work out for themselves. In other words, they are structural in nature, and exist because this list is trying to do it all at once. Before you could create any alternative, you need to know how to correct the structural problem.

A good narrative description should convey a general impression and provide cues for the players. In conjunction with a quick map, it should tell the players enough to know what areas they want to examine more closely – and, if they aren’t there to steal something, or investigate something, most of the details aren’t needed right now.

If, for example, the characters were there to meet one of the lawyers, here’s the order things should happen in:

  • General Narrative introduction (overall impression)
  • Details of the central reception area
  • Encounter with the receptionist(s), who escorts PCs to the secretarial station of the lawyer they are to meet
  • Narrative description of overall layout
  • Narrative description of secretarial station
  • Encounter with the secretary, who takes PCs to the waiting room assigned to the lawyer they are to meet
  • Time to look around from the waiting room
  • Encounter with the secretary, who takes PCs to the lawyer’s office or perhaps to one of the meeting rooms
  • Narrative description of the office or meeting room. Did anyone notice that there were no details of either in the list above?
  • Encounter with the lawyer.

In other words, the long list makes a great planning resource, but it’s not at all useful for the intended purpose. There are ways to convert it into a useful form, some better than others. You could, for example, simply read aloud the parts that are relevant to each of the narrative subsections listed above, skipping the rest. But this is terribly inefficient – employing this approach means that you have to read each item on the list to yourself five times, each time choosing whether or not to then read it aloud. By the time you were finished, you would have read it at least six times in-game – not counting any times you read it in advance of play!

The Stylish Alternative

I’m not going to do all of the narrative passages required, but one should be illustrative.

One of the problems with needing to break this article up now manifests itself. While I have the process outlined as a series of bullet points – there’s some irony there – I don’t have it fully detailed yet. Normally, I would leave this example until the process was detailed in full and then use it to generate the example, but I need the example now. So this example will not be a robust demonstration of the end-product of the process. The finished product should therefore be much better than this quick-and-dirty version. Just a caveat that I thought readers should be aware of before I get into the alternative form of the example.

I did a copy-and-paste of the list, then deleted everything that didn’t contribute to the initial narrative passage. From that, I wrote the following:
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“The elevator dings as the doors open to reveal the offices of Brash, Livercoat, Woodley, and Howe. Interns with arm-loads of law-books and harried expressions walk past with measured strides, deep in quiet conversation. Nineteenth century opulence masks modern convenience. The cream-colored soft carpets become mushroom-brown at the walls and are clearly custom-made for this office space, The walls are polished teak, oak, and maple panels decorated with portraits of partners past and present in identical gold frames. Alabaster-white molded ceilings are almost lost in the shadows above tasteful but modern cylindrical brass chandeliers, and the scent of new leather fills the air. Directly in front of you is a central reception area with the company logo in Gold set against splashes of red, white, and blue on a pane of frosted glass. The receptionist says ‘Good afternoon’ with a smile as she looks up.”

From this point, it would be natural to let the PCs respond with an appropriate social nicety and a statement of their business. In the course of that encounter, a thumbnail description of the receptionist can be provided, or it could be given before they respond at all; either way, the narrative would flow naturally into the encounter.

The Difference

The difference between this version and the full description bullet list should be obvious. It lacks almost all the detail of the first version, but it plants the reader – or the player hearing it – definitively in the surroundings by painting a vivid overall picture of the law firm.

There is a definite narrative flow to the description – floor to walls to ceiling to lights to immediately in front, where the receptionist is located. It was important for that to come last because that logically leads to the next part of the scene, the receptionist encounter.

Everything that was not explicitly stated is either not needed (lunch rooms, law library, etc) or can be incorporated into a later narrative passage, and you know that because the narrative passages have already been defined. This enabled discrimination against the unnecessary and made room to answer a questions or two that would have otherwise arisen, like “How can we tell the carpets are custom-made?”, and sprinkling with the odd additional detail that is just enough to prevent it being obvious that this description is abbreviated and general.

Finally, the description is dynamic – there are things happening, in the form of the elevator doors, the interns, and the receptionist.

Even though the two versions are equally successful in painting a picture of the setting, the narrative passage is only 145 words, compared to the 605 of the bullet list, has additional details, and is better in a number of ways – vividness, dynamism, and accessibility. And you only have to read it once in-game, whereas processing the bullet list effectively involved reading it time and time again.

Now that the value of the technique I have compiled has hopefully been demonstrated, Part 2 will commence the process of actually describing it. Look for it early next week!

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