30 Days of Dungeons and Dragons: Forewarned is For Running Away

So I had a bright idea for my blog posts for the next few weeks, and lo and behold it DOES exist, just as I suspected.  So, courtesy of insertstupidblogname (http://insertstupidblogname.tumblr.com/post/4379859906/30-days-of-dungeons-and-dragons),  I would like to show you the upcoming schedule for the next 6 weeks here.  I will be doing one post a day again, and naturally doing shorter posts.  Fasten your seatbelts!

Day 1-How you got started

Day 2-Favourite Playable Race

Day 3-Favourite Playable Class

Day 4-Favourite Gameworld

Day 5-Your favourite set of dice/individual die

Day 6-Favourite Diety

Day 7-Favourite Edition

Day 8-Favourite Character You Have Played

Day 9-Favourite Character You Haven’t Played

Day 10-Craziest thing that’s happened that you saw (to party/character/your players etc)

Day 11-Favourite Adventure You Have Ran

Day 12-Favourite Dungeon Type/Location

Day 13-Favourite Trap/Puzzle

Day 14-Favourite NPC

Day 15-Favourite Monster (Undead)

Day 16-Favourite Monster (Abberation)

Day 17-Favourite Monster (Animal/Vermin)

Day 18-Favourite Monster (Immortal/Outsider)

Day 19-Favourite Monster (Elemental/Plant)

Day 20-Favourite Monster (Humanoid/Natural/Fey)

Day 21-Favourite Dragon Colour/Type

Day 22-Favourite Monster Overall

Day 23-Least Favourite Monster Overall

Day 24-Favourite energy type

Day 25-Favourite magic item (your character’s or someone else’s)

Day 26-Favourite nonmagic item (your character’s or someone else’s)

Day 27-A character you want to play in the future

Day 28-A character you will never play ever again

Day 29-What is the number you always seem to roll on a d20?

Day 30-Best DM You’ve Had

Long Division: Doubling the Party Rather than Splitting

So a little while ago I posted about the Pokemon RPG I have been running and the problems we ahve encountered.  The most significant problem was that the party had irrevocably divided, separating in to two opposing groups.  I thought it might be worth posting about the result of the decision we made, so you have a little more of the story.  After some discussions, the group has opted to create two full parties rather than divide time up or sacrifice a group.

This decision was only partly due to a desire to follow both sides of the story and to maintain their characters.  A major factor was the lure of character creation.  Given the option to create new characters, new stats had been written up before decisions could be taken much further.  Since the players now are far more familiar with the world, creating new characters was an interesting challenge for them, and all of a sudden, the decision had essentially been made.  The new characters must be played.  So now we switch.  Every week we swap between the good-ish characters who are aligned with Brock, Blaine, Sabrina, Alakazam, and Gaston (Misty’s replacement), and the morally questionable characters who are aligned with Koga, Vincent (Giovanni), and a few other mysterious entities they are not familiar with yet...

We have now had a session with each group since the divide, and it’s going relatively well.  Both groups are poised to investigate Cerulean and Lavender respectively, and the next session for each should be filled to the brim with adventure and plot (I hope).  What is more important to me is that both groups seem to be relatively cohesive.   I asked that the new characters would be generally in line with the party they were joining; I really REALLY didn’t want another split.  Two parties are quite enough.  They are each working together relatively well, although the MQ party nearly fractured at the start as two characters met by trying to commandeer the same vessel.

I like this setup now.  It’s complicated, and I have to try and keep them both on the same timeline; having one group several days ahead of the other really is not conducive to coherent plot.  This hasn’t proven too difficult so far, but it may do.  What it does mean though, is that between the two groups, the players a) get to explore different moral paths, seeing the roads they could have taken and b) get to be involved in much more of the plot.  As there are several factions in this conflict taking place, there are a lot of things going on which the players may never be aware of.  For instance, they are only now starting to notice the problem with the Elite Four, and there is a mysterious stranger who the party will be meeting again very soon.  Yes, I am letting things drop for the benefit of the players that read this.  Good times.

Anyway, it requires extra management but the two-party system is thus far proving rewarding.  I can’t wait for both groups to continue, as things are getting exciting, and hopefully I will improve as a DM as a result of all of this.  I did realise while writing this that if I had been more on the ball I could have just pretended like this was the plan all along and not looked as incompetent.  We live and learn.

Expedition Fleet: An Explanation and an Invitation

Hello.  I am Captain David Louis Nida of the USS Broadsword, a Akira-class starship which has seen its fair share of battles.  The Federation is caught up in a number of conflicts, each of which is threatening its very existence.  The Cardassians are the most pressing threat, and the war with them is only just starting to turn in our favour.  However, the drain on resources puts us in danger of losing everything we have rebuilt so far after the devastation of the Borg War.  Kimira Industries, a galactic corporation, is a mixed bag of assets and dangers, supplying us with technology and resources at some times and then working against us at others.  The Romulans are up to their usual tricks, and on top of all of this, there are seven ancient devices being uncovered by each faction, devices which if brought together, could grant incredible power.  Even one alone is enough to pose a serious security risk.  Ancient races are re-emerging, old enemies are gathering on the horizons, and current events could overwhelm us at any time.  These are dangerous waters we sail in...  However, my crew are more than up to the challenge.  My senior staff are some of the most impressive officers in the fleet, and we will not see the Federation fall on our watch.  Not if we have anything to say about it.

So, welcome to Expedition Fleet.

If you haven't guessed, this is a summary and introduction to one of the many RPGs I play.  I thought this one deserved a special post because it is done in a style of gameplay which many people are unfamiliar with and often find confusing.  This is a play-by-forum SIMM with 4 ships (4 games) running simultaneously, which comprise the fleet, overseen by a friend of mine who wrote the background for this timeline, and captains the Vendetta.

What this means is that everything is done in writing.  Every event that happens, every move you make, every conversation you have and every thought you think is entirely decided by what you write in your posts.  A mission takes place within a single thread on the forum, with a separate thread for Out of Character (OOC) discussion.  There are no dice to roll and no stats to reference - your character is who you say he/she is and can do what you so they can do.  The captain of the ship is effectively the DM.  The DM the mission and push the plot forward.  As the captain, you give assignments to your crew and ask them to carry it out.  If you're clever, you've thrown in some twists and intrigue to keep them interested.

Playing an android or an engineer with a visor may be considered plagiarism...

Players take the role of crewmembers, generally the senior staff - Chief Engineer, Chief Medical, Chief Tactical, Executive Officer, and the like.  You write up a biography and a general character background - the more in-depth the better - and that's it.  That's your character made.  Apply for a position and wait for the captain to accept you on board his ship.

Play takes the form of a forum thread, as I said.  The captain generally starts things off, either wrapping things up from the last mission, granting a bit of shore leave, or just going straight into the next mission.  You can post about your own actions as often as you like, and the more creative you are the better.  There are points where you really cannot go much further, like if you are waiting for a meeting to start or generally having a conversation with another player.  At those points you have to wait for the other players to respond.

That's totally my character... give or take

An example of how conversations works could be the following:
ON:
==Bridge, Deck 1, USS Broadsword==

Captain Nida sat in his chair, waiting for each department to report ready for launch.  He was anxious to get underway with the new mission.  It looked dangerous, but exciting, which would make a nice change from the last mission which was just dangerous.

"Helm, have you finished the diagnostic on the warp drive yet?" he asked impatiently.

<tag Chief Flight Control Officer>

"I see," he replied, and went back to waiting.

OFF

The helmsman would respond in the next post by copying the above post, and either adding in their own thoughts and actions as background and then inserting their half of the conversation, maybe adding extra bits in if they feel like it.

http://www.expeditionfleet.net/forum/

This is where we play.  Take a look.  It's pretty awesome.  All 4 ships would love to have more people, and it's a really interesting style of game play.  It has its advantages and disadvantages, like how it allows you to really explore the background and thought processes of the character and challenges your creative writing skills, but at the same time can be difficult to, in the middle of a mission, express true initiative, because you can only deviate so far from the main plot (although you can send a message to the DM asking if certain actions could be allowed, which can make life very interesting).  All in all though, it's an excellent system, and doesn't take much time, as you generally post a few times a week, instead of an entire afternoon which it takes to play a game of D&D.

So boldly get on over there and join in!

Never Split the Party: Crisis in the Pokemon RPG

It is a well-known saying in the world of RPGs: ‘Never split the party.’  You will be outnumbered, you will never find each other again, and gameplay slows down because the DM can only focus on one group at a time.  Scooby-doo never learned this lesson, and Daphne can attest to the dangers of wandering off alone that result from this.

I’ve written a bit about the Pokemon RPG I’ve been running for quite some time now.  We’re in somewhere around the 20^th session, I believe, and it’s been going really well.  The only thing that doesn’t work well is the party.  When they are focused on a single goal, they are an unstoppable force.  Defeating Koga at a disgustingly low level was testament to that.  Unfortunately, this does not happen often, and it has now led to an irrevocable divide in the party.

It's even a book!

To be fair, it’s partly my fault.  I gave the assassins in the group the assignment of taking out Misty, the leader of the Water Gym and therefore of one of the other party members.  The assassins dutifully did just that, but not quite subtly enough.  It was very well done, but they were discovered, refused to go quietly, and we left the session with the pair of them sailing off in a commandeered ship, with the Water Gym party member following them with Sabrina, who was angry.  The other two players were both away and so their characters are in totally different cities.  Not to difficult to reunite each with one of the groups, but good grief.  I do not see it happening that the party will ever be completely unified again.  So, people of the internet, come to my aid.  I see three options.

         1)      Split the Party: Keep going as is.  I will have to switch back and forth between the two groups regularly, and one will side with the Ground Gym, and the other will side with the Water Gym.  It’s questionable as to who are the good guys, but I’m pretty sure it’s not the people who just killed Misty...  I’ve played games like this before and it’s worked fairly well.  The original Final Fantasy game I played in this game setting had party members all over the place every session and it was fantastic, so it’s possible.  But it will seriously cut into the playtime for the players.

         2)      Pick a Side: Either the ‘good’ characters get replaced by more devious ones and a new party is formed, or the ‘morally questionable’ characters are replaced.  Both scenarios work out within the game easily, and could lead to some very interesting new characters joining the party, as I would give them the option of choosing from amongst some NPCs they have met previously, such as Jessie (yes, that Jessie).  The other characters which have been replaced would not be simply killed off, but they would become significant NPCs under my control, and the party will probably meet them again, probably as recurring villains/nuisances.  So they would hear about their original characters exploits every so often, which could be fun, and they get to create a whole new character now that they fully understand the world in which it is set.  A new, unified party is created on one side of the fence, though that fence may just be broken all over again.

         3)      Radical Perspective Change: Most difficult option.  Total shift.  Everyone leaves their character behind and the whole tone of the game shifts.  Everyone becomes Pokemon, for instance, and has to work things from there, either as a liberation movement or a faction of war or even a diplomatic envoy.... unlikely.  Everyone moves up a grade and gains control of a Gym Leader or a Lieutenant.  The game suddenly becomes a massive war, with many units under your command and meeting the opponent on the field of battle.  It’s not my favourite option, and I don’t think they will like it either, but it’s a possibility, and it could be really cool.

So what do you think?  I’m most tempted to leave things as they are, but if the players want to make sure they get more playtime, then option 2 seems the best to me, and could be hilarious with the new characters they create and re-encountering the old ones.

Plagiarism in RPGs – Hilarious or Unimaginative?

I won’t lie.  My games are full of fairly blatant references, at least the homebrew ones are.  The Pokemon game I have going is crazy for them.  The party was recently set upon by a trio of assassins that looked kind of like this:

I like making up stories and interesting people for the characters to meet and interact with.  I’m quite proud of Lorelai’s son, Gareth, who is wandering around with a chip on his shoulder and a total lack of appreciation for the power of the Elite Four, because he’s grown up around them.  I really like what I’ve done with Blaine.  He’s not at all what the party are expecting, but I won’t spoil that for them here.  Quite frequently though, when I need a character quickly, or need a large array of characters to be created, I will just draw upon what I already know.  Hence, Stark and Chad from Bleach are in the world.  So are Scott Pilgrim and Ramona Flowers (the party narrowly avoided encountering them a while ago).  I needed a plotline for their time in Fuschia, so suddenly one of the noble houses was titled the Iron Throne and a quest to go wreck an iron mine was created – fairly directly ripped from Baldur’s Gate.

Is this poor DMing though?  It’s certainly plagiarism, though I doubt it can really be taken to court.  It can add a little humour to the situation, and I do tend to run games which get a bit silly at times.  However, it means that my world is a little less... mine.  A little less... original.  And it wrecks the 4^th wall something terrible, as the players automatically know a bit more information about what’s going on than they really should, and it destroys a little of the atmosphere of a self-contained game world.

On the other hand, I just had the idea of a horrific boss combination: Deadpool and Psycho Mantis rip-offs.  Nasty mind-screwing times.