I’ve seen numerous opinions regarding party dynamics. Many of them essentially mandating party members are friendly with each other and supportive. A symbiotic relationship is best in the minds of many. Introductory rule systems espouse the same logic: A party comprised of X, Y, and Z are necessary to undertake this adventure.

The hive mindset is unnatural to me. I think it is often limiting. I see no need to be friends with party members if they have differing goals than I do. A character can easily coexist with others for a short amount of time because it is beneficial. My enemy’s enemy is my friend….right now..

So many examples come to mind. I’ll start with party balance based on classes within D&D. Basically, all the published material espouses the need for class balance within a party. You need a thief, mage, cleric and a fighter at a minimum to achieve parity. Why? Running games based on the recommendations is easier initially from the balance. It’s also rather dull after a few years.

From the player perspective, the balance approached has been indoctrinated. Most games we play require it to achieve success. GM’s reinforce the balanced approach because they start by requiring it from lack of experience and then are obligated to keep all the characters involved so balance the adventures. The feedback cycle continues until it is ingrained.

More egregious, most DM’s force goal alignment down the throat of the characters. Doing so can snuff the life out of developing a character based only upon your planned campaign. Plans are only good up until implementation. If the players sit down and create 6 dwarves with intertwined backgrounds, can you honestly send them into battle against dwarves that are rising up against humans? Unlikely to happen if you constrained the choices available before character generation but plausible if you put them in an open sandbox.

Many systems, and GM’s also suggest or mandate that the characters all be white hats. The characters are going to undertake the campaign because they are the good guys and some bad guy needs thumped. Let me get out the scissors and carve some cardboard. Alignments in D&D propagate the idea.

Well, I’m lawful good, so I always have to play that way. Nope. If I’m playing a lawful good character and the DM has bad guys kidnap my daughter, I’m going to respond based on raw emotion, not ideals. I’ll hope my chosen god supports me along the way or forgives me in the end. There is no fixed bucket to what a player should be allowed to do or negative impact if she exceeds a certain limitation. You can judge based on overall interaction but the instantaneous, emotional response defies bucketizing.

Party conflicts are often quashed by many GM’s. Why? Is it really necessary to mandate? I played in essentially a 2-player campaign where my cohort was so paranoid of my character killing him, the other party put a massive amount of effort toward thwarting any intrusion into his home. Granted my character used whoever he could to achieve the goals he desired…not the party goals. I’d never considered turning against my party member but in the back of his mind, it was likely.

The same player later played a guy in a campaign who was wretched toward other player’s characters. “What have you done for me lately?” was the question always in the back of his character’s mind. So many PC’s died at his hand, I cannot count them. Yet, those same players kept making new characters and playing. Or trying to play again and again.

The best party dynamics I have experienced come not from planning but from differences. Kevin’s Top Secret campaign is an example. We generated characters based on a blank slate. In the end, the players within the party were very intertwined but also very self reliant. Rarely did we call each other for support. Instead, we called in the others to maximize impact.

Take the opportunity to thumb your nose to the expected and play purely off the players. You will be rewarded.

Tags: Annoyances, Ramblings of Mark, rpg, rules

I’ve been slacking on KORE. Life gets busy in so many different ways including oddball hobbies and interests. I have so many I tend to devote time in sporadic, unplanned blocks to them. Lately, I’ve been focused on building up a robot in addition to planning for the Spring Convergence.

A great small company in Boulder, Colorado is holding an Autonomous Vehicle Competition in April. If you like tinkering with low-level electronics, you’ve probably heard of SparkFun. They are the coolest company in the electronics hobby market. Just this year, they held Free Day and gave out $100,000 worth of free stuff. How cool is that?

Last year, SparkFun held its first Autonomous Vehicle Competition. I took the day off from work and went to watch. For a small company, they are the most welcoming, cool bunch of people I’ve experienced. Game companies could learn a lot from their PR approach.

I attended last year’s AVC as a spectator. It was much like an all day gaming marathon except people were trying to get robots to do what they wanted. Hackers all, they were making furious last minute changes to software, hardware, or the vehicle. Each and everyone of them would take the time to talk, laugh, and discuss the pitfalls they’d encountered. Very similar to a bunch of DM’s or a group of players talking about games current and past.

So when the 2010 AVC was announced, I signed up as an entrant. Today, I finally was notified we had been moved from the backorder list into the official participants list. My team mate and co-worker have been gradually working on a vehicle over the last few months but now the big push is on to get it done. We actually work on autonomous robotic vehicles for a living but the competition is just for fun — win, lose, or destroying the vehicle in the process. No management, no oddball requirements, just for the pure pleasure of doing it. Its a nice change of pace from the corporate grind.

To document the process, I launched a temporary blog for Team HellHound. I also called Kevin and put him through the hard sell of being a sponsor. Eventually after much arm twisting and explaining my sponsor requirements of being a good guy with a logo, I got him to agree. Next on my list is to arm twist, is Chris from 6d6fireball. The hard sell is really difficult when you tell them it costs nothing but you have to send a logo in.

Sadly, given my lack of a secretary and being completely devoid of scheduling skills, I managed to double book myself for the contest and Spring Convergence. My teammate is aware and planning on handling the competition by himself but depending on how the weekend is going I may slip down to Boulder for a few hours to lend a hand, gaming party in tow.

Many thanks to everyone who has contributed to the KORE blog. To each and everyone out there, may your hobbies be fun and fulfilling.

Tags: Assorted Sundry, Musings, Ramblings of Mark

I had a random thought the other night about system knowledge and the ramifications it has. The origin of the idea is completely decoupled from role playing games. Instead, it based on the knowledge and insight provided by an online game. The game in question provides a pretty significant level of information to allow the players to mathematically defeat every foe. Randomness provides a bit of risk within the system but its marginal. It is possible to not only mitigate the risk directly but to also to mitigate it via secondary and tertiary actions.

Within RPGs, players tend to do the same. Odds are everything flows to specific attributes, skills, and advantages that can minimize risk for a particular system. Certainly, I’ve used ill conceived system design to my advantage. Is that bad? Hardly. The rule designers give us choices. Many of the choices can be idiotic and completely useless. So a trend to using the useful is natural.

Online games only have 1 discriminator: the random number generator. RPGs have at least two: dice and the DM. I’d add other players in there as well because they introduce a crazy factor but statistically, I’d wager that impact is marginal. The randomness of dice efficiently eliminates the random number generator.

Many of the choices we make are driven by experience and to exploit the system. Each and every time I’ve been introduced to a new system, the knowledgeable players point out a subset of choices to utilize — maximizing benefit but often ignoring the lesser choices.

More often than not, the core selection is chosen to maximize effectiveness in combat. The alternatives are discarded because they do not appear to have as much impact. Everyone I’ve played with are apt to select the high effectiveness options rather than the lower powered alternatives.

Why? The GM has to amp up the game to counteract the unbalanced options. Doing so makes the other choices even less desirable. At least in a sheer numbers sense.

Strange as it sounds, this occurs because everyone knows the rules and can mathematically maximize the benefit. Rules achieve an imbalance by their very nature. Players can also maximize benefit by knowing their GM. How he plays and rules he utilities most often.

Basically, we power game as players even if we don’t consciously attempt to do so. Evolution wired us to survive so it makes complete sense.

Are there solutions? Absolutely. First and foremost, eliminate the system power skills. If its combat, make combat less common. House rule them out if you find everyone has the same skill or advantage. Ignore the whining. In the end, it will be better.

The many options are for role play, and as game masters, we eliminate many of them by our own actions. Nix the benefit, eliminate the imbalance.

Tags: Crpg, Game Design, Ramblings of Mark, rpg

After many discussions, I’ve settled on a campaign idea for the Spring Convergence. The setting will play off my Red Dawn session from the Fall but will not continue the original session. Instead, I’m going to blend that with other highly requested genres — Modern, Gritty Modern, Top Secret, and Cyberpunk. Each by itself is pretty simple to do although I abhor the over the top cybernetics of most ‘Punk settings. Cybernetics will be available but highly expensive.

I could sit down and run it tonight. My brain is full of the idea but I keep deviating when I attempt to write it up. My Achilles Heel has re-arrived in full force in the form of self distraction. I had a full week off of work during the holidays. My intention was to jot out the history, pick a game system to utilize, and then write up some campaign material. I did manage a few pages of background.

Those pages are not cohesive. They are random 4-5 paragraph blobs of trains of thought. Its a good start but then I started going awry. The concepts I want to use for the campaign are also of interest to me personally. So I bought some books on the subjects. Far too many, I have 5 non-fiction texts and 4 fiction books now just from a campaign idea. I’ve read 3 of the 9 books cover to cover in the last week. So I’m just going to force myself to write tonight in the form of the blog and see where it goes.

Couple that with random wandering on the internet about the subjects and well, I did not get very putting the pen to paper. I want this nugget of an idea to go beyond some mere mental concept into something I can hand to the players to develop characters. Deep characters so the background is critical. Normally I’d be able to sit down and explain my idea vocally. Convergence doesn’t allow me that luxury so I need to find a focus and move forward.

Modern/Post Modern is tough. My target players are all highly educated individuals so if I make a miscue in laying out the science, I fear I’ll fail to engage them properly. I’m probably over thinking the response. However, if I can blend modern science accurately within the session, I get a double entry point — something they want to play and a setting they want to play.

My premise is simple — the break down of modern society, the fall of nations, and the influence of wealth and power. It is not original nor do I intend it to be. This world is just another vision of how things could go wrong. I’m blending the current state of the U.S. with what could happen in the next 20 years. No cataclysmic events occur. My personal nightmare.

Why 2008 as a start? It’s the initial wake up call for everyone that the economy of every nation is intertwined. Sadly, its also the nation, which our wonderful politicians would deem “Too Big to Fail”. The United States economy is based completely on other people wanting to buy our debt. If no one is able or willing to buy that debt, the U.S. is just another Ponzi scheme. Bernie Madoff would be proud. Far too many transactions around the world rely on the U.S. dollar as a basis.

If I were a boxer, I’d see it as Round 1 jabs to determine the defensive posture of my opponent. He keeps hitting me in the body, wearing me down. Crude oil looks cheap on the surface in ’08. Demand is down, the economy is in the tank. Oil supplies are limited and running out.

Green energy is all the rage but it costs. A cost the U.S. economy cannot absorb immediately and the build out will take years and immense amounts of cash. Cash that only comes from people buying our debt. Except they are no longer able or willing to buy the phantom of the U.S. assurance to pay them back. And the efficiency of the green technologies are far below burning oil or coal for power. Everyone is strapped for cash. The U.S. burns more and more fossil fuels to keep the economy running. That boxer just hit me in the kidney…again.

Life sucks at this point…perhaps 2012 but it has been that way for a couple of years. The population is resigned to being in a recession or the Great Depression II. Life will improve. 15% unemployment is unprecedented but things are looking up according to the experts. The U.S. passes new laws. The unemployment extension act for the 12th time. The number of homeless people rises to 10% of the population. The homeless begin migrating across the U.S. in search of work, food, and handouts. The Welfare 2012 bill is held up because no other country wants to purchase debt based on a vacuum. The body blows keep coming.

2015. Financial reckoning. The U.S. starts defaulting on treasury bonds. The rest of the world is no better. Exxon buys Lockheed Martin. Total SA buys the defaulted assets of GM followed by Boeing. Corporations begin to field militaries to defend and protect the resources they own.

2018: Year of Storms. Hurricanes bash the U.S. southern and south eastern states. Florida is obliterated between the flooding and storm surge. New Orleans is swamped once again. The worst drought in history strikes the Mid Western states. The U.S. cannot produce enough food for its residents. Coastal infrastructure is destroyed and the U.S. can no longer produce fuel. Gas prices spike. Mass rioting occurs seeking food and shelter. Unemployment reaches 30%.

2019: The Gulf Stream current breaks down due to the desalination of the oceans. Lack of ice on the poles creates a massive feed forward climate shift. The remainder of the ice at the poles melt resulting in massive flooding of coastal areas. The entire population of the eastern and western seaboard states are forced inland.

Society breaks..

Tags: Convergence, Cyberpunk, Ramblings of Mark, rpg, Setting, Top Secret

This time of year is good for reflection. Its the time of year when you supposedly have more free time when work gives a few extra holidays or school is not in session yet you seem to be busier than ever.

The D&D Edition Wars

• I can recall having them when the transition went from 1st Edition to 2nd. They are hardly new and were not then. If the communication medium of today was available during that transition, the same arguments would have taken place. Maybe it happened in part from 2E to 3E, I didn’t rightly care at that point since I was out of the loop on the hobby.

 

• The passionate, engaged arguments on both sides of the fence are good. The arguments get people thinking but too often go too far. Different viewpoints expressed eloquently make me sit back and reconsider my own. Flaming arguments and insults do nothing for anyone at any time.

 

• New editions help keep the hobby alive. If I were sitting in my teenage shoes again and someone said “hey, this 30 year old game system is the best there ever was. Go try to track it down and play it.” I would have scoffed. Yet, today, you can get modern equivalents of every edition. Or buy the the originals if you care enough to do so.

 

• Enough is enough. I’ve purchased several editions of D&D. When 2E was pumping out book after book, I was fed up. I recall stating I was not going to buy more crap I didn’t need. I stopped not because I was fed up with the ongoing generation of rules, I was satiated with what I had. I didn’t realize it at the time but I wasn’t really pissed about the ongoing publication. I had enough books and systems to have fun. My gaming appetite was satisfied.

 

Heavy or Light: Rules are what you make of ‘em.

• I’ve vented often about tedious rule systems that I find ungainly. I just don’t enjoy trying to learn, recall, or micromanage them. Others find them intriguing and enjoyable. I will still try to convince you my opinion is superior but at the end of the day, if you are having fun, that is all that counts.

 

• Optional rules can hook people. One of the strange hooks about 1E D&D to me was the castle construction costs. I wasn’t playing often at that point but I spent hours drafting my ideal castle and figuring out what it was going to cost to construct. Completely frivolous but it engaged me in the hobby even when I was solo.

 

• Rules aren’t rules. They are suggestions. Play as many as you want, ignore as many as you dislike. The balance is within you and your group. Its a template evolving with you as you find what you most enjoy.

 

• Please don’t argue rules in a game session. Doing so disrupts the game and spoils the enjoyment for everyone around you. If you have a problem with a rules interpretation, note it and ask the GM after the session is over or before the next one. He made a judgement based on his knowledge of the game at the time. It might be wrong, it might have been hasty but her call is what is happening now.

 

Is it new?

• One of the great things about new systems is that they continue to adapt/adopt good elements of other systems. When I read some of the 4E books, I liked the idea of healing surges. Way too complex and intertwined for my taste and then I realized my gaming group already had used them. We used herbs, from Rolemaster, in 2E sessions. We ripped them literally from another game and applied them to a different system. Thanks Rolemaster

 

• Another great adaptation was the use of at-will/encounter/daily powers in 4E. I don’t really agree with the need for the comprehensive rule set but I love the idea. Mages in my fantasy games have gotten read/write/detect magic as basically at-will spells in my campaigns dating back to 1E. I also adapted spell point pools from some unknown source so they acted more as clerics to use a spell as needed rather than memorizing the wrong set and basically sitting on the sidelines. My apologies for not recalling the source, it may not even been a game system. I find the application in 4E too ubiquitous but that’s okay, others do not. Perhaps in a few years, I will reflect that 4E did what I intended better than I envisioned.

 

Community

• Wow. So many diverse view points across so many systems and genres. What can be better than that? I love the idea that someone I don’t know can enter my head and make me think, consider, or reconsider an idea. My thanks to everyone who takes time to espouse an opinion, post an idea, or produce something. I aim to do better in the new year to respond than I have this year.

 

• Be vocal, be proud, be opinionated.

The utter lack of absolutes make this hobby the most enjoyable one I’ve ever known. We might all disagree about critical elements. At the end of the day, if you had fun with your friends, I will lift a glass and toast you.

To you and your gaming group, happy holidays. May you have the best sessions in the year to come.

Tags: Annoyances, Game Design, Ramblings of Mark, rules

Campaign starts can be difficult. Players are looking for a quick start to get involved with the characters and be transported into the magical new setting. Game masters are trying to get the players involved in the storyline as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, the vision of the ideal party by the GM and what the characters bring to the table after character generation can be quite disparate.

Time for the GM to step up and in the words of Greywulf “Have fun and make shit up”. The original vision of a campaign rarely gets played due to the randomness of the character concept. GM’s are stuck with a collective of individual ideas and need to find a mechanism to transform them into a cohesive party and get the play under way.

If the campaign is going to be running for weeks or months, slow starts are easy to overcome. If the game is a one shot session or in a small time window, the game needs to start with a fury. Instant gratification for the players and the GM. Getting a single character engaged at the outset is hard enough but to get the entire group involved instantly seems intractable.

Instant starts are possible but all the players must be interested in the setting and the plot. The GM needs to start the game prior to character generation. The essence of the game has to be explained or be something immediately obvious so the players have a focus during character generation. Most importantly, the players need to generate characters with significant depth and history.

The goals, motivations, and history of the characters provide the necessary hooks for the GM to transform his initial creation into what the player’s want to play. More importantly, character backgrounds provide the GM with the information to exploit psychological triggers.

Triggers are the tripping points in a background to put a character into action. Force the character to react to a situation based on raw emotion, not cognition. Reverse the rule of think before you act. Put them in a situation that invokes an emotional response. To do so, you’ll likely need to know the players well. Great players with good backgrounds will respond even when it isn’t a significant event for the player but is for the character. If you know the players well, you can assume a trigger for the player will spill over into the character more often than not.

The easiest of the emotions to trigger are rage and anger. Violate a character’s sense of love and loyalty. They will respond. Any transgression against a character’s family will be met with a response. Appointed by their local kingdom to overcome something? Kill the king or invade the country. Find and identify the element in a character’s background you can exploit. If the character doesn’t have them, fall back on the player’s motivations.

A singular gut-check, raw, driven response by one character is usually sufficient to get everyone on board. If it isn’t, change it up. Encompass the entire group if you can.

Quick starts are accomplished by the players knowing what the GM has in mind. Then the GM being a prick. He’s not evil, he’s just poking buttons to get you engaged. May an orc eat me if I ever hear “you meet in a tavern” ever again.

Tags: advice, Game Mastering, Ramblings of Mark, rpg, Setting

Religion has been a significant factor within world history. Yet, within the campaigns I have run, it has never played a significant role. Speaking with Kevin, his experiences are the same. Perhaps its the unconscious playing to politically correct times. I’m going to call it a failure on my part to not exploit this obvious gaming opportunity..

Religious aspects are prevalent in most fantasy games. D&D provides a whole host of gods for characters to worship. Yet, you never see that worship carried over into supplements discussing religious differences or wars. Human history is mostly religious wars. Extreme, unconscionable acts have been undertaken in the name of religion. Warranted or not, they transformed us into the society we are today.

Religious differences are taboo. Modern society doesn’t want to consider them, let alone actually discuss them. Putting religion into the forefront of a game is going to be difficult. Yet, it has significant playability.

Consider the Crusades. Consider the American West when religions strove to convert the American Indians. Consider the modern missions to convert tribes in 3rd world countries to a specific religion. I find it all every strange but religious fervor can do that.

It is a Taboo topic. No one one wants to discuss it. Yet, people show up on my doorstep every few weeks trying to ply a variation of religion on me. In a fantasy environment, they would show up and mandate I change. Accept the Lord’s (of the realm) religion or be cast out.

Given the host of gods in most settings, religion is treated as accepting them all. I find that unlikely. Every small village will have a focus on a particular goddess. Expounding her over every other god.

Where are the cults, the religious extremists, the missionaries trying to convert people? How are the Clerics and Paladins of those faiths not trying to do what modern day bicycle riding missionaries doing? Where is the backlash when those gods fail?

As Kevin stated, why are there not lynchings of wizards. If a relatively modern society can lynch people for being suspected of wizardry, medieval ones would jump on it. Crops go wrong? Drought? Whatever it is the local mage or someone passing through would get blamed and probably burned.

I find the topic fascinating because I’ve never considered it within a game. Have you played religion at the extremes?

Tags: Game Design, Ramblings of Mark, rpg, rules, Setting

Twice annually, a small number of us gather for what we dub Convergence. Convergence is a long weekend where we gather at in a central location and game for as many hours as we can fit into the weekend. The first one was pretty ad-hoc. Other than a plan for when and where, none of us formulated a plan for the actual games to be played.

The second attempt was more organized. Instead of Friday night & Saturday, we arrived on Thursday night to have an additional full day. We had a plan for who was running and what system it was. A little forethought let us skip character generation to maximize on the on-site gaming time. In the end we ended up playing one of the pre-planned games and an ad-hoc short session of another game. The end result was far more enjoyable than the first attempt.

During a phone conversation, Kevin stated it would be far better to ask the players who and what they want to play rather than selecting a system by the GM based upon what he wants to run. It makes complete sense. The number of players outnumber the singular GM. Maximizing enjoyment for the majority should always be a priority. After all, when players have interest in the game, it ends up being a better session/campaign and gives each of them the opportunity to toss in some Rule of Cool.

So we’re going to pose the question to everyone planning to attend in the spring. What do you want to play? It won’t be quite that simple. Instead, I’ll be reaching back into a very introspective era when Kevin and I were actively debating the pros and cons of gaming systems, rules, settings and most importantly role playing.

1. Considering all the characters you have played over your gaming career, can you identify a specific one who didn’t reach the potential you envisioned? Or has there been a persona you’ve always wanted to play but have never quite had the opportunity?
2. With that character in mind, what is the ideal scenario, setting, or campaign that would fit the goals and motivations you have envisioned? What did you want to endeavour but didn’t get the chance to undertake? What would fulfil the character concept?

Note the absence of a rule system. Rule systems are just a framework we play by. Someone responding with a rule system didn’t really consider the question. Certainly, rules are useful and necessary in the majority of situations. Rules are also a barrier. A barrier most never recognize. Fewer still can play without rules. Pure enjoyment is achieved when player’s don’t ask how to use a die to achieve something. They act, you interpret, and it just keeps flowing. Dice are nice when you need to add the risk of failure but they are not an absolute necessity.

If everyone would start with an real idea of who the character is rather than what it can do based on rules and stats, gaming sessions would be a lot more fun. Ask to play outside of the box. If you hand a GM a character with a rich background and balanced capabilities, asking for a power outside the norm will not be a stretch..

Instead, everyone starts it with “I have stats of X, Y, Z…and P, D, Q” … uhh, guess I’ll play this template because it fits my rolls. The rules just quashed another great character based on dice. At least it could have been a great character. GMs can make template characters come to life but doing so is the exception, not the rule.

Personally, the most enjoyable experiences I’ve had gaming were when the G in RPG was an afterthought. All the play was dominated by goal driven role play not by fighting a battle with a foe. Defeating an opponent doesn’t always need to take the form of combat.

I have faith there are many other DMs and players like us. I haven’t yet identified the persona I most want to play in the spring But I’m working on it.

Tickle your imagination… Who, where, what and why would you choose?

Tags: Convergence, Ramblings of Mark, rpg, rules

My ponderings for the Fall Convergence began a month or two back.   I was ill prepared to GM for the March convergence but ran an Old West game off the top of my head.   It was mostly ad-hoc and as such suffered from the normal stalls inherent to getting players together, moving the action along, etc.   Its hard to ramp up a 1-off session with very little planning even with great players.

So I set about pondering.   Leafing through my library of books, resource materials, and the array of affilitiated, odd-ball stuff I’ve collected, I walked away thinking something was awry.   There was plenty of stuff available including things I cannot even recall purchasing…let alone the reasons for procuring them at the time.   Inspiration came a few hours later via the History Channel.

Yes, Kevin, I know, always go back to Inspector Gadget.   Where do you find IG these days? -M

The show was about various people, locations, and events during the Prohibition era.   Gangsters, Cops, and Feds allow a vast array of things for a short lived campaign.   Perfect for a Convergence session or three.   A bit of searching around found a variety of systems set in the period.   All of them probably would work just fine.

I went old school and bought a GangBusters (TSR) rule book and 3 modules for inspriration off EBay for about $15.   None of the other people have played the system before and we’re not going to learn it anyway.   Character generation and about 12 rules will suffice…probably 6 or less is more than enough.   I could probably do it with KORE but I’m lazy and my available time is limited.

Game system.  Check.   Area of the genre?   Law enforcement?   Politicians?   Gangsters?  Media?  GangBusters contains it all and suggest a mixed group of all the above.   That is not a reasonable for a single weekend and probably not cohesive enough for a general campaign overall.   Perhaps that was its downfall or perhaps the genre just wasn’t fantastic enough for most.      Being the law is easy on players, they know right from wrong and can easily apply it to characters.

Too easy!   Criminals it is.   Gangsters they will be in one fashion or another.   Not high-ranking over the top ones,  they’ll have to get bloody and do the dirty work.      When common sense and morality are not on your side, you have to push yourself to figure out who, what, and why you are in the role.   I’m railroading the characters at the start so I’ll never have to do it again over the weekend.

Next up is filling out the campaign premise.  Low to mid level gangsters provide a lot of room for chaos.   So I read the material in the rule book and all three modules.   Two of the three modules got discarded quickly.  There are gems to be exploited but not enough for the baseline.   Strangely enough, the material in the rulebook I bought and the 1st module are near identical.   Not surprisingly, its just two different “versions” of the game that may as well be the same stuff repackaged.  I know, I know, you are “shocked”.  So was I.

Both the module and the rule system, dubbed “3rd Edition”, provide a nice baseline of NPC characters and some starter plot lines even if they are nearly identical.   After reading through them a couple of times, I started  jotting notes on scrap paper.   Personas, organizations, plot ideas, actual encounter thoughts are put to paper.   Even if they are copies of the actual material.     If I write it down, my brain retains it far longer than if I let the whim pass by.

The scratched notes are nice but not much of a plan.  Its in my brain and not on paper and will be lost if no action is taken.     So I grabbed a new notebook and started transferring ideas.   One person per page.   One organization per page.   One encounter per page.  If you’ve never seen the idea of a One Page Dungeon, Google it.  I’ve used it for 20 years but cannot say it was formalized.  Its a fantastic methodology to prepare for the chaos your players will create.

I’m unlikely to use the notebook during the gaming sessions.   Every plan is screwed as soon as it is enacted.   But I can use every page to sit down the next day, scratch out people, make notes on others, update events at a location.   Sometimes I need a reminder about a person or place I had in mind.   The notebook will make that easy enough.

However, on the One Page Per Dungeon thought, you may need to start a fight to keep it flowing.   When you have a couple dozen plausible encounters noted in part, its quick and easy to exploit.  And if this idea translates between a couple of different Convergence Sessions, 6 months or more apart, that notebook will be a godsend.

The last Convergence was a great time.   This one should be even better.

Tags: Boot Hill, Convergence, GangBusters, Ramblings of Mark, Setting, system