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Post by Brave Sir Robin on Oct 16, 2015 7:33:58 GMT
So this was my first time hosting, just me and Alex for this episode. What did you guys think?
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missnash
Officer of Many Letters
illustrating happy
Posts: 190 
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Post by missnash on Oct 16, 2015 8:17:16 GMT
Currently listening!  |
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missnash
Officer of Many Letters
illustrating happy
Posts: 190
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Post by missnash on Oct 16, 2015 9:11:09 GMT
As a game-geek that was so interesting and helpful! Lots of little things you talked about that I'm going to try and look into/do - especially with the character generation! I'm inspired! We've got our fist game on Halloween weekend, it's going to be a bit of a binge I think (so we can get to grips with it without worry of having to be anywhere) so the suggestion of lots of food and periodically opening windows has genuinely been taken on board!
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Post by grumblyarcher on Oct 17, 2015 6:31:42 GMT
Definitely good stuff, especially the bits reinforcing the idea that this really is not a competition. That mindset is one of the things that causes innumerable problems in gaming circles. I've played in high lethality campaigns and been both amused and frustrated by them. One of my most famous (in my group anyway) characters, Old Man Bespoke, was the result of getting annoyed at losing so many characters.
Knowing when and how to railroad a party is also insanely important. I've known a lot of players that are the sort to constantly try and throw a monkey wench into the main plot line just because they can and it kills me. On the flipside is the party knowing when to let themselves be railroaded.
A tale I like to toss around is when a DM began to demonstrate a very bad habit of railroading through swaggering 'badass' NPCs that treated the PCs like dirt and essentially forced the party into the story by trying to intimidate them and ruining their lives. It was not just one or two, it was a constant theme. Any NPC that was not part of planned combat could be guaranteed to have much higher level and to throw their weight around like a playground bully.
My character was on parole after doing his time for the revenge/self-defense killing of his wife's murderers. I had originally intended him to be a something of a redemption story but after getting spat on one too many times, I ended up playing up certain aspects of his personality. He rapidly became this rather nihilistic fellow with a remarkable anti-authoritarian streak. I made it very clear that intimidation was not going to work on him as there was absolutely nothing that could be held over him while stubbornly presenting what were ultimately reasonable demands. If you wanted him to do something, you treated him as your equal or provided him a good reason, period.
The DM, to his immense credit, adapted. He figured out some clever ways to use my backstory and began to engage the party more outside of having his NPCs push us around.
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Samwise
Member of the Order of the Quill
Posts: 156
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Post by Samwise on Oct 22, 2015 20:51:45 GMT
I really enjoyed this podcast, definitely opened my eyes to playing RPG's and being a DM, and I will definitely be taking a lot of your advice on board. My main struggle is letting go of my storyline and let the players do what they want, but after a few sessions it's clear to see its more enjoyable when they do their own thing, especially when solving puzzles. My query for you guys is about the character creation, my friends are new to RPG's and they suffer from orphan after vengeance syndrome. Would you possibly have some of those questions Alex gave you guys to hand I could possibly ask my friends to get a better backstory and more detailed characters. Really loving these behind the scenes podcasts, and hearing about past sessions you guys have played and ran  please keep them coming. |
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Post by Melysllew on Oct 27, 2015 16:41:53 GMT
Currently listening to this episode, and definitely enjoying it! I'm liking the Metacast stuff and definitely would love to see more. I'm relatively new to DMing (and I am not great at it because of it, although I am improving... i hope) so as I was organizing my campaign, I decided that I wanted less players. Originally I invited 4 people to play, but that rapidly grew to 6 because we had new players wanting to try RPG out. This has now turned into 7 players since another person put me in a situation where I couldn't not invite them too later on. So, does anyone have advice on handling a bigger group, especially if there are a number of people in the group who have no RPG experience. Also, is there any easy way to sit down with a player and tell them that you don't like their attitude within the game?? Like everyone else is saying, please keep these coming, they are awesome! |
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Post by rainbowdeity on Oct 27, 2015 17:38:07 GMT
My query for you guys is about the character creation, my friends are new to RPG's and they suffer from orphan after vengeance syndrome. Would you possibly have some of those questions Alex gave you guys to hand I could possibly ask my friends to get a better backstory and more detailed characters. I often find that the best questions to ask are ones that highlight either positives or vulnerabilities in a character's personality/history. As Bryn and Alex said, the Orphan Vengeance archetype is often a way to sever ties from the world and large and ensure the character is immune to many consequences - which is best achieved by playing the character as a lone wolf driven mainly by negative emotions (anger, hatred... you know, all the stuff that leads to the dark side). So stuff like 'Who's your best friend?' or 'What's your favourite memory?' can really help to bring out a little more depth. In addition, forcing the character to tie themselves to the world is often a good plan, so even a simple thing like 'What's your character's hobby?' can tie them to some sort of structure (even if they say something like 'Hunting... on my own... while sulking', you can ask them whether they have any rival hunters, have they competed in any competitions, where do they get their hunting supplies from etc...). Even the most seemingly mundane elements can provide rich pickings for plot hooks and moments of levity in a character's otherwise grumpy, batman-esque life. |
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Post by Brave Sir Robin on Oct 28, 2015 0:11:03 GMT
Currently listening to this episode, and definitely enjoying it! I'm liking the Metacast stuff and definitely would love to see more. I'm relatively new to DMing (and I am not great at it because of it, although I am improving... i hope) so as I was organizing my campaign, I decided that I wanted less players. Originally I invited 4 people to play, but that rapidly grew to 6 because we had new players wanting to try RPG out. This has now turned into 7 players since another person put me in a situation where I couldn't not invite them too later on. So, does anyone have advice on handling a bigger group, especially if there are a number of people in the group who have no RPG experience. Also, is there any easy way to sit down with a player and tell them that you don't like their attitude within the game?? Like everyone else is saying, please keep these coming, they are awesome! Oh man, that's really tough. A group of 7 is not easy to manage. The one time I had a group of that size i ended up splitting it in to two groups and running two games side-by-side. That was way more work than I was ready for, but other than that, it sorta worked. As for talking to one player that way, nope, there isn't an easy shortcut sadly. You can always try the sandwich approach - surround the bad things with good things. It's never great - the most important thing is to remember to separate in game discussions from out of game things as much as possible. Good luck! |
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Post by Melysllew on Oct 29, 2015 18:33:13 GMT
Oh man, that's really tough. A group of 7 is not easy to manage. The one time I had a group of that size i ended up splitting it in to two groups and running two games side-by-side. That was way more work than I was ready for, but other than that, it sorta worked. As for talking to one player that way, nope, there isn't an easy shortcut sadly. You can always try the sandwich approach - surround the bad things with good things. It's never great - the most important thing is to remember to separate in game discussions from out of game things as much as possible. Good luck! Thanks I was thinking of splitting my party up for a while, so hopefully I can manage that. |
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Post by Brave Sir Robin on Oct 30, 2015 10:05:02 GMT
My query for you guys is about the character creation, my friends are new to RPG's and they suffer from orphan after vengeance syndrome. Would you possibly have some of those questions Alex gave you guys to hand I could possibly ask my friends to get a better backstory and more detailed characters. I often find that the best questions to ask are ones that highlight either positives or vulnerabilities in a character's personality/history. As Bryn and Alex said, the Orphan Vengeance archetype is often a way to sever ties from the world and large and ensure the character is immune to many consequences - which is best achieved by playing the character as a lone wolf driven mainly by negative emotions (anger, hatred... you know, all the stuff that leads to the dark side). So stuff like 'Who's your best friend?' or 'What's your favourite memory?' can really help to bring out a little more depth. In addition, forcing the character to tie themselves to the world is often a good plan, so even a simple thing like 'What's your character's hobby?' can tie them to some sort of structure (even if they say something like 'Hunting... on my own... while sulking', you can ask them whether they have any rival hunters, have they competed in any competitions, where do they get their hunting supplies from etc...). Even the most seemingly mundane elements can provide rich pickings for plot hooks and moments of levity in a character's otherwise grumpy, batman-esque life. When Alex Newall is back in the country we'll try and get him to share the list he gave us when we wrote backstories for rusty quill. It was a good list. I always find character choices about what to protect and what to sacrifice really interesting. Characters with nothing to lose do not have as many story options. Oh man, that's really tough. A group of 7 is not easy to manage. The one time I had a group of that size i ended up splitting it in to two groups and running two games side-by-side. That was way more work than I was ready for, but other than that, it sorta worked. As for talking to one player that way, nope, there isn't an easy shortcut sadly. You can always try the sandwich approach - surround the bad things with good things. It's never great - the most important thing is to remember to separate in game discussions from out of game things as much as possible. Good luck! Thanks I was thinking of splitting my party up for a while, so hopefully I can manage that. Let us know how it goes. Thanks everyone for the kind feedback on metacasts, I really enjoy them and I'm glad they're being well received. We have actually recorded two additional ones, but I don't know what the release schedule for those is yet. They may well not have been edited. We're planning to do more in the long run, but they can be tough to find time for - and we don't want to miss out on actual play time. I seem to recall a thread somewhere where you can mention topics you'd like us to address. We've always kinda wanted to do a mailbag metacast, but we just need enough questions first. |
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Post by Alex Newall on Nov 2, 2015 15:48:00 GMT
Only just got back in country. I will get that list to everyone in the next couple of days. |
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Samwise
Member of the Order of the Quill
Posts: 156
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Post by Samwise on Nov 4, 2015 14:10:38 GMT
even a simple thing like 'What's your character's hobby?' can tie them to some sort of structure (even if they say something like 'Hunting... on my own... while sulking', you can ask them whether they have any rival hunters, have they competed in any competitions, where do they get their hunting supplies from etc...). Even the most seemingly mundane elements can provide rich pickings for plot hooks and moments of levity in a character's otherwise grumpy, batman-esque life.
Brilliant thanks so much for the advice, ill plan for them to work a bit on them before our next session.
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please keep them coming.
