He claims that their group ends up doing something like this almost every week and I think it’s a GREAT idea.  In my old campaign, we would periodically do offline blog posts as our characters and I would provide a little roleplaying experience, but this takes the idea of online campaign content in a different way that I really think is cool.

Has anyone else tried doing this yet?  How did it go for you?  Let’s hear from you in the comments!

Group Storytelling

This chapter alone is a mandatory read for anyone that is a Dungeon Master.  This chapter is primarily the product of Robin Laws, author of one of my favorite books to date on dungeon mastering – Robin’s Laws of Good Gamemastering.  Mr. Laws outlines several storytelling devices including  how to build drama, use of a mechanic called pass/fail branching, and how to construct the best possible narrative with these tools.

In addition to narrative-building tools, this chapter contains a section on soliciting and incorporating player input which allows the DM to collaborate with their players in order to craft encounters and campaigns.  This mechanic is fundamentally important, and (happily) has been one that I have used for years in my campaigns.  This chapter provides a notable addition in the form of discussion around the limits of collaboration in encounter and game design.  Again, this is an area of DungeonMastering that is often done incorrectly and the advice presented in this chapter is invaluable.

Vignettes and Drama

This chapter also presents the concepts of vignettes, which are small shapted scenes that enable you to infuse your games with more player interaction.  Some examples of this (presented in further detail) are flashbacks, dream sequences, and teasers.  These appear to be used as “glue” to hold together encounters within a game session… a small amount of extra pizazz for your session.  These vignettes feel considerably similar to the episodic content that we have outlined over the years, only miniature in size and usually short running.

Finally, at long last, some guidelines are presented relating to roleplaying experience.  This is presented as “Drama Rewards”, and is built around the amount of time spent in valuable, meaningful roleplaying aimed toward the advancement of plot.  I was thrilled to see this in the Table of Contents, and even happier once I read the ideas on how to dispense these rewards.

Companion Characters

Finally, this excellent chapter concludes with detailed rules surrounding creating companion characters: both monster characters and uniquely crafted companion characters.  Included are instructions for keeping the companion characters consistent with the rest of the party in abilities, damage, and game balance.  Probably the most striking concept about this chapter is how the author adeptly provides advice on how to make the companion character a natural part of the story arc, including their background motivations and traits.  It was truly eye-opening to see this process committed so clearly to a few charts and rules.

I have consistently had difficultly in creating meaningful companion characters, so I suspect this portion of the chapter will get a lot of exercise.

Back to the drawing board

One of my favorite elements of the Group Storytelling chapter is the DM’s Workshop insets.  These asides take you into a situation and explains how to apply one of the concepts in a real game scenario.  Many of us RPGBloggers have gone through a lot of effort to relate our own experiences in this same fashion; this advice is very attainable and easy to understand.

For the rest of this week, we’ll be exploring more features of the DMG2, including Advanced Encounters and Skill Challenges!

In Which Vanir Relays The Origin Story Of Stupid Ranger To Provide Backdrop For His Tale

Way back in late 2003, my bachelor days were coming to a close, and I’d been dating my now-wife about 8 months. My longtime karate buddy Dante was back from college and job hunting, and we invited him and his wife (Stupid Ranger, who I’d only met a couple times before), and we invited them over for New Years at Efreak’s apartment along with a couple of her college friends. After thoroughly disturbing the other guests (I believe the phrase Dante used during Charades was “the Right Testicle of Our Lord?”), we decided it was so much fun we wanted to get together more often. I forget whose idea it was to play D&D, but I was thoroughly excited about the idea. I approached my lady-friend with the idea, and she was apprehensive about it. Eventually, I successfully pestered her enough to try it.

It was rough for her at first, especially the roleplaying, but she got the hang of it eventually. And so the four of us, along with our friend John, embarked on a year-long adventure that would come to be known as the Evensbrook campaign. Efreak played a little rogue gnome named Goudy Sans Sarah (she’s a graphic designer – if you don’t laugh, she will negatively readjust your kerning). I loved that campaign. I thought Efreak did too. I was wrong.

In Which Vanir Completely Chubs His Perception Check

Things went really well for a couple months. But slowly, the frustration she was feeling started to get the best of her. She was too scared to tell me she wanted to quit, and I, of course, was too blinded by the fact that I had a wife who played D&D with me to notice. However, I did start to take notice when she started referring to game night as “F#$*ING D&D”. It was, at the time, like a bomb went off in my face. That sucked. A lot.

In retrospect, I can’t say I’m really surprised there was a breakdown of communication. It was during our first year of marriage, and wow did we need to spend some skill points on that. And we eventually got through that and a lot of other stuff in the years to come, but gaming was one thing we never really saw eye to eye on since. We’d play a little Rock Band every now and then or the occasional game of Scrabble, but by and large we’d just hang out and watch TV. And, as previously stated, my heart’s desire is to game with my wife. So, it never really sat very well with me.

Consequently, every couple of months, I decide to try another game and see if she’ll play it with me. Usually, it’s a videogame. And unfortunately, it usually results in her getting frustrated and not wanting to play anymore. Which sucks, and is not the outcome I wanted at all.

In Which Vanir Discovers That Level 5 Married People Have More Skill Points

This very cycle was perpetuating in my living room yesterday night, this time with Carcassonne on the Xbox 360. I’d recently played the tabletop version with friends and enjoyed it, and thought perhaps it might do the trick since the console version did all the math for you. Well, she got frustrated again, and I got frustrated again, but something a little different happened this time. I’m not quite exactly sure what, but I think our communications circuitry might have finally adapted.

We started having a very enlightening conversation as to what it was we both want out of games. I’m certain we’d tried to have this conversation before, but this time it worked a lot better. The things I enjoy in a game are somewhat typical of a lot of “gamer” types. I like twitch games and shooters, but I have a special weakness for turn-based strategy (disclaimer: I suck at it, but I love it) . I like a lot of interactivity in my games, and I like to feel like I’ve accomplished something when I finish one. And, as you may have guessed, I loves me some roleplaying.

Efreak, on the other hand, loves games of chance. She likes Rock Band. She absolutely hates strategy games. When I asked her why, she said she gets so stressed out that she feels like she’s going to have a heart attack. That’s when it started to make a little more sense to me. When she comes home from work, and she’s frazzled out of her mind, one of the things I’ll frequently hear her say is “I don’t care, I just don’t want to decide anything“. She’s been making decisions and stressing out at work all day. She doesn’t want to do it at home on top of all that. Decisions aren’t relaxing for her, ergo strategy games aren’t relaxing for her. And here I was picking a lot of turn based stuff because I thought it would be slower paced (and I like it). My dear wife informs me a lot of women feel like this.

How in the hell did I miss this? So what does she find relaxing? “Traditional” games like Life,  in which you don’t have to decide very much. The excitement of winning a race just from random chance appeals to her. Card games (sadly, the only one I really know is poker, and that’s only because… well…). Games that you can use your brain on (but not strategy) like Trivial Pursuit. I don’t understand why she likes Scrabble. I’m usually thinking two moves ahead when I play that game, but whatever she does it makes her more than a match for my limited intellect.

There is also a certain amount to which, for some reason, she gets intimidated because “you’re so much better at these games than I am”. I don’t generally pwn the crap out of my wife every time we play games, but it’s a factor nonetheless. Playing a game of chance, in this case, makes her feel like she’s on equal ground.

In any case, it’s plain to see we’re different kinds of gamers. Now, the trick is going to be finding where that Venn diagram intersects so we can have some fun together.

In Which Vanir Ponders The Road Ahead

Well, the road ahead for damn sure contains Boom Blox, as that’s one game Efreak specifically said she’d love to play with me. And she’s a huge Beatles fan, so this is a no-brainer. We’re also going to head out to our FLGS and try to find some stuff we’d both enjoy playing.

In the meantime, I would wholeheartedly encourage anyone with similar experiences as ours to either tell your tale, or (better!) to share what you’ve done that helped you. We surely cannot be the only couple who have gone through this!

Ultimately, it comes down to one of our old standbys here at Stupid Ranger – the only thing that matters is that everyone at the table is having fun. Finding out how to do that in one’s marriage might take some time and effort, but I can’t really think of a better reason to get back on the horse and keep trying.

Until next time!

Be a better roleplayer by asking how you can make the situation better.

Many people complain about their roleplaying experience as a function of the shortcomings of the DM or the interaction of the roleplaying group as a whole. Blaming others is as natural as drawing breath for most people, and in some cases it may be warranted and deserved. I want to challenge everyone to stop blaming everyone else and take some in-game actions to get noticed and inject your character into the roleplaying mix.

Ask yourself the following question: “What can I do to get more actively involved with this story or my adventuring party?” By being personally accountable for helping to steer the story or interact with the other players, you will drive yourself to not be a victim of circumstance within your group. This may spawn a myriad of different results given your roleplaying group and DungeonMaster, but I’m sure it will open up some roleplaying avenues to make you a more satisfied player.

This also works for introverted roleplayers too!

As you all may know, the DM often has many things to juggle behind the screen and it can be quite easy to overlook the more quiet and subtle roleplayers in the group. If you’re not a very outgoing person and this is an especially hard challenge, ask yourself what you can do to support someone else’s strong roleplaying. Often, acting to support another player’s roleplaying will get you noticed because its so darned unusual that most DMs will take pause when you do this.

This advice should also help in groups with very strong roleplayers, and it will help safeguard you from getting drowned out by their bold style. Having fun is the first step, that should cause the DM to notice and throw some more formulated roleplaying/adventuring opportunities your way!

Cursed Consumerism!

This just threw a healthy splash of gasoline on the fire for me to plan my new gaming sanctuary at my new home. While I might not be able to afford the Sultan (unless their big reveal is more economical models!), I certainly would like some sort of a custom gaming area to inhabit with my motley band of adventurers.

The space itself needs some finishing, so once that is done I am looking ahead for some good multi-purpose ideas for using that space as a gaming/recreation area. I’m thinking a big, home-rolled whiteboard would be nice both for drawing encounters or keeping score for the ol’ dart board. A more high tech solution might come along depending on how my research into multitouch surface technology goes… that may take a back burner until warmer months when I can comfortably build things outdoors again.

Other necessary components, aside from a place to rest one’s butt:

• A food/drink/alcohol dispensary of some kind.
• One to many book containment units
• One to many miniature containment units
• Some sort of music system to provide some mad roleplaying tunes
• The all-important ambiance factor, meaning a place to display the ample Lord of the Rings prop/sword collection
• Some sort of glorified display for my autographed OD&D sourcebooks, perhaps with mini Gygaxian Shrine (seriously not a joke here people, I want this!)

I will provide updates as they develop… or when the guys at Geek Chic finally get the hint and drop ship me their newest model for… uh… review and testing purposes. Heck, I’ll even take their slightly loved used equipment off their hands!

As I return from dreamland, feel free to shout out whatever random stuff that comes to mind when you think about your ideal gaming space. Coolest ideas I haven’t thought of already will likely get you hugged if we ever meet IRL, and have a distinct possibility of being implemented in the final Roleplaying Dungeon!

Humility replaced with shame/bravado

One of our commenters, Marty Lund, pointed out quite correctly that humility isn’t something that comes commonly in our culture. This is cutting very close to exactly the point I was trying to articulate… you can take ownership of your nerdly leanings in a humble way and not defaulty replace it with shame as many of us do.

When I am approached by someone at work that notices the d20 on my desk or my “Chewie is my co-pilot” sticker in my cube, I usually just tell them plainly that I enjoy roleplaying games (yes, like D&D) and I let the conversation unfold. Usually they don’t throw holy water on me and cast my demons out, nor do they laugh and tease me… in fact, most folks that I work with have at least tried roleplaying or know someone that is into it well enough to have some context, and it turns out to be a good conversation.

I will admit to being a little pumped up from watching a certain president-elect speak when I wrote the last post, but I really am not advocating you jump up on your chair at work, cite page 32 of the OD&D sourcebook, put on a towel as a cape and run around your cube to show how much you’re into the roleplaying nerd genre. In the end, I’d just be happy if we fought a little bit against that common (but not universal) reaction to self-deprecate.

That being said: I really wouldn’t MIND if you did the things I mentioned above.

For the record: yes, Anonymous, I am married. To Stupid Ranger (the person, not the site) and luckily she’s as much of a nerd as I am!

Thanks to everyone who commented on the last post, the intelligent discourse was certainly refreshing!

Enjoy!

This weekend the StupidRanger crew is heading out of town and that got me to thinking: how does everyone handle traveling long distances? I would like to recount one failed attempt on my part and open up the floor to obvious criticism and comments.

Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’ (wheels, not dice!)

In one of our recent campaigns, the party was tasked with traveling across country to locate pieces of an important artifact. It was all fun and games for awhile, I had a few episodic encounters put together for them to experience along the way and I augmented that with a few random encounters.

Even though the encounters fit into the landscape (feral wildlife and whatnot), eventually both the players and I tired of the encounters. They still had a long way to travel, and having already established this as a “dangerous” territory it didn’t stand to reason that they would be able to travel unmolested for a week or more.

How not to see the coastal plains on just three gold pieces a day.

Eventually, I ended up giving up and in the best interest of the players I handwaved a fair portion of the rest of the travel. I wasn’t very satisfied with this as a DM, I felt as if I should have come up with a more interesting way to transport them across hill and dale without just nixing the “dangerous” aspect of the terrain. The group ended up getting from Point A to Point B and things quickly picked back up once they were wired back into the plot, I suppose a good solution would’ve been not to establish plot points half of the coastal lands away.

Has anyone else run into this difficulty before? If so, how do you quickly move your group without having a random wizard show up and teleport them where they need to be conveniently?

You have the right to be unique!

This statement can apply to so many different areas… but you have the right to be unique in your roleplaying or gaming interests, in your choice of characters, even in the systems you play or the modifications you made to said systems. That is one of the lures that makes the roleplaying game space so interesting to me… it is almost always up for interpretation and modification.

Why do nerds always feel ashamed?

It is your right and duty to engage in your roleplaying games, video games, systems, friendships, and interests in whatever way you desire, and it has constantly puzzled me why gamer nerds have this near universal shame that goes along with their interests. I’ve even seen it spill over into professional areas like computer programming and graphic communications. People seem to want to distance themselves from their passions and skills and I have never understood why.

Me? I’m a nerd and I’m proud of it. I like roleplaying, computer programming, and Heroes. I think it is time that we collectively stand up and embrace our nerdly leanings!

Who’s with me?

I found this excellent piece written by our very own Stupid Ranger on exactly that topic, I hope you enjoy it! Stupid Ranger and I will be undergoing a significant amount of change over the coming weeks, and as we get adjusted we will augment our new content with some of our favorite archived posts, of which this is one. Enjoy!

As your character gains experience and continues to explore the great wide world, you may notice the need to evolve. Not to worry, it’s completely normal for your character to evolve. There have been many, many campaigns in which I developed a character only to realize that some facet of my character doesn’t fit with the group dynamics.

Evolution for the Good of the Many

I originally intended for Skythorn to be more of a background character, there for the battles but nearly invisible during NPC interactions. However, the realization that Lumbar had a tendency to make things more… chaotic meant that Skythorn had to take a more hands-on approach with some NPC’s to ensure the party survived the interaction long enough to actually accept the quest. Skythorn did became more of a negotiator and spokesperson than I had originally planned, but she didn’t go out and introduce herself to everyone in town or seek additional attention. She evolved for the good of the party without betraying the underlying Skythorn-ness that made her unique.

Evolution for your Own Sanity

Recently, I found myself in another situation in which my original character concept was in contrast with the rest of the group. We started a new campaign, and I build a multi-class Fighter/Cleric since most of the rest of the group were not combat-types. I didn’t have a lot of time to develop my backstory , so I fell back on one of the classics: country bumpkin. Silvia was from an unknown outlying community, brought to the group because she could offer support in battle and with healing; she didn’t appear to be highly educated and seemed very naive. Unfortunately, the rest of my group all hadbackstories placing them in wealthy families from town or other lines of nobility. My country bumpkin just wasn’t working out, and it was making life difficult for me to keep Silvia on good terms with the rest of the group. So, when we were dismissed from our meeting with the king’s representative, I dropped the hokey accent and explained to the rest of the group that while I was from a small community, I only played the “simple country lass” around the authority figures to avoid having to deal with their stupidity. She now has two personae: one for the bureaucrats and one for the group.

Evolve Modestly and Logically

If you’re having difficulties with something about character after a few sessions, try examining the problem. If it’s just that the guy across the table has decided that his character will be in perpetual conflict with yours, nothing you do will change that. However, if your character’s personality could be tweaked for the better good (where better good = you having more fun), start identifying a few small steps that would improve your character. Once you’ve decided on a change, don’t just stand up and announce your intentions; find some in-game roleplaying opportunities to introduce your newly evolved character traits.

I do believe, however, that you shouldn’t change just for the sake of changing. Evolution doesn’t just occur because everything is going great; some catalyst sparks change for the best. Examine the circumstance. Review your character’s personality, backstory, profession, race. Take a look at everything carefully before deciding if you really need to change. Then, if you feel that a slight evolution would be for the best, start planning how to implement that change. Remember, this is all about having fun, and if you’re not having fun, maybe it’s time to change.

Originally Posted on 10/7/2007 by Vanir-

In a lot of gaming groups I’ve played in, it’s not an unusual occurrence for eyes to roll and mumbles of “damn it, not again” to be overheard when somebody decides to roleplay. Frequently, this is because the would-be roleplayer has decided to do something stupid and/or outrageous in the name of roleplaying. Having put much more emphasis on roleplaying in the last several years, I think I’ve figured out a major reason why — and how to minimize its effects.

Schtick
When some people roleplay, it’s more like they’re following a list of unchangeable rules they’ve established for their character. They’re dedicated to “fighting evil” and that’s what they do no matter what.The worst example of this is the dreaded “attack on sight” mentality.

I’ve also seen a lot of people who think a particular concept would be funny and that’s their character’s schtick for the whole campaign. For instance, their character is afraid of rats so they’d make a big five minute deal about checking for rats under every snowbank if they were in the middle of the Arctic tundra. These kind of characters seem to me like the player is telling a joke that takes six months or more to tell — but the punchline still makes everybody roll their eyes. It wouldn’t be so bad if this was something this character does somewhat regularly in the course of roleplaying, but when it happens without fail, even during battle, it is murder-inspiringly annoying.

You’ve probably figured out by now that I’m not crazy about this particular brand of roleplaying. Either the characters just get irritating or the players do things that cause things to go horribly wrong “because that’s what their character would do”. Like charging a dozen orcs all by yourself with a first level wizard.

Of course, there are always the characters that you didn’t mean to end up this way. These are the ones that you’ve honestly set out to roleplay fully, but either the concept didn’t work out as well as you’d hoped or the setting changes or doesn’t allow you to do what you had planned. And you end up doing the same thing over and over and over and getting bored. Bat Loaf is a very good example of this — he was a ton of fun to play for the first 5-6 sessions. The problem with Bat was that there were many, many roleplaying opportunities well-suited for him in the beginning and it was fun because his misadventures would spill over into what the other players were doing and vice versa. As the story progressed these roleplaying encounters dried up in favor of Major Plot Events — but there was still an inn, booze, and women in every town we’d travel to. Eventually the cycle of “go to inn, get drunk and find chick, run away, occasionally Inspire Courage +2 in combat” got old. For everyone, since it meant splitting the party pretty much every single session. And it just got boring for me.

Intentional or not, the problem with schtick is that it eventually gets in the way. One-trick PC’s are either a direct hindrance to the game for everyone, or they just aren’t fun anymore after awhile.

The Cure

I think schtick comes from three sources: lack of imagination, laziness, and an inability to sense danger. A little effort goes a long way when making your character. And the reason the other players get irritated when a Schticky player does things is because he’s not playing the same game they are anymore. He’s playing his own and doesn’t care about the consequences for everyone else. Which makes them want to hurt him.

Here’s a few ways to avoid personal bodily injury:

• Well-Developed Characters
  Well-developed backstory and character motivations and schtick don’t mix. They cannot exist together. A well-developed character with a frequent quirk is fine – it’s just a personality trait and doesn’t define the character. The difference? A one-trick PC is that same quirk armed with a battleaxe.
• Acknowledge That Your Character Has Intelligence
  Your character REALLY hates orcs. Your character is also, in most cases, an experienced warrior. They know it’s dumb to face a dozen orcs alone. Instead of attacking them all, think of strategies. You might even use (gasp) TEAMWORK. Or decide that you could do more damage later if you live to fight another day. Most one-trick PC’s are roleplayed as if their INT was about 6 or 7. Their INT scores are probably much higher, which means they wouldn’t think in such simplistic terms as “ORC! BOB SMASH NOW!”. Act smarter than that, and make your PC’s act smarter than that.
• Change Things Up
  Nothing says your PC can’t change if it’s not working as planned. Hell, an emotional crossroads makes for a good roleplaying excuse. Incidentally, that’s how I saved Bat Loaf from one-trick PC hell — I married him off, got him some new abilities, and had him start a bardic rock academy / militia. All of a sudden the old boring stuff became backstory for me to build on and he’s fun again.

Hopefully, this will significantly decrease the number of eye-rolls at your gaming table. Have you had problems with Schtick in your gaming group? We’d love to hear them, and how you deal with it.

In the next installment of Roleplaying Pitfalls, I’ll talk about another issue plaguing today’s modern roleplayer: the dreaded Spotlight Hog!

Until next time….

<evil laughter>

Oh wait, wrong column. My bad!