Choose the Illusion: Dungeon Mastering

Aeolius · Jan 1, 2012

Hussar said:
Sure, there's lots of possibilities covered under, she's rescued or not rescued, but, at the end of the day, you've only got two possibilities. Everything else is just details.

"The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but it is by far the least interesting." - Doctor Who

Suppose the daughter was due to succeed the king, so he had her assassinated and will frame her murder on the PCs who "rescue" her.

Suppose she was not kidnapped. Instead she willing left to pursue a pastoral life unconcerned with political matters.

Suppose the PCs find the princess as a ghost, yellow musk zombie, or petrified statue?

Getting there is half the fun!

JamesonCourage · Jan 1, 2012

Gentlegamer said:
Gary makes analogy to drama in the basic parts of the activity, not the whole of it. When he goes to specifics of game-play, the objectives are on challenges to the participants that do not include 'creating a collaborative story,' but posing and overcoming in-game challenges, puzzles, etc. The aftermath of this in-game activity is a story, in the sense that any recounting of tales of derring-do are also stories. The meaningful distinction is whether the purpose of the activity is to create a story or a story is its mere by-product. The distinction is meaningful because it impacts the structure and premise of the activity and how the participants are expected to engage in it. D&D is a role-playing game. Stores are created by the in-game activities of the participants. But it is not a game whose purpose is collaborative storytelling. The structure and premises of the game are not suited to this purpose. There are other RPGs that have been designed with this purpose in mind (Torg, for example, players had cards that could influence the plot/narrative on a meta level).

I can't XP you, but this is an extremely good post.

ExploderWizard · Jan 1, 2012

Stories generally have plots. A roleplaying game technically doesn't need one.

Fanaelialae · Jan 1, 2012

Aeolius said:
"The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but it is by far the least interesting." - Doctor Who

The whole point of the matrix is that it isn't a straight line.

Instead of plotting out the adventure as A > B > C, you instead plot it out so that A > D > G is just as viable as B > A > E > H (or any other combination of the numerous permutations of the matrix). Please keep in mind that I am using "plot out" in the loosest sense. You're simply laying out what might happen; a framework to act as a starting point for the improvisation every DM inevitably has to do.

Suppose the daughter was due to succeed the king, so he had her assassinated and will frame her murder on the PCs who "rescue" her.

Suppose she was not kidnapped. Instead she willing left to pursue a pastoral life unconcerned with political matters.

Suppose the PCs find the princess as a ghost, yellow musk zombie, or petrified statue?

Getting there is half the fun!

He means if you've already decided that it's a straight forward rescue the princess plot. It was an example. Obviously, if you decide to add a twist the potential outcomes will change.

If you write an adventure where the PCs find the princess as a ghost, then the outcomes you write down might include sending her to the afterlife, or attempting to raise her. That doesn't mean that the party wizard can't do the unexpected and bind her ghost to serve him for eternity. It just means that that wasn't one of the outcomes you planned for, so you'll have to improvise.

Mercutio01 · Jan 1, 2012

Gentlegamer said:
But it is not a game whose purpose is collaborative storytelling. The structure and premises of the game are not suited to this purpose.

That is not objective fact. It is merely an opinion.

Fanaelialae said:
I don't think there's any winning this discussion because you're all correct

Fair enough.

Hussar · Jan 2, 2012

S'mon said:
But, as I have said many times, by your trivial definition of story, any real life sequence of events also gives rise to a story. Which is where I came in.

But, that doesn't make sense. Your life is not structured by some outside agency to produce a series of events that get progressively more challenging culminating in a final, most challenging event.

OTOH, what I just described is virtually every single D&D adventure ever produced.

Hussar · Jan 2, 2012

Aeolius said:
"The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but it is by far the least interesting." - Doctor Who

Suppose the daughter was due to succeed the king, so he had her assassinated and will frame her murder on the PCs who "rescue" her.

Suppose she was not kidnapped. Instead she willing left to pursue a pastoral life unconcerned with political matters.

Suppose the PCs find the princess as a ghost, yellow musk zombie, or petrified statue?

Getting there is half the fun!

But, this is the same thing that DannyA brought up earlier. You, as GM, KNOW these things beforehand. Thus, you can plot out you decision tree based on these facts. If the princess is already assassinated, then an end point, "The princess is rescued" isn't going to happen. It can't because she's already dead. Same if she's a petrified statue. But, the petrified statue means that they are most likely going to try to find some way to un-stoning her. Thus, you build your matrix around that idea.

Oh look, we have a plot and story.

[MENTION=53980]Fanaelialae[/MENTION] - I'm not 100% convinced. I think there is a real resistance to the idea that RPG's=collaborative storytelling games that is based on the idea that story=railroad and plot=railroad. It's also strongly based in the idea that the one true way of gaming is the sandbox and that sandboxes don't have plots.

All of which is utterly ridiculous. But, it is a persistent meme in gaming. The opposite of sandbox is linear, railroading is just as easy to do in a sandbox as a linear adventure. And, sandboxes are simply a collection (or matrix) of plots for the players to interact with, otherwise you wind up with a litterbox campaign where the players run around in circles never actually accomplishing anything.

JamesonCourage · Jan 2, 2012

Hussar said:
But, that doesn't make sense. Your life is not structured by some outside agency to produce a series of events that get progressively more challenging culminating in a final, most challenging event.

OTOH, what I just described is virtually every single D&D adventure ever produced.

D&D adventure, perhaps. But not a single one of my campaigns has been built with that premise.

Connorsrpg · Jan 2, 2012

Whoah, sorry James, I did not read all of the posts until this point. My head nearly exploded reading the 1s two pages of detailed analysis of your idea.

Another one of many tools to help a GM prep a game. As such I like it and would look to using it some of the time. Thanks. (Not sure why such an idea drew so much criticism - if you write adventures for others, there has to be some parameters/limits. Of course it relies on GMs making the adventure their own a running with it).

Anyway, another concept/idea in the arsenal. BTW Popplet | Collect, curate and share your ideas, inspirations, and projects! may be an online method to present this, that may suit you visual learners

... I like it and it would suit this set-up, it is extremely easy to use, and looks pretty

Fanaelialae · Jan 2, 2012

Hussar said:
[MENTION=53980]Fanaelialae[/MENTION] - I'm not 100% convinced. I think there is a real resistance to the idea that RPG's=collaborative storytelling games that is based on the idea that story=railroad and plot=railroad. It's also strongly based in the idea that the one true way of gaming is the sandbox and that sandboxes don't have plots.

All of which is utterly ridiculous. But, it is a persistent meme in gaming. The opposite of sandbox is linear, railroading is just as easy to do in a sandbox as a linear adventure. And, sandboxes are simply a collection (or matrix) of plots for the players to interact with, otherwise you wind up with a litterbox campaign where the players run around in circles never actually accomplishing anything.

You have to keep in mind that the idea of a story game has certain definitions associated with it in the general RPG community (or at least the online community). While this is a bit of an oversimplification, it's basically the idea of a campaign that's built along the lines of what would make a good novel. Those adventures are designed to achieve climax rather than anti-climax (because an anticlimactic ending usually makes for a bad story).

What folks are saying is that not all campaigns are played for that reason. It can be a lot of fun (I've done at least one campaign that would fall into the story-game category) but it isn't everyone's cup of tea. Some people like the idea that, just like in real life, an anti-climax is possible or even likely. Again, not everyone's preference, but some enjoy it.

Effectively, like it or not, you're using loaded terminology. Yes, every campaign tells a story. However, not everyone plays to tell a collaborative story. Some people play because they enjoy the combat, some enjoy matching wits with the DM, and others simply want to experience what it's like to be an elf for a few hours. In these latter cases, even though you end up with a story, it isn't necessarily a good story, because the goal is something other than telling a good story.