[4e] [Interest/Discussion] ePoL->New Weird OR start afresh?

Sooo...
A while ago I launched a game I was thinking of as "extreme-Points-of-Light", where the world was in bad shape and the players were the only heroes.
They grew up in a small town with a mystical mind control effect that kept people docile, prevented them from leaving the boundaries of the town and kept them alive. The characters would start out "sub-1st level" (we didn't have the books then) and be possessed by heroic souls (-> become first level characters) as the narrative progressed.

It had a lot of things that feature prominently in my games like mysteries to uncover (history has been forgotten, everyone in the town is illiterate, heroic souls are supposed to be extremely powerful but the ones in the PCs aren't, the gods can't be directly contacted, etc), weird NPCs, spooky happenings, etc.

I wanted it to be interactive so players could define their own heroic soul, make up backstories among the different heroic souls, create their NPCs and effects in the town, create items they'd gotten from a mysterious NPCs (which appeared to be toys for children, but would actually turn out to be magical items later).

We only ever had a couple of players, but the people who posted were enthusiastic and really contributed a lot; the whole thing felt a bit like a collective storytelling experience and I was pretty satisfied.

In another thread someone said:

Zweischneid said:

Been parsing through the X-treme POL thread, awsome stuff, a bit of a D&D version of hardboiled wonderland and the end of the world.. though the Japan tales might have added to that impression.

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I don't know if I would say go so far as to say Murakami-level personally. But I confess to strong New Weird tendencies that influenced the world building.

Anyway, turnover was high. People who dropped seemed to indicate that they liked the game, but it was too much work to play (you're DMing your own PC, helping DM other people's PCs and it was a lot of reading and writing).

And, of course, when players drop out in a game with a lot of character specific plots/events/stories and only a couple of players it's a lot of work to rebuild the campaign so that it's now centered around the right people and there are plot hooks that are appropriate to new "main characters".

I can start another game, of course, but the ePoL game is basically "built". It's got enough story stuff to run, probably for 10~20 levels. I feel that I shouldn't try to start something new unless there's really no interest (partially because I think it'll probably being weird anyway, and I'll wind up in a similar situation).

So, given that I think there's some demand for 4e games and I want to run one, I'm asking for input. If you're interested in playing some version of ePoL I'd appreciate feedback on the following:
(If you think I should drop my New Weird setting and run something else just skip to the last question)


Player determination of storytelling OOC (not through character action but putting stuff in as a fellow storyteller -- PICK ONE OR MAKE UP YOUR OWN)

• I realize it's a lot of work but I'd like to play ePoL as is and add story narrative (i.e. by writing in character as a fellow storyteller)
• I wouldn't mind adding things in OOC, but I don't want to have to type it in IC (or would rather the DM do it)
• I have another idea ____________ (example: Players spending "drama points" to change the world, or create NPCs/locations, etc.)
• I wouldn't mind having a chance make an occasional suggestion but I don't want to have to do much
• Straight DnD! We make the characters, you make the world!

Degree of Mystery (PICK ONE OR MAKE UP YOUR OWN)

• I like ePoL as it is now; where both the player characters and the players don't know much about the world
• I don't mind not knowing about the big picture secrets but I want to know more about the little details of the town (AKA I don't like weird NPCs/events around my character).
• I don't mind not knowing about the town and the little plots but I want to know more about the metaplot (AKA I don't like having this weird metaplot hanging around that I don't know about).
• I don't mind my character being in the dark but -I- want to know about ________. (world history, the sort of things we'll be facing in the future, my characters past lives, the metaplot, current actors in the world, etc)
• I'd like for you to dial down the mystery level overall; I want to know more about the town/the word/everything in IC and OOC. (AKA I'm here to play DnD not some weird pseudo-novel you think you're writing)
• I have another idea/opinion/suggestion/preference _________.

[sblock=Just so I've mentioned it: The #1 reason for a mysterious history] The big reason for the world mystery is/was that I don't love homebrews. I think it's hard for one person, in their spare time, to develop a really good world. If the history of the world is hidden then you can have events and so forth without stressing about which King ruled which country for however long and other world building.

Plus: if players are adding stuff in then it being mysterious gave people space and freedom.
Plus: I like to find out stuff in character when I play. If someone says "so-and-so is really a demon" then it's just a sentence, you absorb the info and move on. I like to play out finding that in a story. -But-, obviously, my tastes are kinda divergent from the main.

But, obviously, I can just leave it vague.
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I'm not interested in New Weird/ePoL but I do want to play 4e DnD. (FILL IN THE BLANKS -- duh, right? )

• I'd like to play __________ because ___________

[sblock=Fair warning]Anything I'd come back with is gonna be somewhat non-standard.
My current favorite alternate game ideas (in no particular order) are

• A narrative flashback based game set during in Eberron's Last War (mostly goblins, with a bugbear or a hobgoblin tossed in).
• A spelljammer game where everyone helps build the sphere of the base of an old idea I had (or multiple spheres? or spelljammer with some sort of mystic paths between worlds in addition to ships? or heavily modded Spider Queen?)
• Everyway-style planar hopping (again resurrecting an old idea I had)
• something based around 1st edition Darksun box set...; you'd have to suffer through a lot of arbitrary conversions and rules discussion.
  
  (PS I don't have the Planescape chops to do a pure Planescape game... I love the setting but it's outside of my capacities.)

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You don't need to look at any of the threads that have come before, but, just for completeness's sake, the original OOC thread & IC thread.

I should probably mention that the game, at it's core, is pretty standard DnD.

Explore, beat up monsters, take their stuff.

Just who you attack and don't attack and what you do with the stuff will have a big impact on the world and the direction of it's development (or not).

As one of the original players, and someone who is still interested in the storyline, I have to agree that it has been a lot of work staying up to date and involved. I am still very interested in the story, and in playing the character I've been working on. Now that we have the 4E books, I'm ready to start up a quest and see what happens.

Integrating new PCs might be a bit tough, however, as anyone coming in now would likely feel that they had missed some of the formative pieces of the story, and were therefore relegated to a less pivotal role in what is to come. I know Graf wouldn't play it that way, but I can see people being concerned.

So those are my thoughts, for what they're worth.

graf said:

I think it's hard for one person, in their spare time, to develop a really good world.

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"Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue parceque je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte"

The key to good 'world-building' in my opinion is not what you put in, but what you leave out. Collective input is likely to create a better result, but it'd be false to assume it will take less effort. Rather, coordinating massive creative, player-driven input and content will need exponentially more work from the DM(s) than 'pre-made' worlds to cut the filler and focus, focus, focus, focus....

Zweischneid said:

"Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue parceque je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte"

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I should put this in my sig.

Zweischneid said:

The key to good 'world-building' in my opinion is not what you put in, but what you leave out. Collective input is likely to create a better result, but it'd be false to assume it will take less effort. Rather, coordinating massive creative, player-driven input and content will need exponentially more work from the DM(s) than 'pre-made' worlds to cut the filler and focus, focus, focus, focus....

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I was pretty worried that ePoL left out too much for the players. Mystery is just another way to look at it (i.e. instead of "avoiding talking about history" I just say "there is history you don't know")

That -is- true. A collaborative effort is a lot of work, especially when a player does something and it gets "dropped" by someone else (sometimes because they've missed it and sometimes because two people don't see eye to eye).
And then the DM (as sort of arbiter) has to pick up on that, and try to thread things back together.

There were definitely posts people put up where I had to think and think and think and think to try to figure out how it would work.
[sblock=Unimportant example](I basically re-wrote the plot from scratch after hewligan had Karothen receive "nothing" from the Geeche).

Before that Karothen was -not- going to be a particularly important heroic soul. After that? He had to be. It didn't make sense otherwise.

Of course, hewligan is gone now... but that does give me a "free" heroic soul to use as a deus ex machina. And since I didn't make him up myself he's a much richer character than he would be normally. IMHO anyway.
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[sblock=Just speaking generally about homebrews/published settings, adventures and "control"]
I'm a pretty control/power dynamics obsessed person. I think healthy relationships/lives etc come from people being at a parity in terms of power (and comfortable with that), or people being in dominant positions using their authority in a way that is transparent and everyone is more-or-less happy with.

I usually only run published settings. I just think it creates a richer vision if the DM is writing on top of an existing world. You've given up your right to "total control". Maybe you hate drow or warlocks but drow exist in your world and you've got to make do and find stories you can tell that include them.

If we pick a setting as a group, then everybody has say. If we're playing in Eberron then there are a bunch of things you've been promised (at least in theory, some people don't necessarily absorb that and run Eberron in ways that diverge from the book). But in theory, in addition to all the "game objects" you have, like shifters and artificers you also have a bunch of things you've (in theory) agreed to.
The PCs are powerful, important heroes
The world is grey instead of black and white
etc.

If you're playing a "specific adventure" then there's even more parity. I tend to think that that's the reason why there are so many So-and-so's Published Adventure Z (rena1g's RHoD, Redclaws Eyes of the Lich Queen, S@s' AtG, etc).

I tend to feel that this is DnD's strength: players have a lot more "rights" than they do in other games. (Some people don't think so but I just think they're confused about actual power as opposed to apparent/superficial power).

With the forge, etc this is changing a bit, but DnD is still one of the few games where players have a lot of "rights" (especially in 3.5, with the CR rules). The clarity of rules, world and the strength of tradition mean that the players have a "right" to experience stories their a certain way, to have their characters treated a certain way, etc.
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Redclaw said:

As one of the original players, and someone who is still interested in the storyline, I have to agree that it has been a lot of work staying up to date and involved. I am still very interested in the story, and in playing the character I've been working on. Now that we have the 4E books, I'm ready to start up a quest and see what happens.

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Cool!

Redclaw said:

Integrating new PCs might be a bit tough, however, as anyone coming in now would likely feel that they had missed some of the formative pieces of the story, and were therefore relegated to a less pivotal role in what is to come. I know Graf wouldn't play it that way, but I can see people being concerned.

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I am actually not too concerned about this...
-Most- of the story telling that's happened has been personal so far.

I actually do have a deus ex machina way to just -start- the adventure. We could even just have basic character concepts and start in media res.

Redclaw said:

So those are my thoughts, for what they're worth.

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Any opinion about the "mystery level".
Or is it not the big deal I was thinking it was?

Graf said:

Any opinion about the "mystery level".
Or is it not the big deal I was thinking it was?

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Not only not the big deal you thought it was, but it's one of the things I liked about your original idea. It's a truly start small and explore/discover the world opportunity, and in case you didn't get it from my own developing homebrew, I like that approach.

I posted a concept for your campagin, and another poster (Sarahrequiem) did, too