Compelling Storytelling

[RobShanti]

I had a discussion with my friend about what makes stories compelling and interesting. His position boiled down to a single principle: relationships. He argued that the stories we enjoy the most are those that are inextricably tied to the relationships among the characters, whether they are former/current paramours, friends, rivals, etc.

Of course, I immediately considered how this applied to GMing tabletop roleplaying, and recalled that many of the most memorable games I've ever run or played had strong relationships among the characters. Some doubt lingers in my mind, though, as to whether relationships among characters are the whole of it, or just a part. I've had fun, too, playing a simple archer in a raid of a goblin lair who had no strong ties to the rest of the party.

So, to a community of storytellers, I ask...what do you think? What is the keystone of a compelling story?

 

[TarionzCousin]

Conflict, tension, resolution, and in a game, meaningful choices.

I particularly enjoy longterm interactions/relationships with NPC's in my games; it helps the world feel more "real" to me as it helps add depth.

 

[Quickleaf]

So, to a community of storytellers, I ask...what do you think? What is the keystone of a compelling story?

Relationships is a good answer.

Honestly, I think it depends on your audience/players – knowing them is half the battle. For some groups a "compelling story" is the DM riffing off of whatever crazy shenanigans the players come up with, or wave after wave of great combat challenges with lots of opportunities to belittle and confound the monsters – it doesn't go much deeper than that, and that's OK.

I embraced the relationships principle recently in starting up a Star Wars game, and so far it seems to be making the game far richer.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I agree with your friend, I'll add that I think "relationships" is part of the more basic answer, which is compelling, dynamic, characters.

In my RPG in development, every PC has at least 3 contacts, an area they are from, a culture they grew up in, and a profession or equivalent, all of which feed into those contacts, but also give GMs myriad avenues to bring in characters that they are or can be tied to in some way, and the difference is very noticeable.

 

[Sunseeker]

"Relationships" seems reasonable as far as "sum up this important issue with one word" answers go. Relationships to other characters (PCs and NPCs) is a very limited selection of that though. I think perhaps more fundamentally "connections" would be a better term, which really is just another word for "investment" which is the ever elusive thing that all GMs attempt to get players to establish. Investment in important NPCs, investment in their own character, investment in a specific country or area of importance, because these things in turn frame the character's in-game decisions. Since, for example, defending ones country may require a character to sacrifice their connection to family or a lover and determine what path they take when their decision has run its course (the war is over, but now they cannot return home anyway).

I still find investment to be ever elusive.

 

[Grogg of the North]

This is one of those questions that seems so easy but is incredibly deceptive. If I knew the magic formula for an awesome story/campaign I'd be writing them for a living and then going to bed on a giant pile of money. Like a dragon.

So as I struggled to come up with an answer, I decided to think less about awesome campaigns and more about what characters I remembered the best. And, for me, the ones that had the more interesting story were the ones that not only had relationships with other (N)PCs but also accomplished something outside of dungeons. The warmage that used his rewards to open his own tavern/brewery, won the girl's heart and got married. The cunning rogue that used the crisis in the city to get himself pardoned, stepped into the city's leadership, and attempted to woo the princess.

So for those characters, not only did they have meaningful relationships but they were able to accomplish goals during their downtime. They didn't cease to exist when there were no dungeons to delve; no monsters to slay.

But, all of that is only possible if you have a DM that is willing and wants to help you do these things! I played a half orc barbarian once whose goal was to go find himself a nice place in the wilderness, build a great lodge and host other like minded hunters. They would take turns hunting great beasts and monsters to each prove their strength and worth. When that campaign ended (it died with a whimper) I was no closer to accomplishing that goal at level 17 than I was at level 1.

So, in a round about way, I would have to say that for a good story not only do you need relationships between characters and NPCs but your character needs depth. They need to accomplish something personal. A character that "left home to seek his fortune as an adventure" is kind of lame. Why? What does he want to do with that money? Does he want to raise his parents from the dead? Does he want to become king by his own hand? Is he going to use that money as tribute to the nearby dragon and save his village? If your character effectively doesn't exist when the party returns to town then there isn't much depth there.

 

[Imaculata]

I think the best campaign stories, are those that keep the players guessing what will happen next. Memorable characters and relationships are a big part of that. But it's also about suspense, twists, and a world that feels alive.

One of the things I love in my current campaign, is that my players know all the major gods by name. There's no classic DnD gods, it's all homebrew. And yet they know all of the important gods by heart. They also remember the names of a lot of characters, and again, there are so many characters that appear. They also remember words that I've made up, and use them as if they are real words. When a character is called a "Skua", they know what that means. They don't even question it, and I think that is a sign that the players are completely immersed in the world that I've created for them.

 

[Aenghus]

There are no guarantees, no magical formula that will always yield results. For me it's important to stay open enough to notice any player enthusiasm for particular game elements (NPCs, plots, locations, activities, etc) and try and emphasise those elements providing I think I can also enjoy them.

The risk is that players turn out to be most interested in stuff you aren't interested in and vice versa, but thats the eternal risk of RPGs. Often a workable compromise is possible.

Having lots of detail about the gameworld helps in fleshing it out on the fly, for me at least.

 

[Wednesday Boy]

I think relationships are a great piece to compelling storytelling but my number element for compelling storytelling is adversity. How the characters react to setbacks, failure, and fallout from their actions and how the characters overcome those adversity is what invests me the most in a game. My interest wanes if I constantly overcome adversity easily and repeatedly. But put me through the wringer and make me fight and struggle to achieve my character's goals and I'll be hooked.

 

[Celebrim]

I had a discussion with my friend about what makes stories compelling and interesting. His position boiled down to a single principle: relationships. He argued that the stories we enjoy the most are those that are inextricably tied to the relationships among the characters, whether they are former/current paramours, friends, rivals, etc.

I think that for some people compelling relationships are enough. I don't think that that is the full answer, and in particular I don't think that's a sufficient answer for everyone. If you look at books with broad appeal, they have a variety of features in common:

1) Sympathetic protagonists - You can have a story about an unsympathetic protagonist, but you'll lose a portion of your audience over it.
2) Compelling relationships - Your friend's criteria. Or to put it another way, the character loves and respects other characters, and does thing on their behalf, or hates or fears other characters and plots accordingly. You can eshew relationships, but you'll lose a portion of your audience over it.
3) Dramatic twists - Things happen in the story the reader didn't see coming. There are mysterious events. There are sudden obstacles and changes in fortune. There are scenes of tense conflict and danger. The readers perceptions of events are suddenly dramatically shifted.
4) Underlying Meaning - The conflict in the story is about something philosophically substantial. Like human relationships, this gives the story a timelessness so that regardless of setting, the reader feels something about the story applies to them.
5) Satisfying Conclusion - The story ends in a way that the reader is satisfied that it is complete. The conflicts in the story are resolved. The mysteries are explained. The main hindrance to the happiness of the protagonist has been removed.
6) Worth reflecting on - The events in the story ultimately made sense. Parts of the story that seemed unimportant are revealed as having greater importance than we at first thought. The questions that the story raised and the answers that it gave are worth chewing over.

I don't think that there is any one keystone. Instead, you build a story out of various pieces that people prize, and the more your stories satisfying those various needs, the more beloved it will tend to be.

I would say that some of the hardest parts of achieving this in an RPG is that the players have to be skillful as well. They are responsible for so much of that stuff, and if their input is missing or inept or unworthy, it doesn't matter what you do with the villains, setting, and chorus of the story. In fact, the meta-story of the RPG, whether we are talking about Knights of the Dinner Table, or The Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising, it's this conflict between the DM's desire to tell a great literary story and the player's ineptness or lack of interest in that as a goal or even perception that the DM's goal is orthogonal to their own is often the driver of conflict in the story.