Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Since it's the end of the year and the campaign has been running for 14 months (!), I'm giving some thought to things I like and things I plan to adjust. This is all brainstorming, so there's no particular order to them.
For any of my players reading this, I'd be interested in any feedback and observations, both positive and constructive! It's fun to keep making the game better. Similarly, what have you folks found to be essential lessons from running or playing games?
For any of my players reading this, I'd be interested in any feedback and observations, both positive and constructive! It's fun to keep making the game better. Similarly, what have you folks found to be essential lessons from running or playing games?
- Attendance has been really good. There have been a few games we've canceled due to schedule difficulty, but having a fixed day, six players and being willing to play with only four means that most games have gone off. Tonight's game is game #26. That averages a game every 17 days; since we generally play every 2 weeks, we're right on track.
- Levelling is on track. My initial goal was to have them level every 5 sessions. Tonight's game, #26, is the second one at 6th level. I like this pace of levelling. It gives people enough time to know their abilities but not so much they get bored.
- The players feel like their characters are poor, possibly because they paid for a lot of healing potions before they got a leader in the group. I'm working to rectify that.
- I'd never heard of Dragon Age when I started this game. Weird coincidence that they have the monster-hunting organization named the Grey Wardens! A different long-term plot, of course, but I was surprised by the parallels.
- Our wizard feels ineffective. Part of that is consistently bad dice rolling, but I'm working to include rituals and other things to help.
- I need to roll out plot faster than I have been. It sounds ludicrous to say that I'm worried about fitting everything into a six year campaign, but I was having so much fun introducing stuff in Floodford that I put off introducing and developing some threads. The second half of heroic tier will include be slotting some of those into place.
- Similarly, I've been slacking on character development plotlines for the players; they're in place, but not moving quickly enough. That'll change.
- There weren't any rogues in my last campaign, and I got lazy about using traps and locks. Now that I have two rogues in the party, that's no longer a good idea.
- Most games have involved at least one combat. Most combats are in one way or another plot related. Games with totally random combats aren't as much fun for me as games that are more focused on the ongoing adventure. Alas, random encounter tables, I barely knew ye.
- Pacing is important. Not every combat should be at "on-level xp" difficulty. Sometimes the most fun thing is to swarm the group with minions or fewer combatants than recommended, just so you don't feel bad when unleashing your big guns later.
- Dynamic battlegrounds are key. Static or personality-free battlegrounds run the risk of contributing to boredom. The details of the fight (who, what and where) should make the fight more interesting for everyone.
- Speaking of avoiding boredom, fast fights are essential. Letting players know their order in the initiative, and having them plan their action while other people go, really helps.
- I REALLY need to just set aside a bunch of hours and map my world in a non-scribbled-on-scrap-paper way. I know what it looks like in my head, but that helps no one but me. Similarly, detailing various countries and rulers for everyone else will really pay off.
- A list of NPC names and identities to share with the players is another good idea.
- I have deliberately made the Grey Guard into an apolitical organization (another inadvertent commonality with Dragon Age), in a world where politics are vicious and important. It'll be interesting to see what that means.
- I see religion and the Caprian Empire's bureaucracy both playing a large role in the world, but I've almost completely ignored them so far. That should be remedied. In a world where the First Emperor ascended to the heavens and there's an official patron God that everyone is required to venerate, religion should be much more in-your-face and obvious than it has been. (To be fair, the PCs are off in the far flung provinces where such things aren't as important, but I haven't been stressing it in my Merchant Prince campaign either.)
- One of the best things I do for my sanity is have a separate Word doc for each level. In that doc I track treasure parcel distribution, including who gets what and when; I also copy-n-paste in stat blocks from DDI and keep master lists of names and plots. It tells me roughly what happened to who on what game, and makes it really easy to refer back.
- Similarly, regarding DDI? Worth every penny to me. My average game prep time is a half hour to an hour, including plot development and loot/monster customization.
- The downside of heavy DDI reliance is that house rules and custom magic items now make me think twice before implementing them. That makes me sad, but probably isn't a bad thing. I'm mostly taking existing items, keeping combat stats the same and completely changing the chrome so they appear to be something else.
- Having Sagiro manage condition tracking with a white board has been key. Tracking conditions and marks is hands-down my least favorite aspect of 4e. There's lots of things for me to love, but that isn't one of them.
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