Tav_Behemoth
First Post
Over in the thread I forked this from, there's a discusssion of the Gospel of Papers & Paychecks:
and Harlekin points to Piratecat's 4th edition thread as a good example of a storytelling approach.
I played in a 4E game Piratecat ran at Anonycon and it was fantastic, one of the best experiences I've had as a player in 4E. Some of the things he brings to it, like an actorly mastery of character voices and idiom and an explicit "It's OK to try doing different things, there's no wrong way to play" message, would be valuable in the arsenal of any DM, old-school or new.
Other things he was able to pull off I had previously thought were impossible, and made me reconsider where the line was between techniques that work in RPGs and ones that only work in fiction. For example, as we were racing flying carpets through a djinni city, in between narrating the thrilling action sequence he'd give us these brilliant little descriptions of what we could see people doing in the windows as we flew past!
On reflection, I think that his doing new-school, storyteller GMing extremely well helped me identify a difference between this and old-school reactive GMing.
I ran a 4E game for some NerdNYCers with whom I'd been trying to explain why the old-school approach wasn't simply DM fiat. Afterwards, one of them was like "Oh, I see what you mean about old-school now" and I was like "no, wait, I was wearing my 4E hat; that's as new-school as I know how to be!"
The thing this player identified was a moment when the PCs were preparing to enter a mine. They spent a good while discussing how to do it, considering the advantages of rappeling vs. riding a mine cart and working out the details of each. Everyone seemed really into this, so I sat back and enjoyed watching it happen. My new-school player said that as a DM he would have pushed the party right past this; it was obvious to him that the story was about what was in the mine, not how the PCs entered it.
As an old-school DM I see the story as "that thing the players want to do"; as long as they're having fun I'm happy to roll with it (which, of course, means finding ways to horribly complicate whatever plan they come up with; that much all DMs can agree on). When I think about great old-school DMs I've been fortunate enough to play with - Tim Kask, chgowiz, James Raggi, as well as my homies Eric, James, and Adrian from NY Red Box - I can clearly picture each of them sitting back and, behind their poker face, being amused by the PCs making trouble for themselves.
Piratecat doesn't sit back, he leans forward. When I say stuff as a DM, it's usually either in response to a player's question or because I see a lag in the action and need to move people along. Piratecat's descriptions of scenery flying by moved things along even when they're already going full-tilt and all the players are totally engaged!
It seems to me that a new-school storyteller DM is, well, the teller of a story, and as such you can look to them to be entertained. An old-school DM is just the stage manager; if you look to them for entertainment, it's likely to come at your own expense & in the form of wandering monsters rather than an exciting storyline that'll sweep you away.
I can't speak to the issue of narrative choice on a macro-level, having just played a convention game. I don't doubt that Piratecat handles this as well as every aspect of his DMing that I did get to see, even if I suspect the player narrative control emerges at a different level using different tools than my sandbox campaign. He certainly allowed players lots of choice within the framework of the rules and adventure (including an unusual-in-my-experience degree of freedom in not-as-written uses for skills and powers in a challenge or combat), and people supplied their own motivations. Still, I felt like doing this helped us get more into the story that Piratecat was moving forward, whereas even in my own convention games where I do design a beginning-middle-end I feel like I'm leaving it up to the players to discover what that story is and advance it.
I'm not at all saying that sitting back is better than leaning forward. The former trades a sense of freedom for the risk of a slack and fragmented experience, and in fact I probably never would have started exploring the virtues of a sitting back approach if I were able to tell a story as excitingly & apparently effortlessly as PK did! (Maybe doing a storyhour is good training in coming up with D&D-appropriate narrative on the fly?) What I did want to point out was a difference I've observed even under the similar conditions of a convention game for strangers that I think exemplifies the different ways each style can be awesome.
and Harlekin points to Piratecat's 4th edition thread as a good example of a storytelling approach.
I played in a 4E game Piratecat ran at Anonycon and it was fantastic, one of the best experiences I've had as a player in 4E. Some of the things he brings to it, like an actorly mastery of character voices and idiom and an explicit "It's OK to try doing different things, there's no wrong way to play" message, would be valuable in the arsenal of any DM, old-school or new.
Other things he was able to pull off I had previously thought were impossible, and made me reconsider where the line was between techniques that work in RPGs and ones that only work in fiction. For example, as we were racing flying carpets through a djinni city, in between narrating the thrilling action sequence he'd give us these brilliant little descriptions of what we could see people doing in the windows as we flew past!
On reflection, I think that his doing new-school, storyteller GMing extremely well helped me identify a difference between this and old-school reactive GMing.
I ran a 4E game for some NerdNYCers with whom I'd been trying to explain why the old-school approach wasn't simply DM fiat. Afterwards, one of them was like "Oh, I see what you mean about old-school now" and I was like "no, wait, I was wearing my 4E hat; that's as new-school as I know how to be!"
The thing this player identified was a moment when the PCs were preparing to enter a mine. They spent a good while discussing how to do it, considering the advantages of rappeling vs. riding a mine cart and working out the details of each. Everyone seemed really into this, so I sat back and enjoyed watching it happen. My new-school player said that as a DM he would have pushed the party right past this; it was obvious to him that the story was about what was in the mine, not how the PCs entered it.
As an old-school DM I see the story as "that thing the players want to do"; as long as they're having fun I'm happy to roll with it (which, of course, means finding ways to horribly complicate whatever plan they come up with; that much all DMs can agree on). When I think about great old-school DMs I've been fortunate enough to play with - Tim Kask, chgowiz, James Raggi, as well as my homies Eric, James, and Adrian from NY Red Box - I can clearly picture each of them sitting back and, behind their poker face, being amused by the PCs making trouble for themselves.
Piratecat doesn't sit back, he leans forward. When I say stuff as a DM, it's usually either in response to a player's question or because I see a lag in the action and need to move people along. Piratecat's descriptions of scenery flying by moved things along even when they're already going full-tilt and all the players are totally engaged!
It seems to me that a new-school storyteller DM is, well, the teller of a story, and as such you can look to them to be entertained. An old-school DM is just the stage manager; if you look to them for entertainment, it's likely to come at your own expense & in the form of wandering monsters rather than an exciting storyline that'll sweep you away.
I can't speak to the issue of narrative choice on a macro-level, having just played a convention game. I don't doubt that Piratecat handles this as well as every aspect of his DMing that I did get to see, even if I suspect the player narrative control emerges at a different level using different tools than my sandbox campaign. He certainly allowed players lots of choice within the framework of the rules and adventure (including an unusual-in-my-experience degree of freedom in not-as-written uses for skills and powers in a challenge or combat), and people supplied their own motivations. Still, I felt like doing this helped us get more into the story that Piratecat was moving forward, whereas even in my own convention games where I do design a beginning-middle-end I feel like I'm leaving it up to the players to discover what that story is and advance it.
I'm not at all saying that sitting back is better than leaning forward. The former trades a sense of freedom for the risk of a slack and fragmented experience, and in fact I probably never would have started exploring the virtues of a sitting back approach if I were able to tell a story as excitingly & apparently effortlessly as PK did! (Maybe doing a storyhour is good training in coming up with D&D-appropriate narrative on the fly?) What I did want to point out was a difference I've observed even under the similar conditions of a convention game for strangers that I think exemplifies the different ways each style can be awesome.
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I stand up, I don't sit. I hover over them sometimes and move around, lets me think and react better. I like telling them the things they see as they move, and let the subtle plot unfold by their actions. I roll combat dice in front of them, I never hide it. 
