D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[pemerton]

Note that I don't personally do what you suggested like "ok, as you cross over the hill uh - map's blank, what do you see?" I ask a crystallization question that asserts something about the reality first so others can build - "as you pass into the woods, what smell hits you that reminds you of the last time you were under the canopy? what do you always hate about venturing deep into the Great Forest? &etc."

I agreed with all of your post, but this in particular seemed important to me.

Burning Wheel - as you know - isn't the same in its techniques as Stonetop (PbtA) or BitD. But here's something that I think has a bit of similarity:

Jobe, being unable to buy Halika any lunch, suggested he might be able to find some work for them instead. . . .

Jobe, having both nobility and sorcerers in his circles, and a +1D affiliation with both (from Mark of Privilege and a starting affiliation with a sorcerous cabal), initially thought of trying to make contact with the Gynarch of Hardby, the sorceress ruler of that city. But then he thought he might start a little lower in the pecking order, and so decided to make contact with the red-robed firemage Jabal (of the Cabal). With Circles 2 he attempted the Ob 2 check, and failed.​

The NPC Jabal was Jobe's player's invention - but not from nowhere: rather, in the context of a Circles test built around the player-chosen affiliation with the sorcerous cabal. I subsequently established Jabal's tower, having recently been rereading Tower of the Elephant, and also having in mind that Jobe had an instinct When I fall I cast Falconskin (and a tower can be a precursor to a fall).

Jabal felt real.

 

[The Firebird]

This doesn't seem right to me: RPGing happens in time, by people talking to one another. So it's a feature of the medium, not a regrettable limitation, that what is said is finite and focused.

It's not about what is saif being finite, but about what exists being finite. Ideally finite things are said. But ideally anything in the world is well defined enough that the players can go and interact with it.

Some posters - @Micah Sweet, perhaps you - treat the GM writing something up makes it, per se, a component of the fiction. Whereas to me, while writing something up is a fiction, it's not part of the shared fiction until it's shared. Its function, prior to being shared, is to serve as a type of constraint on, and prompt for, what the GM says.

Yes, I was thinking the same. For example, if the DM had all this prepared, I would argue the sandbox game is not railroading as you consider dungeon crawling not railroading--because the PCs can have predictable effects on the world, and they can learn how to do so.

 

[The Firebird]

Is this conjecture, or assertion? If the latter, is this based on your experience?

It's extremely different from my experience: I posted, upthread, a series of scenes from BW play - Aedhros humiliating the harbour official, and then Alicia by stealing the key, and then Alicia taxing herself to unconsciousness by way of a mis-cast spell, which caused money to rain down, drawing the unwanted attention of the rag-clothed poor of the docks.

That felt pretty verisimilitudinous to me, in play. As I posted, the ragged poor were especially vivid - though so was the humiliated official. Of course I know they're all imaginary, but I know that of something written by the GM prior to the session, rather than during it.

Assertion , based on my experience. Again, my point isn't that the narrative you are getting out lacks verisimilitude. It's that as a player, the world feels real to me when I know I can go two hills over and something fixed exists there. If instead something has to be made up on the spot, either procedurally generated or generated specifically to challenge me, then the world doesn't feel as real. I know it didn't exist until 10 seconds ago.

 

[The Firebird]

So literally the only problem isn't the distinction, which you agree is present and relevant...

It's literally just the word "color".

Even though you specifically said that this "meta distinction" was the problem.

The way the word is used implies a kind of frivolity or lack of importance; something that can easily be changed without affecting anything important. I don't like using that, because I don't like treating aspects of the world as just set dressing. They may function that way to players who don't engage with them. But they shouldn't to me, the GM.

 

[robertsconley]

Oh, sorry. No. Sorry. That wasn't directed at you at all @robertsconley. No. Absolutely not. You've been incredibly forthcoming and open about your work. Totally on board. I might disagree with some of your approaches, but, no, sorry, did not mean that you weren't being 100% open and helpful. I was addressing that at @EzekielRaiden and @pemerton.

Whoa, totally my bad.

Oh boy the limitations of text. I was kidding you. Sorry about that.

Seriously your post is on point and I encourage folks to share their approach.

For one thing I started top down with the world while you picked out a regional map. Because of that some folks may find what you do more approachable than what I outlined.

Again all good. Sorry for the misunderstanding. Also thanks for the compliments.

 

[pemerton]

Might I suggest gentlemen that you follow my lead here. Post how you would develop your next sandbox. And then let's see where the discussion takes us?

I was addressing that at @EzekielRaiden and @pemerton.

Here are two actual player reports, for Classic Traveller and Torchbearer 2e. These show what I've done, using those systems.

Recently I've been re-reading my Classic Traveller books, and yesterday I GMed a session. It's the first time I've played Traveller for at least a couple of decades.

One of the distinctive things about Traveller is its use of random generation to deliver content and flavour. For PC generation, I had written up some tables that were pretty close to the original ones (from Book 1 and Citizens of the Imperium), but with a few of the newer skills overlaid.

My collection is Books 1 to 8, Supp 2 and 4, a few adventure, The Traveller Book (an early-80s single volume re-release of Books 1 to 3 with a few updates), and MegaTraveller books 1 to 3.

I generally don't like MegaTraveller much - it replaces random PC gen with too many skill choices, which somewhat defeats the purpose of the system; and it has a uniform task resolution system that I also don't like (I think it increases rather than reduces fiddliness). But one change I do like is the introduction of a "special duty" line on the basic PC generation tables, which allows extra skills rolls. I did include that on my tables.

We approached PC generation in a fairly leisurely fashion, and with only one copy of the charts to go around. So we did it term by term, with everyone seeing how everyone else's PC was doing, until we had two characters each for the three players. (I was re-reading some advice from early White Dwarf - I think by Andy Slack - which suggested 2 PCs per player, and it was good advice, at least for our group. It worked out well.)

Of the seven PCs generated, only one died during generation (necessitating generation of another PC for that player). That same player would have had a second PC die too, except that We were using a rule that if you fail your survival roll by 1 - which he did - you can muster out instead with a shortened (2 year) term and a -1 penalty to the roll for special duty.

In preparation for GMing, and to give my charts a test-run, I had generated about a dozen characters of my own (and I've hung onto these as potential NPCs), but PC gen was much more fun in a group. Each character really does unfold with a story. We ended up with the following PCs (sheets attached):

* Roland, who served 4 terms in the Interstellar Navy but never received a commission despite finishing a PhD (Educ D);

* Xander, a pirate who didn't even make it to Henchman status in 3 terms of service and ended up being denied "re-enlistment" - clearly this meant he'd been marooned by his piraticals shipmates!;

* Sir Glaxon, who started with Soc A and so "enlisted" as a noble, only to be denied re-enlistment after 1 term - the player tried for a roll of 6 on his one mustering out roll (to get a Yacht), but got TAS membership instead;

* Methwit, who had poor physical stats but good Edu and Soc and served as a diplomat - it quickly became clear (given his skill rolls) that his status as 3rd Secretary was a cover for some sort of espionage role, and after 3 terms the player decided there was no reason to hang around and risk aging rolls, so Methwit "retired" from the diplomatic corps to make himself available for a wider range of "irregular" operations;

* Tony, a 6 term Merchant who made it to 3rd officer, hung on in hope of further promotion but was not going anywhere (and hence had no hope of getting a ship in mustering out), and who spent his last 4 terms of skill rolls rolling to maintain his stats agaist the ravages of aging - his Str survived but his End still dropped, leading to the conclusion that he'd been dosing himself on some bad steroids;

* Vincenzo (Baron of Hallucida), the replacement for a belter who died in his first term (crushed between asteroids!), was rolled up last - with Soc B the player went noble to try for a yacht; this looked pretty unlikely when he failed his second term survival roll (by 1) and so had to muster out early with Gambling-2 and Bribery-1 his only skills, and just a single roll for mustering out benefits; but the die came up 6 and everyone cheered - now the group would have a ship.​

Given that all the players had submitted to the randomness that is Traveller - and had got a pretty interesting set of characters out of it - I had to put myself through the same rigour as GM. So I rolled up a random starting world:

Class A Starport, 1000 mi D, near-vaccuum, with a pop in the 1000s, no government and law level 2 (ie everything allowed except carrying portable laser and energy weapons) - and TL 16, one of the highest possible!​

So what did all that mean, and what were the PCs doing there?

I christened the world Ardour-3, and we agreed that it was a moon orbiting a gas giant, with nothing but a starport (with a casino) and a series of hotels/hostels adjoining the starport (the housing for the 6,000 inhabitants). The high tech level meant that most routine tasks were performed by robots.

Roland, having left the service and now wandering the universe (paid for by his membership of the TAS), was working as a medic in the hospital, overseeing the medbots. Vincenzo was a patient there - the player explained that Vincenzo had won his yacht in the casino, and the (previous) owners had honoured the bet but had also beaten Vincenzo to within an inch of his life (hence the failed surival roll).

Xander, meanwhile, had been marooned in a vacc suit in open space - but Traveller vacc suits have limited self-propulsion, and so he'd been able to launch himself down to Ardour-3 (burning up his vacc suit in the process, but for some parts which he sold for 1,500 credits - his starting money). He was hanging out at the starport looking for a job and a way off the planet.

Tony was also at the starport, working as a rousabout/handyman (no technical skills, but Jack-o-T-3) - and it was decided that he was the one who had bought Xander's vacc suit gear and fitted it onto a vacc suit that he modelled himself (paid for out of his starting money).

Glaxon and Methwit, meanwhile, were at the casion - Glaxon getting drunk and Methwit keeping his ear to the ground, having been sent to Ardour-3 as his final posting.

With the background in place, I then rolled for a patron on the random patron table, and got a "marine officer" result. Given the PC backgrounds, it made sense that Lieutenant Li - as I dubbe her - would be making contact with Roland. The first thing I told the players was that a Scout ship had landed at the starport, although there it has no Scout base and there is no apparent need to do any survey work in the system; and that the principal passenger seemed to be an officer of the Imperial Marines. I then explained that, while doing the rounds at the hospital, Roland received a message from his old comrade Li inviting him to meet her at the casino, and to feel free to bring along any friends he might have in the place.

In preparation for the session I had generated a few worlds - one with a pop in the millions and a corrosive atmosphere; a high-pop but very low-tech world with a tainited atmosphere (which I had decided meant disease, given that the world lacked the technological capacity to generate pollution); and a pop 1 (ie population in the 10s) world with no government or law level with a high tech level - clearly some sort of waystation with a research outpost attached. (File with world details attached.)

Given that I had these worlds ready-to hand, and given that the players had a ship, I needed to come up with some situation from Lt Li that would put them into play: so when Roland and Vincenzo (just discharged from medical care) met up with her she told the following story - which Methwit couldn't help but overhear before joining them!

Lt Li wondered whether Vincenzo would be able to take 3 tons of cargo to Byron for her. (With his excellent education, Roland knew that Byron was a planet with a large (pop in the millions) city under a serious of domes, but without the technical capabilities to maintain the domes into the long term.) When the PCs arrived on Byron contact would be made by those expecting the goods. And payment would be 100,000 for the master of the ship, plus 10,000 for each other crew member.

Some quick maths confirmed that 100,000 would more than cover the fuel costs of the trip, and so Vincenzo (taking advice from Roland - he knows nothing about running a ship) agreed to the request.

Methwit thought all this sounded a bit odd - why would a high-class (Soc A) marine lieutenant be smuggling goods into a dead-end world like Byron - and so asked Li back to his hotel room to talk further. With his Liaison-1 and Carousing-1 and a good reaction roll she agreed, and with his Interrogation-1 he was able to obtain some additional information (although he did have to share some details about his own background to persuade her to share).

The real situation, she explained, was that Byron was itself just a stop-over point. The real action was on another world - Enlil - which is technologically backwards and has a disease-ridden atmosphere to which there is no resistance or immunity other than in Enlil's native population. So the goods to be shipped from Ardour-3 were high-tech medical gear for extracting and concentrating pathogens from the atmosphere on Enlil, to be shipped back to support a secret bio-weapons program. The reason a new team was needed for this mission was because Vincenzo had won the yacht from the original team - who were being dealt with "appropriately" for their incompetence in disrupting the operation.

(I had been planning to leave the real backstory to the mission pretty loose, to be fleshed out as needed - including the possibility that Li was actually going to betray the PCs in some fashion - but the move from Methwit's player forced my hand, and I had to come up with some more plausible backstory to explain the otherwise absurd situation I'd come up with. And it had to relate to the worlds I'd come up with in my prep.)

The PCs stocked up on some gear - combat and non-combat related - and we made some rolls for the content of the ship's locker. Methwit also made sure that they stocked up on a high-end medical kit with good pathogen analysis and vaccine-development capabilities - "just in case".

Then they headed off: Vincenzo was master of the vessel, Glaxon piloted it, Roland did double duty as engineer and medic while Tony served as engineer and steward (it is a noble's yacht after all). Xander was taken on as Vincenzo' bodyguard, and Methwit was clearly the mission leader, given his extra briefing from Li.

The distance-per-time chart showed that with 1G acceleration it would take them about a week to travel beyond 100 planetary diamters of the gas giant for a safe jump. An encounter check showed a scout ship - Lt Li's ship passing them with its 2G acceleration, and sending a brief "good luck" message - but nothing else happened en route to the jump point.

A jump-1 took them to Lyto-7, where Vincenzo decided to engage in some commercial speculation and paid 30k+ credits for 5 tons of ambergris-like substance (taken from the deep-sea creatures the researchers were investigating). (Because they were using refined fuel, and they had an engineer on board, the checks to avoid misjump and drive failure succeeded automatically.)

Another jump-1 took them to Byron, where Roland (with Admin-1) negotiated their entrace without having their papers or cargo checked too closely. Their ship not being streamlined, they needed to ferry their goods down to the planetary surface; but they wanted to use their own small craft (a yacht comes with a ship's boat) rather than a commercial service, so as to keep their cargo under wraps. Methwit (with Recruiting-1) was able to find a ship's boat pilot on the station orbiting above the on-world starport, but (the roll being pretty bad) she was taking her "day off". So Vincenzo used his Bribery-1, and an offer of Cr 700, to persuade here that she should revisit her timetable. And so they flew down to the surface of Byron, parking their boat and cargo while heading to town via the monorail to await contact. At about this point, Methwit briefed Roland on the true situation - that they were part of a bio-weapon development scheme. Thankfully for the mission, Roland seemed pretty relaxed about that.

Contact took six days. (A six on a roll of one die.) In the meantime, Roland found Vincenzo a broker to help sell his goods, and (even after broker's fees) Vincenzo made a tidy profit of about Cr 15k. Unfortuntely Vincenzo then went out to find a casino, only to learn the hard way that gambling is illegal on Byron - and he had to pay a Cr 120 bribe to the two police officers who informed him of this fact to get them to leave him alone.

The session ended at the point of contact, with the PCs heading back to the starport to transfer the "cargo" to the contact's free trader. Hopefully we'll get in at least another session or two over the next couple of months, to find out how things resolve. (And given that Methwit has Wheeled Vehicle skill, and the yacht comes with an ATV, and two of the PCs have vacc suit skill and the party is equipped with five vacc suits, I'm pretty committed to finding some way to get the PCs out in either the corrosive or disease-ridden atmosphere with nothing between them and near-certain death but their ATV and some vacc suits.)

Given that this is a 40 year old system, I think it holds up really well. (Although the original generation rules give very low-skill PCs - whereas I thought the addition of the special duty roll made our PCs, even the ones with only a term or three, interestingly well-rounded.) We did't have any combat yesterday - and Traveller combat is ridiculously brutal, hence the need for two PCs - but the rules for social encounters, dealing with officials, and the like all worked smoothly. The only source of complaint was from Vincenzo's player - "I didn't want to play an accounting game!" An abstract resource management system would probably make the experience of running a starship a bit smoother.

The other thing that I was struck by is how bleak the default setting of Traveller is. The chance of dying during low passage transit is 1 in 6 for an ordinary person (1 in 12 with proper medical personnel overseeing the process). That's really high, and yet the rules are full of starship with low berths and passenger tables that show plenty of people willing to pay to travel in them. So the impression one gets is of worlds full of poor people willing to face a really high risk of death in order to travel to worlds that offer better propsects (but only 1 jump at a time!), while nobles lord it over the populace in their ridiculously expensive yet largely pointless intersteller yachts.

And this bleakness came out even in the worlds I generated - who would want to live in the universe of Ardour-3, Byron and Enlil?

For what it's worth, I recommend this system.

In summary: roll up PCs; roll up a starting world; roll up a few other words to be used if/as needed; roll a patron encounter; and then start play. I have a big pile of Traveller NPCs, but might want to roll up some starting NPCs also to use as/if needed.

You especially asked about developing - so that would be the time preparing some NPCs and worlds for use in play. That could take a few hours.

We played a session today with my regular group. I used the eastern GH map for our starting point, focusing on the area around Urnst/the Bandit Kingdoms/the Pale/Tenh.

The four PCs were:

Korvin, 21 year old human skald - from Fayan's Way, a prosperous wayhouse on the Urnst side of the river between that land and the Bandit Kingdoms. A skirmish-wise, pragmatic loner, he's a bit of an all-rounder: talking, fighting (with a sword), scholarship, criminal, riding and hunting. His raiment is a night-black cloak. His enemy is a bandit lord. He never tells the truth, and believes in following the clues to hunt down the wicked.

Telemere, 71 year old Elven ranger - from Elfhome in the Fellreev Forest. A stars-wise, calm loner, his enemy is his brother Kalamere who stole his place in a boat to the west. He believes that one should see things through to the end; and when he enters somewhere new, he checks to see if he is being watched. A pathfinder, cartographer, scout, survivalist, healer and archer, his raiment is the traditional Elven greycloak.

Fea-bella, 69 year old Elven dreamwalker - from the tower of the wizard Jobe on the edge of the Bluff Hills, not far from Elfhome. A hills-wise and herbs-wise scholar, healer and Elven enchanter, she believes that one should delve deeply, for knowledge holds the power to change the world. Her instinct is to read every word. Her mother Fella is a scholar, she was mentored by Vaccin (a 7th level Dreamwalker) before Vaccin was betrayed by her enemy Megloss, the elder apprentice of Jobe who set fire to the tower. Her friend is an adventuring Elven ranger whom she last saw riding his steed in the Fellreev. Her raiment is a forest-green cloak.

Golin, 43 year old Dwarven outcast - from a forgotten temple complex just inside The Pale. He is cynical and explosives-wise, and believes that explosive solutions are good solutions; he always looks for weak points in structures and mechanisms. As well as fighting, orating and Dwarf-y stuff, he is the group's cook. He carries a huge maul. His friend Vaxen (who may be the same personage as Vaccin?) is an alchemist from Jobe's tower; his mentor Grantham is a 7th level outcast; and his enemy is also called Golin, and cheated on the exams to get the best apprentice position. He is an orphan (or, at least, has repudiated his parents) and in memory of them wears an armoured glove worth 1D. He also wears galoshes as his raiment.

Although not everything about these PCs is stone-cold serious, I think they bear out what I said in my OP in the other Torchbearer thread: the colour in this game is first rate. These first-level characters have personalities, backstories, and relationships.

I had already decided on my way to the session to use the Tower of Stars as my scenario, but also - inspired by my Darkwood Forest experience - to open with a bandit encounter if any of the players built a talk-y PC. So when one built a skald, that settled that!

In the introductions phase we established that the PCs had met on the road, although Fea-bella and Telemere had once met in the Elfhome, while she and Golin had met at Jobe's tower. I read out the scenario backstory, and the players chose goals (Korvin: discover the truth about the Beholder of Fates; Telemere: discover if my brother came through here; Fea-bella: raid the tower for the secrets of the starts; Golin: raid the tower for its laboratory ingredients). Then I described the approach to the tower, where the PCs could see four rough-looking individuals sitting at the base of the basalt-scree slope up to the tower, one of them bandaging the feet of another.

The players decided to go for a social option, but for reasons I didn't follow decided to have Fea-bella (Persuader 2; cf Korvin's Orator 4 and Manipulator 4) do the talking, trying to persuade them to let her do the bandaging. Her goal was then to administer some sort of soporific. The Persuasion test failed; so she became angry in the course of the debate with Aunty - the one doing the bandaging. (The one with the injured foot, which the players had inferred had been cut on the basalt, was Rot Grub.) Telemere had been helping with this, and so became hungry and thirsty while the argument went on. He drained his waterskin and also his Fresh condition.

Once Aunty relented, it was then time to administer the soporific as part of the healing process - which was beginner's luck Alchemist, another fiasco, prompting the leader Scaramander (wearing a helmet and carrying a knife - the only arms and armour in this group of bandits) to try and drive the PCs off.

The players decided that Golin was their conflict captain; and Golin decided that their intent was to kill. Disposition was 8 for the PCs and 7 for the bandits. I scripted M/A/D; the players - mostly Golin and Fea-bella's players - initially canvassed opening with an Attack but then opted to Manoeuvre for advantage. And decided to try for a third-round Feint, anticipating a likely Defence at that point. Thus they scripted M/A/F.

Opposed manoeuvres are independent checks against Ob 0: the bandits got 3 successes and disarmed Telemere by closing with a dagger (there must have been other effects in there but I don't remember them); Korvin for the PCs got 6 successes and disarmed Scaramander, and both debuffed the NPCs and buffed their own next action. The Attack vs Attack was a massacre - the NPCs got in one point of damage, which damaged Golin's helmet, while Golin got 8 successes (5 rolled, plus 2 for Maul, plus 1 for superior Might) which eliminated the NPCs' 7 points of disposition. With no compromise required.

I had already rolled for the bandit's loot (Loot Table 1 for my area, and 2 times Loot Table 2 for four Might 4 NPCs): 2 candles, a helmet and an indecipherable note. So Scaramander's knife turned out to be broken by Korvin's disarming of it; but Golin was able to take the helmet to replace his damaged one, and Fea-bella successfully deciphered the note (written, it turned out, in a wizard's cypher by the adventuring enchanter Maila, and consisting of instructions on how to travel from Stoink to the Tower of Stars). They left the candles on the bodies for the moment, having nowhere to put them.

Not liking the look of the scree slope, Golin searched for another way into the tower - a weak spot - and the Crafting Nature check failed and so he was angry by the time he found it. His beginner's luck Labourer test to knock a hole in the wall also failed, and instead of opening up a hole in the wall the whole tower settled further on the basalt rubble, opening up crevasse which Korvin (who had been helping) avoided with a leap.

That sequence of events cost 3 turns and took the clock to 5 turns, and so everyone was hungry and thirsty. They ate and drank.

They then decided to go up the basalt scree, with Telemere making the test (beginner's luck Dungeoneering) helped by everyone else, and using a rope to assist. The test succeeded (5D, I think, vs Ob 3) and they entered the tower. At this point - 6 turns in - they lit a torch.

Looking around, they found a pool of water (which enabled them to refill their two empty waterskins) and a broken Basalt Guardian. They deliberately decided not to reassemble its broken head, and thought about making copies of the markings (runes?) on the head another time. Instead, Telemere (with Survivalist) helped Golin use rope and spikes to make a way through the gap in the ceiling. (With my daughter, I had assessed this as two tests; today I did it as one, having reread some of the advice in the Scholar's Guide.)

7 turns.

In the second level (which Golin correctly identified as a waiting room), they started with Telemere inspecting the corpse. His Healing test succeeded, and he was able to identify its cause of death (a severed wrist). He also spotted the signet ring and removed it. The mucking about with the body disturbed the dust (ie I had forgotten it for Telemere's Healing test) but despite the extra obstacle penalty Fea-bella was able to identify the ring, using Lore Master and assisted by Korvin and Telemere (both Lore Masters) and Golin (Dwarven Chronicles-wise) as a cult ring from Golin's forgotten temple complex, most likely crafted by Golin's nemesis Golin.

9 turns. During this time the torch burned out, and Fea-bella lit her lantern which had burned for one turn.

Looking in the alcoves on the inner wall of the semi-circular room - which the players (as their characters) identified as places to clean up before having one's fortune told - Telemere found inscriptions in a strange language. Fea-bella read them instinctually, but struggled to make them out (especially as strange inscriptions in the mouldy dust reminded her of her haunted dreams - about 3D vs Ob 6) and once she had identified them as writings about having one's fortune read in the stars had become sick from inhaling the dust.

Still 9 turns.

Once again the poor layout of this room description got the better of me - I had remembered this time to mention the door, but had not mentioned the glyphs - and so did now, when Telemere's player went to look at the rubble in front of the door; I suggested that the glyphs near the body must have been concealed by the dust before it got disturbed. When I also described the arm of the Basalt Guardian banging as Telemere crossed the glyphs they inferred that the glyphs must be some sort of activation mechanism without bothering to try and read them. Though their were differences of opinion as to whether the Guardian was trying to beat them up as intruders, or offer to help them change into their finery for having their fortunes told!

I asked Telemere's player if he was concerned about being watched, and he made his instinctual Scout test. It failed, and so he did not spot the head of the Guardian, with its sigil, in the rubble; but instead my favourite ley-line mutated moles swarmed out of the rubble towards the PCs. At which point - still at 9 turns - we has to finish the session.

In our end-of-session phase, rewards were distributed: Korvin got two Fate, for pursing his goal and his belief (as he had helped to interpret the signet ring); Telemere got two Fate, for pursuing his goal (he had been trying to find records, in the waiting room, of who had been there) and for trying to see things through to the end, and also one Persona, being judged the teamworker; Fea-bella got three Fate, as she had delved deep for knowledge, had sought the secrets of the stars, and had aided the group with her instinctual reading of the indecipherable note; and Golin got one Fate (for trying to find and take laboratory ingredients) and one Persona as MVP, for taking out the NPCs in a single round with his maul.

I'm now at three first sessions for this system, but its uncertain when a second session will happen for any of them.

Summary version: PCs build PCs; we place their home settlements on the map as necessary; I place an appropriate place to explore - say, The Tower of Stars - on the map; play starts.

If I needed to draw up a map, I could - but for TB2e, the WoG maps will do the job. If I had to prepare my own "dungeon", then from experience writing up a 6-area dungeon for TB2e takes an afternoon. (Or thereabouts.)

 

[thefutilist]

The reason there are terms like color is because a lot of Narrative games play around with who gets to say what about what. There needed to be a shared terminology about what was legit to say.


My Rogue is trying to find the location of the Red Star cult.


Me: Rogue enters the Black Boar tavern, it's still busy this time of day, filled with yellow smoke from rot weed and the sound of the cries and lamentations of the gamblers. I approach one eyed Broher, the tavern owner, and ask him where the cult is hiding. He tells me they meet in the cellar of the Mangled Duck.

I've invented the Black Boar, rot weed and what color its smoke is, Broher and the fact he has one eye and also the location of the Red Star cult.

In some games none of that is legitimate. In some games just the part that's italicised isn't legitimate. In some games it may be legitimate depending on the roll. In some games it's all legitimate. In some games it's legitimate if my character frequents the Black Boar but not legitimate if this is a 'new' tavern he's going to. And so on.

 

[AlViking]

One of the side effects of how I run my sandbox campaign is that the campaign works out fine for players who don't have any goals or strong beliefs for their characters. They are mostly reactive in how they handle things. They generally pursue straightforward objectives like asking where the nearest dungeon or ruin is, then heading out.

In a groups where some players are goal-oriented they come along for the ride, especially if they are friends of the goal-oriented players.

A subset of these players will tell me, I don't want any backstory, I am just here to hang and see where things take me.

If the campaign goes long enough, usually something happens where they get invested in something and become slightly more proactive in seeking out conflict (as TB/BW defines it). Often, after roleplaying with an NPC, and they really like that character.

A lot of my players, and myself if I'm being honest, are pretty casual about our games. Challenging beliefs, deep introspection of a character? Not interested. Detailed backgrounds just aren't that motivating. Fighting the (obviously) evil guys, making bad jokes and laughing at the stupid things our characters do? That's what we're there for. Obviously different people should play what they enjoy and I'm not saying any of this like it's a negative aspect of those games. But we all play for different reasons.

The thing that I get tired of is people pushing other games with such different approaches like they add anything to the conversation. We get it. Other people like BW or BitD or DW. Do we have to always go on these tangents when those games don't really apply to D&D? There's a TTRPG forum for discussing other games. But we always go round and round how D&D doesn't do.... something... that other games do better and if we would only not be so blind and unwilling to open our eyes we'd agree.

That last paragraph doesn't apply to everyone of course. But we have been told that D&D can't do a real sandbox, that the DM not having guardrails leads to harm, that we're just willfully ignorant.

 

[pemerton]

Since a link wasn't supplied, I had to search the thread. @pemerton is probably referring to this.



While not a definition, as he is saying what BW is not, the phrasing implies that it’s a campaign that focuses on place, the locations in the world, and journeying, the act of traveling from one place to another, along with the choices players make about where to go.

All these elements are part of a sandbox campaign, but it is not the whole picture and omits crucial details.

In the living world sandbox campaigns I run, what matters just as much, if not more, is that the world has a life of its own. In short, life doesn't wait around for the players. NPCs move on with their goals, whether the players, as their character, interacts with them or not. If the players ignore a brewing war or leave a town in trouble, those things still play out. They don’t freeze until the players come back. That’s the heart of it: a World In Motion, reacting to what the players do or don’t do as their characters.

To focus on traveling to locations for adventuring paints an incomplete picture. As I stated previously in Post #3,745, the crucial difference is that the system used by BW and Torchbearer mandates conflict (as defined by those two systems) as central focus. Everything that is prepped, adjudicated, or roleplayed is focused on that. In contrast, conflict in sandbox campaigns is emergent, resulting from the situations that the players, as their characters, choose to get involved with. These two goals are not compatible and lead to different techniques being emphasized or used.

What do sandbox campaign focus on well there are several variation including my own living world style. But all of the share a common focus on allowing the players as their characters to set the direction of the campaign by their choices. In otherwords conflict (as defined by BW/TB) is emergent from what the players choose to do as their character.

Now I use the phrase "as their characters" a fair amount. What does it mean? What it doesn't mean is first-person roleplaying. That is a stylistic choice that different groups may or may not use. I emphasize it in my living world campaigns. Others do not. What it means is that decisions are made in the first person. In other words, the players consider the situation that their character is in and decide what their character would do solely on the basis of what their character knows, what they are capable of, and using any goals or beliefs defined for the character. They may be expressed in the third person, the first person, etc. But it is the viewpoint of the character at that moment that is the foundation for the choice.

This is why conflict is emergent, one choice leads to one kind of conflict, and another choices leads to a different conflict. The nature of either conflict will be shaped by the situation not the character.

All of this is adjudicated by an impartial referee. As I noted in my previous post, the criticism levied here is that players' goals are always subordinate to the referee's goals. What is being forgotten in this criticism is that players always have a choice. The referee doesn't make it for them. Because the referee is impartial, if the player decides to go left instead of right as their character, the referee will respect that choice and describe the new situation accordingly.

I don't accept that your sort of "living world" game is the only approach to sandbox RPGing.

So what you describe as "omission of crucial details" is, in fact, deliberate generality that allows for multiple approaches to sandboxing, not all of which involve "impartial refereeing".

 

[AlViking]

And then they can be called out for violating the rules. Which is literally what I said. Having public, known, written rules means you can actually say, "Hey, that thing you're doing, you're not supposed to do that".


If you think yelling is the most serious problem, we have a lot of work to do going over what is actually a problem at the table.

"Yelling" is so far down the list of possible issues it's not even worth talking about.


And? Rules can still help. You're requiring that they be absolutely perfect shields. Perfection is a ridiculous standard. It'd be nice if you didn't use a standard of perfection or nothing.


Note: something that would HELP. Not something that is absolutely 1000000% perfect.

But, as an example: the Dungeon World rules for "Spout Lore" (effectively a knowledge check). On a full success, the GM must give an answer that is both interesting and useful. Refusing to do so is breaking the rules. The rules are clear and simple, they don't require tons of effort.

Likewise, as previously mentioned, the X-card (and the rarer but still useful O-card) is enormously helpful for avoiding unintentional harm through GM actions or words. Given literally its only function is to create a discreet but recognizable signal--and even in the fantastically unlikely situation that it gets abused, you can see that because it's in the open--it helps, objectively and consistently. It isn't perfect. It's theoretically possible for it to be abused, or for the GM to just ignore it or only pretend to recognize it...but, again, because both of these are public acts, we can do something about them.

A great deal of what happens in "rulings not rules" games inherently puts this stuff behind the black box. You aren't allowed to know. You aren't allowed to have oversight. And then it's coupled with an extremely strong push against any form of disagreement or even mere commentary during session, forcing all comments to happen long after, when memory is fogged and the social contract strongly enforces a "come on man, just let it go, it's already past" effect. (Why, yes, I have dealt with this exact issue in a social group I was in!)

The social contract is important. But offloading 99.999% of stuff to it has consequences. It is NOT a cost-free choice. It is NOT as sweet and simple and perfect as so many in this thread pretend it will be. Because there is a spectrum of behavior, not 100% saintly perfection or 100% demonic vileness; there is a spectrum of GM skill, not 100% blissed-out awesomesauce or 100% dirt-worst awfulness; and, most important of all, the social contract can be JUST as harmful, JUST as oppressive and damaging, as any overly-restrictive ruleset--all while actively resisting any efforts to improve or change it because you can't discuss it openly, that's the whole point of it being a social contract.

I've given examples of the text that explains the roles of DM and player from the books which basically boils down to "don't be a jerk" and "everyone is at the table to have fun so make that a priority". The 2024 rules do a better job of this and includes an entire section in the DMG "Ensuring Fun for All" which includes gathering soft and hard limits, hopes, expectations and concerns. Perhaps it should have been included more explicitly in previous versions but it is there now.

As far as your example, not giving out information may be your preference but it is not harmful.

No one is forcing you to be at the table even if you have a hard time acting on it, that's not an issue with the game. A GM may control aspects of the game they have no power over you, the player.