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<blockquote data-quote="Wik" data-source="post: 5046421" data-attributes="member: 40177">Okay, so if you don't know about the West Marches, you might want to read this:<a href="http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/" target="_blank">ars ludi » Grand Experiments: West Marches</a>The idea is, the land is unexplored, and the PCs explore that land.&nbsp; Except, the party changes each session, with a large pool of players grouping together and launching exploration parties to their heart's content.&nbsp; A sort of table-top Massively Multiplayer RPG sort of thing.&nbsp; The creator of the West Marches says you can probably use any system for this type of play, but that it should probably have &quot;Granularity&quot;, meaning levels of character selection so that it takes a while for PCs to reach the games &quot;end point&quot; or &quot;midpoint&quot;.&nbsp; I'd add that the game should also have less reliance on &quot;Character roles&quot; (as opposed to &quot;if the group lacks a cleric, we're screwed&quot;), and that there shouldn't be a &quot;Magic item necessity&quot; (or &quot;If I don't have a +2 longsword, I'll miss foes of my level every time).&nbsp; At the same time, it should have an incentive for treasure and wealth being a means to PC improvement (to encourage competition between parties).The system would also need to be very easy to GM for, and easy to plan encounters - because the GM is going to spend a LOT of development time stocking dungeons and making random encounter tables.&nbsp; Because of this, I think the monsters should be quick and easy to run (with little reading necessary to run things, because the GM is probably going to be running the encounter &quot;cold&quot; - ie, with little to no preparation).&nbsp; It also helps if the system expects the party to only fight a small selection of monsters at any one time, or if there is an easy system of accessing monster stats (such as the adventure builder for 4e).&nbsp; So, what system would work?&nbsp; Which is ideal?&nbsp; Has anyone run a west marches game?&nbsp; And what other necessities am I missing?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Wik, post: 5046421, member: 40177"] Okay, so if you don't know about the West Marches, you might want to read this: [url=http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/]ars ludi » Grand Experiments: West Marches[/url] The idea is, the land is unexplored, and the PCs explore that land. Except, the party changes each session, with a large pool of players grouping together and launching exploration parties to their heart's content. A sort of table-top Massively Multiplayer RPG sort of thing. The creator of the West Marches says you can probably use any system for this type of play, but that it should probably have "Granularity", meaning levels of character selection so that it takes a while for PCs to reach the games "end point" or "midpoint". I'd add that the game should also have less reliance on "Character roles" (as opposed to "if the group lacks a cleric, we're screwed"), and that there shouldn't be a "Magic item necessity" (or "If I don't have a +2 longsword, I'll miss foes of my level every time). At the same time, it should have an incentive for treasure and wealth being a means to PC improvement (to encourage competition between parties). The system would also need to be very easy to GM for, and easy to plan encounters - because the GM is going to spend a LOT of development time stocking dungeons and making random encounter tables. Because of this, I think the monsters should be quick and easy to run (with little reading necessary to run things, because the GM is probably going to be running the encounter "cold" - ie, with little to no preparation). It also helps if the system expects the party to only fight a small selection of monsters at any one time, or if there is an easy system of accessing monster stats (such as the adventure builder for 4e). So, what system would work? Which is ideal? Has anyone run a west marches game? And what other necessities am I missing? [/QUOTE]

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