Dookie in the Sandbox?

[ST]

It's all good, Dramatist I think is a good description, don't take it as a hassle.

I'm fascinated by sandbox play, but haven't really done much of it at all, so I'm following the thread with interest to steal ideas for how to set up my next campaign.

The only reason I harped on Narrativism as a term is I'm actually looking to incorporate that into my sandbox setup, by having whatever theme/story comes out of the game be entirely from what the players decide to do and what conflicts they persue.

That's still "sandbox", I think, to the extent that there's a lot of content to explore; I'm not sure if it's all that different from a traditional sandbox, except that we'd be focusing more on the characters and their goals than on pure exploration.

 

[Ariosto]

The characterization of the "site-based freeform" campaign as exploration of "a generally static sandbox" is bizarre to me. Such campaigns have always been quite dynamic situations in my experience, and as described in the classic works starting with The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures (and going well beyond D&D).

There's a difference between ongoing events in the world and a "plot line" for players to follow.

A "narrow" start is pretty common, and in my opinion a good way to get things going.

The notion that "any decent campaign has to have an end" is foreign to me. The term "campaign", in an RPG context, has always been used in my experience to refer to an open-ended continuity of play in a given "game world". That it should not end is rather more the ideal with which I am acquainted! Characters, and even players, may come and go, but the game goes on.

That the ideal is seldom realized, campaigns commonly going at least into long hiatus, makes the idea of some sort of "endgame" interesting. Most of the time, I don't think folks really want to end the game! There are probably different temperaments in terms of whether it's more satisfying to leave off with loose ends tied up or with plenty to look forward to whenever the game resumes.

Considering what makes sense should generally be a good guide to what to expect in one place or another, but a fantastical world can abound in surprises even more than our real one. Demons, magicians, shape-shifters and spirits malevolent or benign may be afoot for reasons mysterious without extraordinary investigation. Considerations both realistic and for the sake of the game should allow all but the foolhardy or exceptionally unlucky opportunity to gauge danger and avoid untimely ends (more so as characters attain higher levels).

 

[Desdichado]

I apologize for using the term Narrativist. Maybe the GDS Dramatist is more appropriate here? *shrug* Either way the point of the thread was more for issues that have come up with sandboxes, and I wanted to start off by explaining briefly what the different styles are.

Yeah, I kinda missed the point; I'd still reiterate my same point, though... players tend to be a bit lost and purposeless in a sandbox campaign. Simple exploration of hex after hex, all the way down the row, usually isn't sufficient motivation to get any players I've ever played with going. Also, as Hjorilmir (I think) said, how do you get the players to agree on what to do?

It sounds like you're proposing the opposite of my narrow-wide-narrow proposal; I've never, ever been successful starting a game out wide. It's frustrating spinning of wheels until the players find something to sink their teeth into.

In any case, we like having a few events happen. I'm not talking about "the world is in danger of being consumed by fantasy-Galactus" type of events. The PCs stopping a band of brigands who're raiding the road to a little village of farmers could be one. The mayor's daughter having uncovered something in the the backyard that led to a haunting could be another.

I'm a fan of "little, local" events and lowish level play, not save the whole dang world over and over again.

 

[Desdichado]

The notion that "any decent campaign has to have an end" is foreign to me. The term "campaign", in an RPG context, has always been used in my experience to refer to an open-ended continuity of play in a given "game world". That it should not end is rather more the ideal with which I am acquainted! Characters, and even players, may come and go, but the game goes on.

That the ideal is seldom realized, campaigns commonly going at least into long hiatus, makes the idea of some sort of "endgame" interesting.

That's fair, but as you say, that goal is seldom realized. A game that ends on a high note is much more satisying than one that gradually fades away with a whimper. I've caved to the inevitable and at some point start looking for a "closing" for every campaign I've ever run, and I've had a better gaming experience overall because of it.

Also: I'm a bit fickle. I'll be running one game when some other concept will grab me 'round the throat and demand to be run. Or, I decide I want to play. Or the other guys want to run (almost everyone in our group is a part time GM, so we have to have some natural limits in place so everyone gets a chance behind the screen.) In any case, I think it's more common that campaigns do end rather than run into perpetuity, and given that fact, it's better to end them well than not.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I like campaigns to come to an end. FFZ uses the term explicitly as "one big story."

I tend to play things episodically, like a season of Buffy. The Campaign is the entire season, each session is a single episode, and then, after a year, we might play another campaign in the same world, or move on to a new world, new characters, and new havoc.

That's just kind of my default way of running things.

I absolutely agree with the "begin narrow" thing, too. I open with the words "roll initiative" as much as possible, so I force the PC's to figure out how they wound up in this combat themselves.

IMXP, plunking people down on a map and saying "go wild" generally makes it hard to have group cohesion, and the players generally lack the impetus to do anything. It's like putting a kid who just learned to read into the Library of Alexandria. Yes, there is a lot to do, but how to make sense and prioritize those options? How to get to the good parts as fast as possible?

 

[Doug McCrae]

I'm running a M&M superhero game at the moment. It definitely isn't sandbox. All opponents are unique, it takes quite a while to create them so it's not possible to have a really large variety of opposition available at once. For each session I have a moderate amount of planned stuff, including one or more adventures. If the PCs refuse all the adventures then nothing will happen. Superheroes don't refuse adventures though, usually. I say, "Some bad stuff is happening in Pennsylvania (or wherever)" and the players say, "We go stop it". Superheroes tend to be, like players, reactive.

Occasionally the PCs won't try to stop a bad thing that I thought they would but I get away with it because I almost always have more stuff prepared than I need each session.

One of my players says he really likes the freedom he has in my games, which is weird considering the number of adventures available is usually one. But I think he means that within each adventure there's a lot of choice. This is true. I have no pre-determined path or solution, in fact I don't often think about what the PCs might do when I set up an adventure. I find this saves time. Superheroes are so powerful and can go about things in so many different ways it's pointless to plan very much.

My problem with sandbox is that I'm very lazy and find it hard to create a milieu before a campaign starts, like Gary would've wanted me to.

Although I've never seen it done it should be possible to run a sandbox game in a superhero universe. You'd need a really crazy world filled with a wide variety of costumed weirdoes, a la Marvel or DC. It would be a lot of work to set up, but it would be doable. The PCs would most likely be heroes-for-hire or mercenaries. It could also work with more traditional heroes, provided there are lots of interesting and/or bad things happening at once, which gives the players plenty of choice.

To a very limited degree, I have done this in my current campaign, sometimes there's been two or three avenues for adventure open at the same time. But I wouldn't call that a sandbox.

 

[Ariosto]

Yeah, superheroes tend to be pretty reactive. When they get into proactive, "Let's really solve problems and change the world!" mode, they often end up switching dramatic roles to villains (or at least tragic heroes) -- "Power corrupts", especially when Utopia would be narratively inconvenient.

Sometimes I have gone with a complete plot (including climactic scene) in mind, but there are so many ways things can go "wrong" that it's a gamble.

Mostly, I just work out what the NPCs plan to do, and have them respond in keeping with their natures when the heroes intervene.

For D&D, I think the original "underworld" concept is brilliant. I don't think it's really necessary to map even half a dozen levels before players make their first descent into the dungeons beneath the "huge ruined pile, a vast castle built by generations of mad wizards and insane geniuses".

Indeed, experience suggests that keeping just a couple of steps ahead of the players is probably preferable to developing much without the inspiration of active play. I find that the pressure helps to focus attention on essentials and override a tendency to perfectionism, keeping an immediacy that is very vibrant in play. Not playing for a while, there can be a tendency to forget how much players' imaginations "fill in the blanks" and how much of the fun comes from improvisation. YMMV, of course.

Anyway, it's brilliant because the labyrinthine catacombs and caverns provide an environment with a huge number of possible paths through it -- and yet a sharply finite number of immediate choices at any given junction -- and whichever way one goes promises peril and plunder, mystery and wonder. By keeping it dynamic, rather than letting levels be permanently "cleared", one can ensure that the ever-growing maze remains fresh for players new and old alike.

Couple that with a town initially sketched in broad strokes, and a wilderness environs even less defined (details to be discovered when the players are strong enough for exploratory expeditions), and you're ready to roll!

Over time, you can gradually flesh out the core area and expand outward. Provision for the adventures of early players tends to produce material that can be reused in years to come, and the campaign gets richer year by year. Eventually, the first characters to attain "name" level retire to become basically "NPC" lords of their domains cut from the wilds (occasionally venturing forth to deal with matters of such level as to interest them). Their biographies (and those of the valiant fallen) by then contribute to the history and legend of the realm.

There can be a lot of pleasure in the organic development, something different from playing in someone else's world neatly packaged.

 

[LostSoul]

The characterization of the "site-based freeform" campaign as exploration of "a generally static sandbox" is bizarre to me.

I think you have to look at it in terms of a metaplot: If the PCs don't deal with this, bad stuff will happen.

For example, when I was first thinking about my campaign I thought that if the PCs didn't deal with Orcus he would eventually usurp the Raven Queen. Now I'm thinking, no. The PCs may make that come about, but if they do nothing the status quo will remain.

That's because I don't want to give them the non-choice of saving the world vs. doing what they want. I am only concerned in challenging player choice, not in making them jump through hoops of my own creation.

(One problem they are going to have to deal with is some NPCs who are going to return in a few months to establish control in their area; this is based on the actions of now-dead PCs. Now that's the kind of "metaplot" - PC driven - that I can get behind.)

I guess what I'm saying is that, if you want to make player choice drive the events in the campaign, you don't want to introduce a "must do" event.

That the ideal is seldom realized, campaigns commonly going at least into long hiatus, makes the idea of some sort of "endgame" interesting.

I have played in many short campaigns that ended on a dramatic moment. It depends on what you want out of the game - that is, to create a story. D&D is probably not the best system for it - though it's possible - but these games I'm thinking of have been using Sorcerer, The Shadow of Yesterday, Burning Wheel, and other indie games.

That probably outs me as a big Forge guy. I like GNS. However, I would still not like to see GNS discussed in this thread.

edit: Ariosto's last post is very good. I need to spread some rep around before I can reward him; can someone cover me?

 

[I'm A Banana]

I don't want to give them the non-choice of saving the world vs. doing what they want.

In most of my games, saving the world is, sooner or later, what they want to do.

Not just because the world will end, either.

Gil-focused mercenaries save the world because there will be a life of luxury for them if they do it.

Lovelorn Ted Baxters save the world because of all the drooling fangirls (or maybe just that one aloof girl in the party...)

Cool old dudes save the world so that the next generation can enjoy it, so that they leave a legacy for the youth of the planet.

Folks with a Mysterious Past save the world because doing so will help them define who they are now, regardless of who they were before.

Atoners save the world because that is the only way they can make up for the evils they've done.

Perfectionists save the world because it is the highest demonstration of their skill as warriors/crafters/whatever.

"Saving the world" gets you what you want. It also lets you conquer your weaknesses and fears. On one level, it's allegory, which makes sense in a fantasy setting: you represent one of the millions of reasons to continue to live in a world where death wants to end it all.

 

[takasi]

In most of my games, saving the world is, sooner or later, what they want to do.

It's all about timing. When some of the players I know discover that in order to save the world they must act soon then they feel more railroaded. If they uncover a plot that will take years to unfold then they will still feel just as satisfied if they defeat it (after all, they did still save the world), but they also have the freedom to take their time in approaching it. They may still grumble because yes, if they like the world then this will become something they have to do but at least they can put it off for later.

For sandbox play the next best thing to a Status Quo World is a Procrastinator Friendly World.

And 'saving the world' doesn't necessarily mean protecting everything in it; it could be a nation/city/village/house/person/etc. Anytime there is a danger of destroying or changing something in the world, timing determines how much pressure a DM is putting on his players. Some players are more tolerant of this pressure than others.