Enemy-less adventures?

[Kahuna Burger]

My son is watching Balto over and over again this week, and it has me thinking about adventures with no foes. Balto is the (highly fictionalized) story of the sled dogs which brought antitoxin through 674 miles of Alaskan winter to Nome in the diptheria outbreak of 1925. While the movie inserts various canine interpersonal drama, the main story is Man/Dog Vs Nature. Tracking, survival, dodging, climbing...

It got me thinking about how much I liked the Posiden Adventure for being an action/adventure story with no bad guy. I tried to recreate the feel of that in an Alternity one-shot with a similar struggle on a badly damaged space liner.

So the general question is, have you ever played or run a significant adventure without any sort of sentient foe? Natural or created disasters, vermin, plagues and weather but no one that you can say "here's the bad guy to slay!" ? Would you want to? Would you feel cheated if there was a significant, character's life threatening, adventure with no BBEG at the end?

 

[Rel]

So the general question is, have you ever played or run a significant adventure without any sort of sentient foe? Natural or created disasters, vermin, plagues and weather but no one that you can say "here's the bad guy to slay!" ? Would you want to? Would you feel cheated if there was a significant, character's life threatening, adventure with no BBEG at the end?

I've actually run adventures precisely like this for a solo game I did for my wife a while back. As a low level wizard on her own I wanted something with peril but not a lot of combat. In D&D I think it works exceptionally well with Rogues and Rangers and Druids who have a lot of skills in this arena.

But I also think that as you get a larger, more diverse group of PC's and players, it's less likely to work as well. Some PC's (as well as some players) are more optimized for combat and unless there is a meaningful foe then they will be dissatisfied. If you know your group well then I think it could make a very fun adventure.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

But I also think that as you get a larger, more diverse group of PC's and players, it's less likely to work as well. Some PC's (as well as some players) are more optimized for combat and unless there is a meaningful foe then they will be dissatisfied. If you know your group well then I think it could make a very fun adventure.

Well, you do have to think about PC niche more carefully I suppose. Though the optimized fighter will probably have abilities or skills that make them useful - in the posiden adventure for instance, being strong enough to force a hatch or agile enough to jump up to the valve and close it without something to stand on.... Making a non-enemy challange multifaceted enough for everyone to have something to contribute... hmmm....

 

[Mycanid]

What about a mystery to be solved or something?

I know it may sound silly, but weren't the detectives always figuring things out without necessary BBEG crushing taking place?

 

[Piratecat]

Sure. I run enemy-less adventures every once in a while, and they're a great change of pace. A neat example is when the PCs have to go into a friendly, happy place for something, and they realize that in this case they're the "enemy." Another example is a place where the environment is the foe; I sent the PCs off to a plane where magic didn't work and they ran the risk of being hunted as witches. They were really nervous, despite their "foe" (the mayor of the town) being LG.

 

[S'mon]

I ran the great West End Games' Star Wars (d6) adventure "Starfall", which concerns the escape of a group of Rebels from a critically damaged Star Destroyer. The Imperials do provide occasional opposition, but essentially it's Poseidon Adventure in space.

 

[Ourph]

So the general question is, have you ever played or run a significant adventure without any sort of sentient foe? Natural or created disasters, vermin, plagues and weather but no one that you can say "here's the bad guy to slay!" ?

Yes, I've done that.

Would you want to?

I would have to carefully consider the type of players I was running for before doing it again. The first time around the players got very bored because they were mostly sitting around making a lot of skill checks. They were more interested in the tactical combat side of the game and didn't really care about thinking their way through the problem and using skills at critical moments.

Would you feel cheated if there was a significant, character's life threatening, adventure with no BBEG at the end?

I wouldn't feel cheated by no BBEG, but I tend to think entire adventures with no combat at all are boring. While the skill systems in some RPGs are well developed, I've yet to see one that goes into as much tactical and strategic detail in its implementation as the co-existing combat system for that game. Most RPGs (whether they realize it and admit to it or not) are "about" killing things and taking their stuff. Doing a no-combat adventure with a system that devotes the vast majority of its rules to combat leaves little room for actually playing the game during that game session.

 

[Psion]

So the general question is, have you ever played or run a significant adventure without any sort of sentient foe? Natural or created disasters, vermin, plagues and weather but no one that you can say "here's the bad guy to slay!" ? Would you want to? Would you feel cheated if there was a significant, character's life threatening, adventure with no BBEG at the end?

Several Traveller adventures written like that... investigating mysteries, performing rescues, and dealing with the environment.

In fact I just read one such adventure released for Traveller D20, Scout Cruiser:
http://enworld.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=3253&

 

[the Jester]

Yeah, I've done this from time to time- from the adventure whose goal is to "win the contest" to the time the dire beaver dam flooded the town, to my current low-magic game- which has some foes, but a LOT more environmental adversity. I've also run a political game where the pcs had to choose sides and help their guy win an election.

 

[DemonKing]

Tomb of Horrors doesn't have a lot of "enemies" in it, unless you count the tomb itself and Gary Gygax's bizarre design approach (No Save! No Save! NO SAVE!).