Fluid/changing party makeup

[Felix]

What do you think about this idea for running a campaign...

++Assume 4 players in the group.

++Each player rolls up 4 characters, all at the same level.

++Each player rolls 1d4, and that chooses the character they're playing for this particular adventure.

++Play out the adventure with those four characters.

++Adventure ends. All characters (even those not played) gain XP for the adventure, so all remain on equal footing. Not the same for material wealth. characters keep what they earn.

++DM rolls 1d4, and determines which of the players keeps his character for the next adventure.

++The other 3 players roll 1d4 and see which character will be in the next adventure.

++Party assembles around the character that stayed on from the first adventure for whatever reason or motive, and they go on the second adventure.

++Second adventure ends, DM rolls 1d4 to pick the next character that carrys on. Other players roll 1d4 to see which of their characters gets called from the bullpen.

++Rinse, repeat.

I got this idea reading my old Conan comic books... Conan seems to run into the same rogues and cutthroats at different points in his life, although they've gained in power, ability, and their backstory has gotten deeper as well.

This would allow for there to be more of a plot-driven story (as opposed to character driven) and the PCs would not be restrained to stay together as a party only because they're all PCs: the characters are going to go their seperate ways anyhow. So there doesn't really need to be a burning reason for these guys to stick.

It also allows players to explore several different character builds, which can make things a little more interesting as playing the same character with the same abilities can get a little monotonous after a while.

Tactics would be interesting -- there wouldn't be a standard operating procedure for fights since there is a new party makeup every adventure.

Material wealth would be low... this would have to be run in a low-magic world like Hyboria d20 so a marked lack of magic items at higher levels would be less noticed.

There would be a good reason that the BBEG doesn't go after the party at mid-levels when they are not quite a threat, but could become one in the future... it's because there is no "party". Bad guys might know about one of the PCs, but they would not be able to prepare for all 4 of them since any given party hasn't adventured for that long together.

There would remain a bit of history twixt the characters, since they will run into each other at different points in their own particular history, although keeping track of the different relationships might be a little difficult... perhaps notes might need to be taken to remind players how their PCs feel about the other individual PCs.

So, what do you think about this way of running a campaign?

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

That is a really really interesting idea that I'm going to have to try sometime. I guess it could be tough since some players will get attached to one PC, and might get a bit upset if they have to play another(even if they did make it). But with a good, open minded group, this could really be a very fun game with a unique feel to it.

 

[Impeesa]

I once had an idea vaguely similar to that. It was basically inspired by Final Fantasy Tactics. I envisioned a party that would consist of a stable of a dozen or more characters, from which any players who were there could select their PC for the evening. Only those characters being actively played would be present in-game for the evening's adventuring, but any time they could make contact with the rest of the party they could draw on their full resources (knowledges, item-crafting ability, etc). It would work well for a large group with fairly fluid attendance (like mine), which is what I initially thought of when I read the topic title.

--Impeesa--

 

[The Grackle]

I like it, but if I was a player I'd prefer it to be even more freeform than that. Don't bother w/the rolling, just let people pick out the PC they want to play that night. That way you won't end up w/an all wizard party. (unless that's what people want.)

You'd have to run real episodic adventures, but you could also do wierder storylines- like episode 1 w/party A and episode 2 w/party B where at the end of ep.2 they find out it actually took place before eps.1 and set up the following adventure... Hmmm... There's all kinda tricky stuff you could do, w/OOC knowledge too. A character reveals himself to be a vampire (or whatever) and then the next game everyone in the next group has to pretend they don't know... Or you could get a player to play someone elses PC unexpectedly...

Yeah, that could be a cool campaign.

I once had an idea vaguely similar to that. It was basically inspired by Final Fantasy Tactics...

Yay FFT!
(I have a new policy to cheer every time someone mentions Tactics.)

 

[Impeesa]

Yay FFT!
(I have a new policy to cheer every time someone mentions Tactics.)

A good policy, to be sure. You can take all kinds of ideas from it. A few of Sollir's PrC's over in House Rules are based off a Holy Swordsman PrC that I did a while back.

On a related note, want to see something terrible? Observe what my dvd drive did to my non-greatest-hits FFT cd. It makes me cry.

(end hijack)

--Impeesa--

 

[Chimera]

A bit too random for my tastes. Characters will be played extremely inconsistently and there will be no player "investment" in any character. I would vote against this...probably drop the game if enforced.

A pool of characters might be a better idea. Kind of like suggested. Have each player draw up 2-4 characters and put them in a pool. At each session, each player choses a PC from the pool. Of course, you'll have some of the same problems as above. I wouldn't like it too much either, because I couldn't plan on what to do with my characters. After all, WHO controls the 'level up' of each character? What if Joe choses to multi-class the character when everyone else dislikes that idea? What if Betty choses crappy feats or spends the skills points in a sloppy and inefficient manner? Do you want players dueling over who can muck up specific PCs in the pool, or purposely screwing over the PCs someone else likes the most?

Back in the late 70's and early 80's, I played with three highschool buddies. We rotated GMing between the four of us. We also ran five PCs each. These PCs traveled around in a big group with their henchmen, guards and hirelings. Why didn't the bad guys mess with us? Because we had a freaking army! When we got to port, or to the GM's dungeon, each of the three of us playing picked two of our PCs to make up a group of six characters for the adventure.

 

[Terwox]

The idea sounds bad at first, but I think it could be fun.
Sounds like you should run it past your group first, though, if you haven't already -- if you get any major pain from them, you might not want to try it. Although, no harm done in trying it for a couple weeks anyway and giving up, of course.

 

[Chimera]

Another option I am seriously considering for my next game is based on the way my last campaign worked.

In the last game, it was like the PCs were a group within a larger group of "friends and allies". Occasionally the PC group would take along other (NPC) members of this group, occasionally they would train underlings of their allies. The NPC members of this greater group were not idle when not with the PC group. They formed their own group or groups and went adventuring. Sometimes doing things the PCs refused to do, sometimes acting on things the PCs didn't know, sometimes merely acting in support of their own ambitions.

In my next game, I will probably attempt the same thing, depending on the disposition of the (entirely new group of) players.

But it will be used to add a "shadow PC" concept. What this means is that I will allow each player whose PC has real ambitions and outside duties that require large chunks of downtime to run a "shadow PC" within the framework of this larger group.

When your main PC has to spend three months (game time) to learn a new class or PrC (enforced), or wants to spend a month or so creating items or serving at the main temple or tending crops or whatever the heck they want to do that takes them away from adventuring but makes them a real person; they can activate their "shadow PC".

This will be a part-time PC, most of the time NPC within the larger group. When not in play, it will be an NPC under the full control of me, the GM. It will not be a subordinate or henchman of the player's main PC, nor will I tolerate it being treated as such. I will allow the player to decide what the SPC will do in it's downtime for the most part, but will keep overall control and veto over it's actions. I may decide to send it off on NPC only adventures. I may have it take other actions.

Sending it off in other adventures serves two purposes. One, it will allow me to keep the SPC at the same or near enough level to the main PC. Two, it will serve to create plot hooks, relationships and knowledge for the player group.

Good theory, but I'm not 100% sure of how it will work in practice.

 

[Conaill]

Yikes. Definitely not the kind of game I would want to play. How could you ever getr attached to your character? And how could you believably keep a continuing story line going, with the PCs swapping in and out like that?

Well, you did ask for opinions, so here's mine: I would probably walk out if my DM tried to force this on me...

 

[Queen_Dopplepopolis]

First impression: pretty cool.

However, I think a plot driven story would be harder to achieve if your players do not have that special attachment to their characters. Being *into* your character, I think, takes the story to a whole new level of depth and interesting-ness.