Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 5179396" data-attributes="member: 29398">How I keep track of big story arcs varies depending on the situation.If it's something I planned for going in, I've already roughly story-boarded out what adventures happen in what order and what the PCs should in theory accomplish in each one (see example below).  Then, as things go along I keep rough notes which get refined each week into the game logs - one for me, and one online for everyone else.  I also have to be aware of what story hooks are being followed up on and what ones are being ignored, so I don't waste time planning for something they've already turned away from.However, if it's a bigger story that simply grows out of the adventures they do I'll dig back in the log and see what I can dredge up that might be relevant now, to make it all fit together better.And on an even larger scale, I'll plot out strings of 3-5 adventures that can logically be tied into a single story arc (a good example is the 1e A-series) and then try to work out ways these strings can somehow fit in with each other; I'll also keep a list of one-off or diversion (or red herring) adventures to lob in if needed.I also intentionally try not to let things get too complicated.  If there's more than about half a dozen significant NPCs I have to keep track of at any given time (as opposed to NPCs that just lurk in the background until I need them) that's too complicated.  City and-or kingly court adventures are horrible for this.Example of an adventure-scale storyboard for my current campaign (that bears only passing resemblance to the way things actually went) in format "Adventure name - plot notes and hooks": (were I writing this on paper there'd be arrows leading from one adventure to the next)1. Keep on the Borderlands - get 'em started, first contact with Ares cult, first contact with renegade Hobgoblins, first contact with monsters pouring into mountains, introduce politics and secret societies2. Krykos the Warlord - small adventure, can be put anywhere, no real significance except to provide hooks to lead in to adv. #3 or #5 depending how things go3. Shadowhaunt Temple - further contact with both Ares cult and renegade Hobgoblins, second time seeing them operating together should cause suspicion [if followed up, this leads to a 5-adventure arc]4. Sphondalai Mountain Hop - party follow up and try to figure where all the monsters from adv. #1 are coming from [leads to a 3-adventure arc]5. Defense of the Empire - party become agents working on behalf of a secret society whose goal is to reignite the fallen empire, the learn of the society and its fearsome (but decent) vampiric leader [could lead to all sorts of things]As it turned out, they did adv's #1, 2 and 3; then one party went to work for the empire (giving a nice little story arc) while the other left-turned on me and decided to ignore the empire-rebuilders and may yet end up actively working against them; they ignored the mountains as well (a sub-party of quasi-retired PCs is just now dipping their toes into that mess), and none of them even bothered with the Ares-Hobgoblin business (which means it's still out there for future reference if I need it).So now instead of working for their own empire they're mostly going up against another one (I'll get years of action out of this) except one party has gone a-wandering up north - their story really doesn't impact the main one at all...yet.The advantage I've got - and the point I think I'm trying to make with all this rambling - is that the history and backstory are already in place and all I need to do is mine these for adventure ideas.  Once that's done, keeping track is (or should be) relatively easy; but you have to keep some sort of a game log/story hour/whatever as that's the only way to remember details from one year to the next.Lan-"of little brain tonight, it seems"-efan</blockquote>

Verification