How Much input do your Players Have

[Neo]

My group is in the disapointing situation of only being able to once per month. To encourage "buy in" i have encouraged the players to help build the world, for which I give XP. So I give XP for background & Journaling, But I aslo gave XP to a player who designed one of the Major towns in the setting and such. I have another player who is working out who Mordenkainen, Bigby, Tenser etc are in my homebrew.

Does anyone else do this? Any success stories of things you let/asked players to contribute?

I've always given bonus xp for a background (about 250 I give..but the background must be made available before the end of the first session.. no using it as an excuse to get that last bit for next level down the road).

I also offer a session bonus for those who are willing to Journal but although the note taking isn't too difficult the time required to turn those notes into something that reads less like a list of actions and more like a narrative has often led to Journal keepers only keeping it up for relatively short periods before it starts to take a toll...pity really as some of those in my group who have done the journal keeping before have a real knack for it.

With regards to them contributing to the construction of a homebrew... my homebrew setting the World of Anslad was created entirely from feedback and discussion with my group about what they liked, disliked, hoped to see etc... So I guess you could say although I did the writing for it, it was all done to thier specifications.

 

[LostSoul]

I'm planning to run a Star Wars game where the players can come up with "plot" on the fly. One character might have a high Knowledge: streetwise check, and use that to determine if he knows anyone in town that can help him out in his current situation.

I'm also asking the players to come up with 9 one-line NPCs: 3 allies, 3 enemies, and 3 neutrals/rivals. All that I need is a name, general occupation, and relationship. Using something like that you can really bring the player into the game. I think.

I'd like to have something kind of system where the players can add twists and turns into the plot line - along the lines of laying down a "Plot Twist" or "Nemesis Appears" cards, or something like that.

 

[Harmon]

Back when i was GMing a lot of GURPs I would let the Players GM. I would run the behind the scenes and they would talk about the campaign and what they thought was happening and I would use the elements that i liked as the campaign. Worked pretty well for a lot of years.

My Players have a lot of say though I do not give xps for what little work they do- I usually give custom magic items.

One of my Players asked for a cool sword, but didn't give me stats, just a back ground- a history. I gave him a pretty nice sword.

I have been known to write back grounds for characters in the dozens of pages, some times hundreds. Coyote6 has them, but has yet to speak up or use much of them- some have what i think would make cool plot elements.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

On rules issues a lot. On setting issues the buck stops here. On character background issues, all theirs with my approval.

The Auld Grump

 

[DrNilesCrane]

My players can pretty much double what their characters earn in EPs with journals, which works really well. Provide EPs for contributing to the website, providing character information, etc.

In our next campaign, I'm providing bonus EPs for helping create parts of the world (everyone gets an island to develop basically), and "deferred" experience points for other contributions. The deferred points are used to make up for lost EPs for when a player can't make it or a character dies rather than just added to the character's total, so as not to let the spread of character levels get too large.

 

[Seeten]

I'm primarily a player, but I assist my regular DM with all sorts of things. I handle rules and balance questions, feats and conflicts, and assist with D&D-ifying certain things which he has concepts of in mind, but no idea what to do game-wise with.

I also help the other players with custom feats, and the like, to fit concepts and yet stay balanced. I have also assisted with the creation of a couple of kingdomsand places of interest. No bonus xp, or anything, but I am sort of a co-dm.

 

[Templeton580]

I am supposed to play in a d20 Future campaign at some point in the future (heh)

D20 Future: The game you say you're playing when you haven't got a group yet.

(Sorry for the tangent, but you cracked me up, Sammael.)