Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 6103983" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Issue 311: September 2003part 8/9Dungeoncraft: Having given us a location, this month Monte is all about keeping the damn thing active, talking about a bunch of different models you can use to make the inhabitants seem intelligent and active with a little less effort. You can create if/then contingencies that predetermine what'll happen if the players do something. You can give monsters a schedule that determines where they are at different times of day. And then there's the full plot model where if the players don't do anything, X, Y, &amp; Z will go off at particular points and ruin people's days. All will take more effort than just plopping a monster in a room with no idea how it survives, but should still be less stressful than just making stuff up as you go along. If you're running an extended campaign, you should probably think about employing all of them in various combinations, as that'll keep things interesting for both the players and you. As with Johnn's advice, this manages to pack in a few new things, and remind us of a whole bunch of old advice as well, which may not be the freshest, but it's still a good idea for you to follow it. Realism may get boring occasionally, but you have to keep coming back to it, otherwise your work will lose emotional resonance and be overthrown by the next generation of creative sorts who use different techniques and trappings that aren't so stale.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="(un)reason, post: 6103983, member: 27780"] [B][U]Dragon Issue 311: September 2003[/U][/B] part 8/9 Dungeoncraft: Having given us a location, this month Monte is all about keeping the damn thing active, talking about a bunch of different models you can use to make the inhabitants seem intelligent and active with a little less effort. You can create if/then contingencies that predetermine what'll happen if the players do something. You can give monsters a schedule that determines where they are at different times of day. And then there's the full plot model where if the players don't do anything, X, Y, & Z will go off at particular points and ruin people's days. All will take more effort than just plopping a monster in a room with no idea how it survives, but should still be less stressful than just making stuff up as you go along. If you're running an extended campaign, you should probably think about employing all of them in various combinations, as that'll keep things interesting for both the players and you. As with Johnn's advice, this manages to pack in a few new things, and remind us of a whole bunch of old advice as well, which may not be the freshest, but it's still a good idea for you to follow it. Realism may get boring occasionally, but you have to keep coming back to it, otherwise your work will lose emotional resonance and be overthrown by the next generation of creative sorts who use different techniques and trappings that aren't so stale. [/QUOTE]

Verification