Metaplots - it wasn't just TSR that did them

[Dausuul]

All in all, changes in plot arcs tend to follow fan demand over what game designers want. All the assassins died in Faerun not *just* because uncool AD&D2 made it so, but because they were a widely despised class in 1e. In fact, most of the AD&D2 changes were themselves focused responses to 1e complaints at the time.

But that was a rules change. You don't need to kill all the assassins to satisfy the requirement that assassins be removed from the 2E rules! I find it very hard to believe that it was faster and cheaper to come up with the whole Bhaal-dies-and-kills-all-the-assassins story than it would have been to say, "Assassin characters now use the thief rules."

It's quite rare that metaplot is required to justify a rules change. You'll note that there was no Time of Troubles when Forgotten Realms went to 3E, even though the rules changes were far more drastic than the 1E/2E transition. The Spellplague was more about fixing perceived flaws* in the Realms than the conversion to 4E; if the 4E conversion were the only concern, it would have been sufficient to provide an origin story for dragonborn.

Like I said, both the Avatar Storm and Bhaal's sacrifice smack of 11th hour Hail Mary attempts that, like it or not, are part of making things that you'd like to ship in a timely fashion -- but keep in mind that metaplot is inherently ambitious, and requires a constant effort.

Here's my question: What is the purpose of this effort? What does metaplot bring to the gaming table? I can see a few possible answers, but without having an answer it's impossible to say whether any given metaplot element is well executed, poorly executed but necessary, or a total waste.

[size=-2]*Let's not get into whether the perceived flaws were actual flaws, or whether fixing them justified taking such drastic measures. That's a whole other can of worms.[/size]

 

[Alan Shutko]

I'd say a good metaplot (from the player's perspective) is one that lets the PCs make world-changing decisions and shape the future across multiple adventures. A bad metaplot is one that makes all those world-changing decisions on the part of the players. They may be involved in the adventures, but the outcome is predetermined and any decisions that the players make somehow end up in the same place.

The Mystaran metaplot is an example. No matter what, Alphatia sinks, the macguffin is disabled, and the only difference the play makes is how the players are rewarded. From a publishing standpoint, this makes perfect sense: you can't sell product unless you know how things happened. But it removes the ability of the players to affect things.

 

[Dausuul]

I'd say a good metaplot (from the player's perspective) is one that lets the PCs make world-changing decisions and shape the future across multiple adventures. A bad metaplot is one that makes all those world-changing decisions on the part of the players. They may be involved in the adventures, but the outcome is predetermined and any decisions that the players make somehow end up in the same place.

What would be an example of a good metaplot, then? Metaplot by definition does not give players a say in how the plotted events turn out; it wouldn't be metaplot if it did.

 

[Wik]

What would be an example of a good metaplot, then? Metaplot by definition does not give players a say in how the plotted events turn out; it wouldn't be metaplot if it did.

Well, off the top of my head:

Large events that can involve numerous adventuring parties, where no single guy is the hero, and where a bunch of "faceless" people all contribute to some grand cause. For example:

* (DARK SUN): The city of Tyr is about to be attacked by a coalition of other city-states. The city council groups up numerous adventuring companies, mercenary bands, reformed raiders, and vigilante traders in a heroic defence of the Free City. While the Tyrian army is split and sent in multiple directions to meet multiple enemies at once, guerilla bands of raiders ambush supply trains to stall for time, while diplomatic teams barter for peace with the angry Sorcerer Kings. When the war ends (with Tyr victorious - but barely), it is written as a victory where hundreds played their parts. And individual tables can each have their own stories to tell that took place within that bigger whole.

* (SHADOWRUN): One of the particularly mean corporations performed a crackdown and in one fell swoop kidnapped many of the famous runners (ie, those in the products). Everyone from Pistons to the Neon Samurai, Hatchetman to Picador, and (of course) Fastjack have been kidnapped. The runners of Seattle have banded together to rescue their colleagues, in the so-called "Twilight Run". But those captured runners are in prisons all over the world, and the rescue runs have to take place all at once. So there are dozens of runner teams all dispatched, matrix oversight groups, corporate spy teams (to get the locations of the prisons and feed misinformation), and the like. When those runners are freed, everyone talks with pride about the Run and how it brought the runner community together. Meanwhile, the PCs talk with pride about how they were able to pull The Neon Samurai out of this little concrete prison guarded by spirits and magically-enhanced tribesmen in the Bolivian jungle.

* (WARHAMMER FANTASY): Oh no! Some chaos things are invading the Empire again. Numerous small armies are barely banded together to fight off the threat from all sides, while cultists and revolutionaries run amok in the city streets. Of course, everything goes to hell, with the Empire close to dissolving before the chaos armies dissolve into nothingness, with many of the chaotic elements becoming absorbed into the empire ("Chaos is now lurking among us even more!"). The PCs talk with resignation about their inevitable failure. Frank tells stories about how he lost both legs and three arms to an infection caused by a hangnail. People buy Frank a drink, and he dies of gutrot.

 

[billd91]

What would be an example of a good metaplot, then? Metaplot by definition does not give players a say in how the plotted events turn out; it wouldn't be metaplot if it did.

If the metaplot is on a fairly macro (and/or vague) level, the local specific effects of it could be significantly influenced by the PCs.

 

[Orius]

Well, DL is different, but more because it's place in the timeline. It looks to me like every metaplot-heavy setting or game follows Dragonlance. It's the first example of real, solid metaplot - as the first example, it was executed somewhat differently than the others, but I don't think that makes it a fundamentally different beast.

The novels were wildly more successful than anyone would have imagined, making it a proof of concept. Metaplot became a bandwagon to jump upon.

From what I can tell reading this (since I've only played D&D, and even then never really got deep into the settings), DL seems to be what kicked the metaplot off to begin with. At first, it was just a series of modules, with novels written about the pre-generated characters from the modules. The most important thing though, is that while the novels presented a sort of canon ending to all the events, the modules at least let players actually participate in events. Downside is that the modules have a reputation for being a huge railroad (didn't stop me from jumping in here though).

With DL's success, TSR wanted to do it again, so they started churning out settings. Whether or not they were responding to stuff like SR or WoD or just hoping for another DL or FR I can't say.

the weird "Fiends can't teleport anymore" crap that came from some PS module but was imposed on every setting in late 2e (screw that!),

That was from Hellbound: The Blood War, and that was a metaplot event that could be influenced by the players:

[sblock]There was this entity the yugoloths created from a fallen celestial that enabled fiendish teleporting by knowing the true name of every fiend in existance. The yugoloths planned to drop it in the River Styx to erase its memories and thus deprive the devils and demons of their ability to teleport and use it as a bargaining chip (go along with the yugoloth's plans, and they'll restore the teleporting). Over the course of the adventure, the PCs learn about the entity, while the demons and devils try to gain control of it for an advantage in the Blood War. In the end, the PCs can teach the entity its own true name, at which point it teleports itself directly to the Styx to rid itself of all the terrible memories it has of being tormented by the 'loths. This is presented as something players should want to do just to screw all the fiends. And naturally, it would make enemies. LOTS of enemies. [/sblock]

So the PCs could actually cause this event to happen, instead of it being something that happened in a book or worse the backstory for a new sourcebook, which is probably how a metaplot should unfold. Like in Dark Sun, any victory against the Sorcerer-Kings should have been something the players were part of, not part of the novels. Given what I've read about the setting, the players should probably want to do something like that in the first place.

I'd say a good metaplot (from the player's perspective) is one that lets the PCs make world-changing decisions and shape the future across multiple adventures. A bad metaplot is one that makes all those world-changing decisions on the part of the players. They may be involved in the adventures, but the outcome is predetermined and any decisions that the players make somehow end up in the same place.

I agree, let the metaplot be something the players can participate in. The hardest part though is that you can't predict what will happen in any group, so to keep things simple, railroading comes into play.

 

[Saeviomagy]

So the PCs could actually cause this event to happen, instead of it being something that happened in a book or worse the backstory for a new sourcebook, which is probably how a metaplot should unfold. Like in Dark Sun, any victory against the Sorcerer-Kings should have been something the players were part of, not part of the novels. Given what I've read about the setting, the players should probably want to do something like that in the first place.

The prism pentad presents precisely what a group of PCs might want to do, and then has it achieved by a bunch of NPCs who need no help in doing it. And what they do is wreck up the campaign world. I think it's pretty much as bad as it gets.

 

[DragonLancer]

I play because of metaplot.

Metaplots add versimilitude to gameworlds, showing that things do happen around and outside of what the characters are doing. They can be affected by the metaplot and they can affect the metaplot. It adds more depth to a setting and lets me hook players into a game by letting them buy into something bigger and more detailed than a map of someone's sandbox with isolated adventure plots waiting for players to show up.

Yes, some aspects of metaplots are bad. Some are good. And like every other thing in this bloody hobby, if you don't like it, don't use it and/or don't buy it.

I fully agree with this.

Vampire the Masquerade had the best metaplot I have ever found in an RPG. Each supplement had small references to events as time went on. Nothing major just little things like a Justicar being sent to quash an Anarch revolt, or a mysterious rash of vampire deaths across Asia. Things like that make the world come alive and can be dropped in or ignored.
The major Masquerade metaplot events such as the Week of Nightmares could still be used or ignored by the Storyteller. Nothing ever took up so much space in a supplement that you could look at it and go "I've wasted my cash on something I can't use".
The loss of a metaplot in the new World of Darkness is what makes the games feel somewhat bland. There's no Caine or Gehenna threat, no conspiracies between ancients or elders, no take overs of power....etc. It's still a fun game but there's no life in it.

D&D handles metaplots badly however. People have already mentioned The Time of Troubles killing off gods (why do that?), but to me it is Dragonlance and Dark Sun that got the screw more than any other.

At the point of the Blue Lady's War/Twins Trilogy on Ansalon, Dragonlance was at a perfect point to be static with lots of adventure/campaign possibilities. Ansalon was still rebuilding after the War of the Lance, the Silvanesti forest needed restoring, the remnants of the dragonarmies needed to be contained...etc. Instead we get a sudden shift by involving too large a metaplot and having the world swept away and we lose all the gods again. The recent 3.5 releases of Dragonlance material by Margaret Weiss were too focused in the here and now of the settng that the majority of them were hard to use if ignoring the advanced metaplot.

Dark Sun was the other setting that got messed up and within only a short span of time from release. A perfect setting ready to be used with a cool initial scenario that lets the characters take part in the liberation of Tyr made sense. Wiping out all the setting's BBEG's destroyed the feel of the setting and the expanded lands, while nice ideas, didn't fit very well.

I like metaplots but not to the point where they affect a setting unnessecarily.

 

[green slime]

Manufacturor Metaplots, are best handled in the background, and without major changes affecting large portions of the campaign world.

It should be up to the GM, to make any specific changes, as to whether the rumours of a revolution/earthquake/war/ are true or exaggerated.

Done well, it enhances the game. Done poorly, and it is just wasted paper.

 

[GrimGent]

The loss of a metaplot in the new World of Darkness is what makes the games feel somewhat bland. There's no Caine or Gehenna threat, no conspiracies between ancients or elders, no take overs of power....etc.

Well, there can be, but only if the GM decides that having wide-scale threats such as those in the setting fits in with what he personally has in mind for his own campaign. That's the whole point of the toolbox approach adopted for the nWoD, after all: being able to pick and choose the most interesting bits and pieces from the source material without worrying about those choices becoming obsolete because of some constantly changing "canon."