Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="maddman75" data-source="post: 4913275" data-attributes="member: 2673">I'm going to tell you how you can do this.  I run every game like this, even weekly games, because I find it to be a lot of fun.  It will likely be very different from how you normally run things, but it is certainly doable.First is your game.  4e or 3e are right out, fights take too long.  And D&D is probably a bad choice as well.  Exploration is too heavy a theme, and you don't have time for that.  You need a game where the action is right around the same place, so you can just re-use the same set pieces over and over.  The players will feel ownership of the place.  Good games would be Mutants & Masterminds, Call of Cthulhu, Buffy, most World of Darkness stuff.  You could use any game really, but the idea is that rather than exploring new strange place of the week, you are dealing with the threat of the week (or month, such as the case may be).For argument's sake, let's say its Mutants & Masterminds, as that seems to be popular with the kids these days.  M&M is about as complicated as I'd want to go with this style, but it will work.  I'll explain why in a bit.So you get a collection of superheroes and design their city, or use one from a book.  Put some detail into it.  Places the PCs work, meet, likely fight locations, and so on.  You can use these every month both to save you work and to give your players a sense of the world.  With only once a month, you don't need to be throwing new stuff at them every week.Now for the actual game.  Keep it fairly simple, and be ready to run off the cuff.  Use recurring villains, or a recurring villainous organizations.  This week, Doctor Evil has built a giant robot!  Doctor Evil's henchmen have kidnapped some scientists!  Whatever works.Now I know you said you like character development too.  Me too.  So make sure you throw those scenes in as well.  Have Captain Awesome's mother get sick, Aero Boy's girlfriend is flirting with Ned Evil, the Doctor's son!  Just throw it out there and see what happens.For the actual structure of the game, you'll need to keep the pacing tight.  The trick to getting a game like this to work is conflict.  Either with the PC's ongoing subplots, the villain, or between PCs.  If a scene isn't introducing, exploring, or resolving a conflict you're wasting time.  You ever watch Law & Order?  They don't spend time worrying about where the detectives get their coffee, or how they get from point A to point B.  They cut.  They get a phone call, someone got shot last night.  There's a witness who works at a diner.  DOINK DOINK  The detectives are at the diner, questioning the witness.  She says that the victim was fighting with her boyfriend beforehand, and give the name.  DOINK DOINK  They're knocking on the boyfriend's door, saying they want to ask him a few questions.  They don't worry about finding the address of the diner or the boyfriend.  They don't spend time watching them choose betweek latte and mocha.  They get to the point.Now, you might be saying 'yeah that's great but it sounds like a railroad.'  Doesn't have to be.  You will have to be able to think on your feet.  Don't plot out a series of scenes, present them with a problem.  Let them pursue it however they like.  Talk with your players and let them know you're going to be cutting scenes, but they are free to add ones they like.  If you go to cut from the diner to the boyfriend's apartment and someone says "Wait I want to ask the busboy too!", be sure to let them.This is why I said that M&M is about as complicated as I want to go.  This doesn't work statting up all your bad guys beforehand, because the PCs could do any freakin thing.  You need a setting and system that adapts itself to this kind of play.  You have to be prepared to run a fight completely unscripted.So you introduce a problem, throw in a scene each for the PCs personal growth, and cut to the point as much as possible.  Now you have to wrap it up.  Doing it exploration-style, where you simply stop when you're out of time and pick it up when you play again will not work.  You need an emotionally satisfying climax to the night's game.  Wrap up the conflict, have the threat of the week show up and have a big smack down.  Change things as needed.  You have to be prepared to throw out any plans you might have.  Don't care if the bad guy isn't "really" in this warehouse.  Is time running out?  Would it make a good conclusion to have a big fight here?  Then he's in the warehouse instead of the cabin in the woods.That's basically how I run most games in a nutshell.  I don't even have time pressures, I just think its a lot of fun.  I'm not saying this is the best way to game, I'm saying it is what would work given your time constraints.</blockquote>

Verification