Roleplaying Travel

Here are a few microstories I have used. Most should last less than 1 session and could also be partially recurrent or resolved through several sessions as little filler bits. I also try and design them to avoid simple combat;

1) a forest clearing surrounded by a pallisade serves as a campsite for travellers in the middle of a scrubby forest of low trees. A set of con men frequent the area and try to induce people into games of chance or to pickpocket people and then flee. The area has a "country fair" feel despite the brooding malice of the forest. You can run archery competitions, drinking competitions etc etc. Or a monster could emerge from the forest and demand tribute to allow the people inside to leave without attack; a drunken Ogre who just wants some grog?

2) While crossing a frozen river, the Pcs find a body frozen under the ice from last year. Digging it out reveals a key, some small treasure but no other sign of who he was. The next village the Pcs come to, they see exactly the same man alive! I leave the rest to you.

3) A bridge is washed out and the PCs have to travel up river to cross at a ford near an isolated village. Once there, they discover that the village is plagued by strange occurances. It turns out that the village is built upon the remains of an old burial ground and the restless dead are just asking to be left alone. Removal of the bones of the dead to fresh earth solves the problem.

4) Bad weather drives the PCs to seek shelter. They see a light off the track and head towards it. The cold is so bitter they almost die. An old man greets them wordlessly and invites them to his fire. As soon as they accept and eat his food, they fall into a deep sleep. The next morning, they find no ashes and only the bones of an old man at the back of the cave. Enquiries reveal that the old man was a hermit of "insert deity" that died 10 years ago. If the PCs fail to make an offering at the next shrine to said god, they are beset by bad luck for the next few weeks. Or you can give them a minor item that should be returned to the church.

5) The PCs are asked to deliver a message to someone in a small village. They search for the village, but no-one has ever heard of it. Then, late at night, they encounter the village right beside the road. They are invited to stay but then taken prisoner; this is a village of the dead, and the note is their only way out. They must bargain with the dead to win back the note and their freedom. Once they win free, there is the loose end of who exactly sent them to this village......

6) Pcs are asked to escort a young lady alone a route they are travelling anyway. During the travel, it becomes apparent that the girl is to be married to a brute. The girl begs to be allowed to escape but her maidservant is a hawkish women and will report this to the girl's husband-to-be who is powerful. The PCs must fake the girl's death or deliver her to her husband, or any other ruse they can think up to resolve this challenge.

7) The PCs pack mule is stolen one night while travelling. The thieves use poison and escape as quickly as possible. A few weeks later, the PCs find the animal in a nearby village/town/Inn. What is going on?
 

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I guess what I mean Hong, is that if there is no travel, then there is no chance for the PCs to say; I want to go over there or I want to do this. Yes; I know they can say that before they start travelling, but if they don't know anything about the world, how can they choose? In other words, subtly, the DM is railroading them.

In 3.5E this was unavoidable because the system did not lend itself to winging it so much (though I did it anyway). The great advantage with 4E seems to me that the system is so nice, from a design point of view, that you can really present something that feels living and breathing to the players and play "sandbox style" where the PCs can tramp where they want. Sure, if they don't want that, don't give it to them, but unless you try how will you know?

The PCs should be given as much chance to INTERACT with the world so they can learn about it. If the only part of the world the PCs ever see is the "official adventure locales" then this is largely railroading, because the DM is not responding to what interests the players but instead is worrying about what he has prepared. My players would say this was railroading, but I know not all players feel the same; in my games I always present the Pcs with lots of little tiny stories and let them choose which one to run with.

This approach would not work with all players but neither would "you arrive in 2 days" work with all players either.
 

Ydars said:
I guess what I mean Hong, is that if there is no travel, then there is no chance for the PCs to say; I want to go over there or I want to do this. Yes; I know they can say that before they start travelling, but if they don't know anything about the world, how can they choose? In other words, subtly, the DM is railroading them.

Laboriously roleplayed travel is not the only way to know stuff about the world. For example, this is the reason why game companies are happy to sell you 300-page books about their lovingly crafted and detailed fantasy worlds.
 

Thank you Ydars for the many suggestions. As for the comments above, you're all right. I've seen both extremes, the "Two weeks later you are there" routine and the DM who makes the players suffer through six to eight game nights of travel during which nothing much happens other than randomly rolled monster encounters (Half of my current group once played in a group where the main DM always did that.)

I usually go for somewhere in between, a full game night of travel to set the mood for the module and get the group of chracters used to working together, or perhaps even two or three game nights if I have a specific sub-module to run as an introduction.
 

I guess what I saying is that the way you play Oblivion can now be ported to 4E; i.e. that the players make the adventures by tramping around an area learning as they go. Travel is an important part of this style of play, but I do agree that if you don't like this style of play then you can have great games without it.

Yes, you can read a setting book, but in my experience, NONE of my players ever do. They want a game where as much of the experience of the game as possible, happens in-game. They are not huge fluff-readers (sadly).

I also feel that the idea that you "fast foward past the boring bits" is not well explained. What I hope it means is; look at your players; if they seem to be having fun then linger on that area and wing it. If they aren't then move on as fast as possible. Yet most DMs I have known work to a set plan of what they want the session to be like and I have seen them bulldoze players attempts to do some roleplaying whilst they "fast-forward to the fun".

IMO, the only time a player has a real choice is when the DM presents many different stories without any preference as to which one gets explored. Travel is an excellent backdrop to disguise this interchange between players and the DM.
 


Travel is your opportunity to show off the world/settig to the players and I like to run with that opportunity when I can. Even if there are no major encounters over the days or weeks (or even months) of travel, one thing you can really do to give a sense of scale to a group's journey is have some interesting events pass in the PC's home city while they are gone.
 

Ydars said:
If you want your game to be more than a complete railroad, you need to have microstories that keep the campaign alive and can be dropped in to give people something quick to focus on. If they don't take the hook, find a way to use the story again in a different way later on.
Contrast these two different set ups:

1) PCs can go in any direction they choose, but no matter which way they go they'll meet the slaver innkeeper and have the slaver innkeeper adventure.

2) GM presents three hooks to three separate adventures. Let's call them Steading of the Hill Giant Chief, The Ghost Tower of Inverness and The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth. Once the payers decide which adventure to accept the GM says, "You travel for X weeks until you arrive at the steading/ghost tower/caverns."

According to you, (2) is railroading but (1) isn't?
 
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If you want to make "Roleplaying Travel" interesting, there must be something to "roleplay against".

This. I like some of your suggestions Ydars, and your approach in general, but I disagree with your use of the word railroading. I think it's more about making your world more than a chain of "levels" to play (which can become railroading when there's no choice or any exchange of ideas in the design of the "levels").

Maybe I'm splitting hairs.

Interesting thread though, as a bit of a n00b DM I'd wondered about travel scenes and how to carry them off.

[EDIT] I think the dreaded R-R word has obscured some fairly good advice from Ydars! :(
 

Ydars said:
I guess what I saying is that the way you play Oblivion can now be ported to 4E; i.e. that the players make the adventures by tramping around an area learning as they go.
So you're saying Hong's playstyle isn't videogame-y enough?
 

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