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Message: <blockquote data-quote="maddman75" data-source="post: 3698793" data-attributes="member: 2673">Part of what led me to this structure is a long series of fizzling game groups.  We'd get some people together, I'd have some big long multisession arc to set up, and it would die off before we got anywhere.  I changed my perspective.  I would not spend much time setting future games up - most of my effort needed to be to make *tonight* a completely awesome game.The trick is to control the flow so that when midnight rolls around, the episode is complete.  That, or you throw in a twist or complication and announce a 'To Be Continued' episode.  Next game, your recap is the introduction and you start right back in the action.  Again, this is not railroading because you aren't pushing them at a paticular conclusion, rather you are pushing them toward an emotionally satisfying one.  The players come to love this, and I've been threatened with a dice-pelting for doing the TBC on more than one occasion.  Players want to finish the episode tonight!I've found that by planning for social time it makes everything go a lot smoother.  If you game at six, plan to get together to eat and hang out, maybe play a card game or video games or something.  Then when its time to game, you can game!I don't know if it needs to go down that far.  You can also have asynchronous rules.  Cinematic Unisystem, what I'm running now, has a fairly complete character rule system.  But the bad guys can be put on a quick sheet, and can effectively be run with just a half-dozen numbers.  This'll fit on a 3x5 card easily.  This lets the game be run fast and loose while giving the players plenty of options.As I was reading through my blog again when digging up the link, I thought maybe I could put something more formal together, like a scene creation form.  Establish the set, the conflict that is explored, and the characters involved.  Simple, but might be effective.</blockquote>

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