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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Teflon Billy" data-source="post: 1228623" data-attributes="member: 264">Bingo! Joshua Dyal speaks the truth.This is exactly how map out the "Big Stories" when necessary.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Who are the important NPC's? Write them down (thumbnail sketches are fine until the PC's start interacting with them), decide on their personalities and mindset (Give them an alignment, yes; but also list three personality traits. Two positive, one negative. (You get to decide what a "positive" trait is for each character). </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">What are the important locations? If a city is important to your story, make sure there is a reason why. If it's a trade nexus, make sure you know where the trade is coming from (Caravan? riverboats? whatever). It's not enough to say "it's the highest mountain in the world" and expect people to care. "It's the highest mountain in the world, and the God of Metalwork live in a cave atop it" might give someone a reason to go there. In short, make sure there is a reason places are "important" </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Keep a log. Seriously. after every game session, sit down with your list of Important NPC's and ask yourself if their outlook/actions regarding the "Big Story" have changed at all due to PC behaviour. Use their alignemnt and personality traits to decide what they now think.</li> </ul>And that's basically it. It allows your group to just take off in any direction and do whatever they feel is necessary, and at the end of each session you touch-up all the scratches they put in your story<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />The drawback is that you must be able to improvise. If they take off in an opposite direction from where you expected based on last weeks action, you have an entire game session to fill up.So keep some modular stuff on hand. "Bandit Camp" and "Humanoid Cave Complex" can basically be dropped in anywhere. Also keep in mind that if everyting they do affects the "Big Story" in some way, that they will likely twig to that after awhile and begin to feel railroaded. Every so often just let them rescue a merchant daughter or kill a rival or whatver it is that they will both enjoy and that will allow them a break from your story.  I culdn;'t get by without pet NPC's <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> but it is important to insure that they can't fill the PC's slot in the story for whatever reasons. Joshu and I are of a mind on Single-Track options, though. They are the devil.If you take away nothing else from this thread, take the above quote.</blockquote>

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