Something less convoluted next - please

[Retreater]

I'm sorry, but Zeitgeist seems too convoluted for me. There are over a dozen important NPCs and various factions and mysteries in the first adventure alone.

My group plays every other week, and in the off week, they give little thought to conspiracies, intricate plots, etc. However, as DM I doubt I could even keep up with everything in Zeitgeist.

Any chance of getting some adventures from ENWorld that are a little more straight-forward and perhaps episodic? (These fancy adventure paths are wasted on casual gamers such as the ones in my group.)

Thanks,
Retreater

 

[OnlineDM]

I'll be interested to hear Morrus's take on this, but I'll give you mine.

EN World has staked itself out as a publisher of grand, complex, highly-involved campaigns. Every publisher has a niche, and this is apparently theirs. They do it well, and not many other publishers can say the same.

On the other hand, finding short adventures or one-shots seems to me to be much easier. Heck, I share some of my own for free on my blog. If you're looking for 4e, you've got all of the Living Forgotten Realms adventures freely available, too.

It looks to me like EN World is trying to make money via subscriptions, and they've decided that in-depth adventure paths are what will get people to subscribe. Perhaps there's room for them to make some smaller adventures, too, but the "EN World brand" in my mind is "sweeping epics".

They're not for everyone, true, but they're for some people.

 

[RangerWickett]

I totally understand that the first adventure is not exactly easy to pick up and run in half an hour, and that it's not really "episodic." We're shooting more for 'Babylon 5' than 'Star Trek.'

I mean, I'm endeavoring not to throw so much at the PCs at once that it's overwhelming. Yeah, there are a lot of NPCs in act one, but most of them are just set dressing and barely interact with the PCs; but it's important to see them early because they crop up later.

We want a complex storyline that rewards investment by the players. ZEITGEIST probably isn't the right campaign to run if your players just want to go on action-adventures and not worry about mysteries. However, we're trying to make it easy for players to keep everything straight; hence the various player hand-outs.

The second adventure is three levels long, has 14 NPCs prominent enough to warrant a paragraph or more of description, and involves three interweaving threads of investigation in a bustling city. I'm doing my best to make this a cinch for a GM to run, but ZEITGEIST is meant to be complex.

Maybe Santiago will be different; I'm not involved with that.

 

[gideonpepys]

No disrespect to Retreater, but please don't do anything he has suggested.

The whole point about 4E is that it is easy to create straightforward, episodic adventures yourself. And as Online DM pointed out - there is a plethora of such adventures already available elsewhere - from WotC to third parties and even blogs.

[MENTION=63]RangerWickett[/MENTION] - I know that you were a little concerned about the amount of information players of adventure 1 are required to absorb, but I honestly don't think it is too much. Most of the info can be dropped into a session and passed over, providing breadth, colour and flavour, but having only a very small impact on the game if players don't remember it.

You can't have a murder mystery, or an assassination plot, with only two NPCs!

 

[Morrus]

I can totally understand the concern.

The reason we position ourself in this particular sector of the market is that simple adventures are very easy to come by; in addition this particular thing is something we - with admitted bias - believe we are very good at. We've always said that we write for experienced GMs and DMs, and that there are hundreds of adventures out there for those looking for something a little simpler.

I personally believe that a more complex story, more interesting NPCs, and so on is extremely rewarding. We've received feedback time and time again that the level of immersion in WotBS was outstanding, and it's a style we're eager to explore further.

I hope we've made some innovations thorughout this adventure path which complement the style - for example, the player handout of NPCs that Ryan mentioned above. There's a new one for each adventure, with each NPC updated, because we, too, agree that when the players can't remember who an NPC is that's a problem. So the handout will say things like "This is Bobby the Halfling Spy. You met him in the Four-Dragon tavern while hiding from Orcus' secret police, and he told you about the mysterious network of tunnels beneath the city. He was very insistent on locating the Golden Chalice of Everdrinking, and is notable for having three legs." (I just made that example up, of course - there's no Bobby, Four-Dragon tavern, Orcus, chalice, or mysterious network of tunnels, and that's a spectacularly poor piece of text). Plus we have the free guides (and make a point of explaining the entire campaign to the GM/DM before you start).

WotC, for example, tends to pitch its material towards the more casual or beginner gamer (which is fine - it's just not our cup of tea). We're aiming for those looking for something a bit more complex and immersive. That's not everyone, admittedly - and there's nothing wrong with wanting a more straightforward episodic style campaign, but I feel there's so much of that already out there that we wouldn't really be adding anything.

We do hope you'll give it a try at least; I think you may be pleasantly surprised. It's free, so I'd say it's worth a little try.

 

[Aoirorentsu]

**Minor Spoilers Ahead** Sorry I don't really know how to do tagging, promise I won't give away major plot points.

[MENTION=42040]Retreater[/MENTION] - I totally get where you're coming from in terms of players getting confused among so many different NPCs; I run a story-driven game for players who are both casual and want diverse experiences (social vs. combat vs. investigative), and making sure they're on top of things is a constant struggle. Also, I just read the whole adventure cover to cover and wow, yes, it is extremely convoluted. I think it's the kind of thing that requires multiple read-throughs to understand well, and that may be beyond the investment you and your players are willing to make. Fair enough.

However, consider that the PCs are likely to complete maybe a chapter at most during a single session (and probably not even that for the last chapter), and only a handful of the NPCs (namely, the antagonist) appear in more than one chapter.

As a DM, you can facilitate the PCs keeping track of the different machinations in a variety of ways. Emphasize key features of NPCs you want to make sure the PCs remember. Their boss checks for inanimate objects and grumbles about his leg, Danorans have French accents, etc.

Finally, I think the handouts will be helpful. Doing this has helped a lot at my table in similar adventures, especially if one of your more motivated players will take it and read it between game sessions (I am so blessed).

I hope that helps. And like others have said, there are plenty of freely available adventures that feature interesting plots that can be resolved in a single session (ie, more episodic) or in a few sessions. I for one appreciate both those adventures for what they are and the Island at the Axis of the World and similar adventures for what they are.

Is it not awesome that there is enough variety out there to suit multiple play styles?

 

[Retreater]

I'm really impressed with the work EN Publishing has done with Zeitgeist, I just don't think it fits in with the playstyles of my more casual groups. I would like to see something either standalone or that can be finished in less than three adventures that isn't completely mystery or conspiracy driven. Unfortunately, there seems to be no decent source of 4E adventures that I am aware of.
How well do you think Zeitgeist could run if I were to remove most of the intrigue- perhaps having the group show up as the ignorant muscle of an NPC detective? Could I run this as an action-packed adventure? In the current campaign we've been playing twice a month since March, the players could not name you the city of the campaign, any of the key villians, any of their sponsors or a single faction (including the group they belong to.)

 

[RangerWickett]

I'm sure you could run it that way, but there might not be enough action to last the time it takes us to release the next adventure. The first adventure has four to six combat encounters.

I mean, feel free to give it a try. I saw one person who posted a blog about using War of the Burning Sky in some weird pseudo-anime setting with magical girls, so shifting from Sherlock Holmes to Lethal Weapon is not really that severe of a change.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

How well do you think Zeitgeist could run if I were to remove most of the intrigue?

*Screams*
*Dies*


The intrigue is the best part!

The Auld Grump

 

[gideonpepys]

In the current campaign we've been playing twice a month since March, the players could not name you the city of the campaign, any of the key villians, any of their sponsors or a single faction (including the group they belong to.)

My suggestion would be to have a word with your players. I know everyone has 'different styles' and enjoys different elements of the game, but to be honest, if my players' ignorance (which can reach what I consider to be quite surprising levels) went as far as what you've just described, I'd start to wonder why I was running a game for them in the first place.

You should just run Dungeon Delves or one-offs. Or find yourself some more committed players: the current bunch sound like they're talking you for granted.