Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Janx" data-source="post: 5519554" data-attributes="member: 8835">Would Shaman REALLY get up and walk away just because a scene started in Media Res?Or would he consider the context, the assumptions it made about his character, and other signs before he made his decision.When I have started campaigns in Media Res, I try to set the scene in a way that is both plausible and minimally restrictive.  Orcs attack the village, or you see a mugging going on.Both assume the PCs are in this specific village (where I may have said the game was starting).  I haven't specifically negated anything else about your character (whereas starting captured may have).To me, at the start of the game, time may have passed.  I'd have to know my players to know how much time.  It may have been that a PC wanted to do something urgent from the last game.  If nobody had anything pending (no remaining plot hooks/business to pursue), then time passes.From there, to get the game going again, I may project where the PCs would be (shopping in the village perhaps), and then initiate whatever event I'd like to intersect with the PCs to see what happens next.A capture takes that to an extreme.  It would have taken no die rolls or significant decisions for the party to have gotten to the village market.  It's not even something they would have likely resisted (oh no! we're being rounded up to visit the market).  A capture is exactly what the PCs don't want to happen.  For some characters, it's not even in their make-up to BE captured.  They stay out of legal trouble.  And here you are saying they broke the law on a drunken bender.  Or they are nigh-uncapturable.  And here you are saying they failed.  Without playing it out (which is what Shaman seems to object to), it's your word versus theirs.  And if you play that card, you are now just as much the enemy as the NPC who did the capture on the GM's behalf.Maybe Shaman really would walk out on my game because I started with "The orcs seem to stream into the village from nowhere, disrupting the festivities.  One charges you with his axe held high..."I should think his real deciding factor should be based on what happens AFTER the encounter.  Is he forced to go on the "why did the orcs attack" adventure that I planned?  Or can he help clean up the village, and maybe do some politicking to set himself up as some kind of leader?Planning a capture has always signalled to me, a railroad.  It tends to encourage that kind of behavior.  And while I like me some story in my games, I don't like railroading.</blockquote>

Verification