D&D General The Alexandrian’s Insights In a Nutshell [+]

[DEFCON 1]

Here's something else we should all consider about the stuff JA puts in his book-- they are instructional in nature to get newer players to think differently. To condition themselves as they learn how to DM to not do things in a manner that seems like it would be correct and useful, but in actuality would be more effective doing it differently. Getting new players to work those muscles they might not have even known existed, let alone work out. But these exercises and modes of thinking can be for totally different things, and thus they might seem contradictory when taken as a whole (Don't prep plots vs 3-clues for example)... but the important thing we should all remind ourselves is that when we become more sophisticated DMs... we will have the knowledge and ability to know WHEN to break these rules. At which point the contradictory stances no longer matter any more. Sometimes our actions might be contradictory, and sometimes they will be in harmony-- and because we are knowledgeable about the acting of DMing, we can run our games both ways without any issues.

To me, these are no different than things like the "Rules of Improv". Everyone who takes improv classes for the first time is handed a list of things "you should never do!" when improvising, because your improv will be bad if you do. It's a standard list that every improvisor knows about, and indeed a lot of the RPGers know about too, as those "rules" have been brought over to us as well. For instance... a very famous rule of improv is "Do not ask questions." Why? Because improv relies on the creation of something out of nothing... and when you ask a question, you are forcing your scene partner to create something out of nothing, rather than you having the courtesy to create something yourself. You are putting the burden onto them. "Hey Bob, where we last night?" And now they are the ones in the scene who has to come up with where you both were... rather than you making a statement of "Hey Bob, glad to see you made it out of the Taylor Swift concert in one piece last night."

Makes sense, right? Rather than forcing your scene partner to come up with something... you come up with something yourself and thus they now can react off of you. And this is the kind of mindset we try to instill in new improvisors, because for most of them... they are so freaked out about the prospect of actually improvising (because it's scary) that they just instinctually try to keep themselves safe by not inventing something in the scene that might "screw things up." So we tell them NOT to ask questions, and thus get them in the habit of always creating and not deferring. And eventually after a while it becomes second-nature.

But guess what? At that moment in time... when the improvisor is completely comfortable with making statements and offers to their scene partner... they actually learn the truth. Of course you can ask questions! There's nothing inherently wrong with asking questions in an improv scene. Because both of you-- you and your scene partner-- are so geared in to what you need to do to have a good improv scene that even if one of you "asks a question"... you're comfortable just answering it and moving on with your lives and the scene. It's no longer a big deal.

And this I feel is the same way towards DM advice. "Don't prep plot"? Heck, as a lot of people have already said... most adventure paths are entirely a long-form plot that you will be prepping for your players! There's nothing inherently wrong with having a plot to follow. If you are an experienced DM, you have a plot for your players to follow, but are also completely comfortable going away from the plot for a bit if something catches the table's eye. And then after a bit, you can guide the table back into the plot. And more often than not they won't have any difficulties or issues with it, because you know how to make that plot important enough to the wants and needs of the players that they won't have any reason NOT to want to do whatever the plot or storyline is that the adventure path has written down. And the "3-clue rule" is one of those ways! The party goes off on a tangent and misses clue 1... you throw down clue 2 in their path as they're doing this other thing that interested them... and quite possibly that clue 2 makes them interested enough to get back on the path you've plotted.

At a certain point in our experiences, we all learn the simple truth about rules in anything-- you are an expert in a thing when you know when and how you can break the rules.

 

[pemerton]

I play a story driven game, and I prepare the situation, not the plot.

Given that "plot" and "story" are rough synonyms, and your game is story-driven, I don't understand what you mean when you say you don't prepare a plot.

don’t prep plot means ‘do not prescribe a specific way in which the players have to solve a problem’, no more, no less.

That's not what I understand "don't prep plot" to mean. It's certainly not what (say) Vincent Baker means when he says this in DitV (2004) or Apocalypse World (2010).

DitV p 137:

Don’t play “the story.” The choices you present to the PCs have to be real choices, which means that you can’t possibly know already which way they’ll choose. You can’t have plot points in mind beforehand . . .​

AW p 108:

It’s not, for instance, your agenda . . . to get [the players] through your pre-planned storyline (DO NOT pre-plan a storyline, and I’m not [mucking] around).​

That’s not the sort of clues JA is talking about. They mean narrative clues (e.g. the secret bandit leader always wears a purple ring on their left hand). If they are missed the players don’t know where the interesting stuff the DM spent hours prepping is.

If you are running a story driven game, you prepare the situation. The author may have some vague idea of the story in their mind, but they do not write a script for the players to follow. This is a complete misunderstanding on the part of people who have no experience of narrative gaming. Set up the situation, and the story emerges through play.

This is what JA is saying - if you want to run a story driven game, do not write out the plot. Write out the locations, the characters, the clues, the red herrings, the interesting digressions, and the plot writes itself through play.

I'm familiar with this sort of RPGing. It contains pre-authored clues, red herring, digressions, etc. There is a pre-authored "through line" (to which the clues pertain; that the red herrings distract from; that the digressions digress from). That "through line" is what I call a plot, a bundle, and a rough sequence, of events/scenes/problems that will occur. This is what Baker is saying, in his game texts, not to prep.

The sense I get from The Alexandrian is that he's actually talking about prepping adventures with hooks players can opt into or not, but once you have that binary other than peacing out it's going to follow a fairly routine structure whether node based or purely linear in nature. Sure, side treks might happen, but the players mostly take on the agenda the GM has set for them in the adventure design.

Agreed. This is also what @Paul Farquhar seems to be describing.

Don't prep plots - prep situations implies something else to me where the 3-clue rule does not really have any work to do. If you are really prepping situations and not plots, then it should not matter whether or not player characters solve the mystery or not. The game should move forward, and the scenario should evolve even when the player characters fail to notice "important" details. There should be no need to get back on track. The killer kills another victim. More stigmata appear. Whatever. The game goes on and there is more stuff that happens.

This is generally how my home group approaches our Vampire and Exalted games. If you fail to find out everything that's going on you just operate based on what you know because there is no adventure to solve. Scenarios just progress through fallout and mutate into new scenarios.

What you say here is (broadly) similar to how I approach most of my GMing. There are no "tracks" to get back onto. The difference is primarily in how fallout is established and applied (which I suspect is one marker of the "trad"/non-"trad" divide).

 

[pemerton]

If you are an experienced DM, you have a plot for your players to follow

I'm an experienced DM and GM. I don't have a plot for my players to follow. I use a different set of techniques. One way to describe them would be "prep situation, not plot!"

 

[hawkeyefan]

to inform the players of things that they can then base their decisions on. The clue itself changes nothing except for the amount of information the players are aware of, similar to me reading an article

If you consider that moving the plot forward, feel free. I was arguing about this not railroading the players (telling them how to do something)

I think the problem is that some of us (maybe JA, too, though it’s unclear) seem to be using “plot” interchangeably with “railroad”. I don’t think that’s fair to do.

don’t prep plot means ‘do not prescribe a specific way in which the players have to solve a problem’, no more, no less.


I am not disagreeing, I’d say all should have a plot. JA is only saying ‘don’t make it a railroad’, not ‘don’t have a plot’

I mean, the article is called “don’t prep plots” not “don’t prep railroads”.

I don’t think anyone is saying what you think that means

I’m talking about JA in this case. He dedicates a lot of focus to the published adventures. They all have plots. Descent Into Avernus is one example. He offers suggestions across many articles on how to improve the adventure.

That doesn’t change that Descent Into Avernus has a plot. It very clearly does.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I usually consider “plot” a things that have already happened, or happen outside the player’s control. Story is what happens when the PC encounter the plot. Nothing MUST happen - after all the PCs could all be killed, in which case they cannot encounter the plot.

Doctor Black has already been murdered, the PCs will most probably identify the killer and bring them to justice, other outcomes are always possible.

By this set of definitions I can't understand what "prepping a plot" could even be referring to. Prepping things that have already happened clearly cannot be avoided unless we're talking about zero myth, or nearly so. Nor does it make sense to call things outside the view of any PC plot, but if the same thing is within view of a PC then it is situation instead...

Frankly JA strikes me as being fairly systematic in his thinking, which leads me to the conclusion that your interpretation and his probably don't match.

 

[hawkeyefan]

As you say “hopefully”. You can give the players all the clues you like, but you cannot guarantee that they will interpret them as intended and follow them.

No you can’t guarantee it, of course, but that doesn’t change that this is the intention of the rule. And even the more general advice of offering as much information as possible… an abundance of information. This is done to try and prevent the problem you’re describing.

It’s not bad advice by any means.

Or maybe JA is failing to take into account the possibility that the players may misinterpret the clues?

No, he acknowledges that.

I don’t know, it’s a mystery.

No, I mean if they stall on the mystery in question, then what’s the problem considering you have plenty of other things for them to do?

What’s the concern that if they can’t solve the mystery that they’s start doing “boring stuff”?

That occurred in a previous adventure, this is just a story in an ongoing campaign.

You should remember that I don’t use JAs approach, I use my approach, developed from many years of experience. It is similar to the approach suggested by JA, but as you would expect, not completely identical. In particular, I am more comfortable with leaving some things uncertain - perhaps because I am not writing adventures for other people to run. Someone other than me would have a hard time running my adventures, based on what I put on paper!

Right. And thank you for offering more info on your game, that makes discussion easier for sure.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I am not disagreeing, I’d say all should have a plot. JA is only saying ‘don’t make it a railroad’, not ‘don’t have a plot’

I think I really agree with you here. I get the impression the 'no plot' thing is much more related to small scale stuff, like not mandating that a given obstacle has to be overcome in a specific way.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Again, it seems to me that you simply don't plot out what you expect to happen in any given session, (instead create situations for the PCs to interact with) not that the overall campaign should not have a plot.

Then there's no contradiction. And you can do it whole running Avernus. I know, because I do it that way.

Not that it matters if he contracts himself in two separate pieces of advice. One is for one aspect of gaming; the other is for another.

 

[mamba]

That's not what I understand "don't prep plot" to mean. It's certainly not what (say) Vincent Baker means when he says this in DitV (2004) or Apocalypse World (2010).

DitV p 137:

Don’t play “the story.” The choices you present to the PCs have to be real choices, which means that you can’t possibly know already which way they’ll choose. You can’t have plot points in mind beforehand . . .
AW p 108:

It’s not, for instance, your agenda . . . to get [the players] through your pre-planned storyline (DO NOT pre-plan a storyline, and I’m not [mucking] around).

we are talking about JA here, I am sure Vincent Baker has a different take on a lot of things

The first quote from AW is basically saying the same, I am sure Vince and you take that to more of an extreme than JA does however

Don’t Prep Plots

If you're GMing a roleplaying game, you should never prep a plot.Everyone's tastes are different. These matters are subjective. What works for one person won't necessarily work for another. Yada

thealexandrian.net

"A plot is a sequence of events: A happens, then B happens, then C happens.

A situation, on the other hand, is merely a set of circumstances. The events that happen as a result of that situation will depend on the actions the PCs take."

For example, a plot might look like this: “Pursuing the villains who escaped during last week’s session, the PCs will get on a ship bound for the port city of Tharsis. On their voyage they will spot a derelict. They will board the derelict and discover that one of the villains has transformed into a monster and killed the entire crew… except for one lone survivor. They will fight the monster and rescue the survivor. While they’re fighting the monster, the derelict will have floated into the territorial waters of Tharsis. They will be intercepted by a fleet of Tharsian ships. Once their tale is told, they will be greeted in Tharsis as heroes for their daring rescue of the derelict. Following a clue given by the survivor of the derelict, they will climb Mt. Tharsis and reach the Temple of Olympus. They can then wander around the temple asking questions. This will accomplish nothing, but when they reach the central sanctuary of the temple the villains will attempt to assassinate them. The assassination attempt goes awry, and the magical idol at the center of the temple is destroyed. Unfortunately, this idol is the only thing holding the temple to the side of the mountain — without it the entire temple begins sliding down the mountain as the battle continues to rage between the PCs and villains!”"

A situation, on the other hand, looks like this: “The villains have escaped on two ships heading towards Tarsis. One of the villains transforms during the voyage into a terrible monster and kills the crew, leaving the ship floating as a derelict outside the coastal waters of Tharsis. At such-and-such a time, the ship will be spotted by the Tharsis navy. The other villains have reached the Temple of Olympus atop Mt. Tharsis and assumed cover identities.”"

I assume you consider his situation (last paragraph) to still be a plot

 

[mamba]

I mean, the article is called “don’t prep plots” not “don’t prep railroads”.

I would not go by the headline alone... he is talking about not prescribing solutions that the player have to 'find' to advance to the next situation.

I just quoted the relevant part in my previous post

I’m talking about JA in this case. He dedicates a lot of focus to the published adventures. They all have plots. Descent Into Avernus is one example. He offers suggestions across many articles on how to improve the adventure.

That doesn’t change that Descent Into Avernus has a plot. It very clearly does.

of course it does, that is my point