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Message: <blockquote data-quote="aramis erak" data-source="post: 9081194" data-attributes="member: 6779310"> <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">create sandbox elements -  <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Most obvious:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">encounter tables </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">maps</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">specific detail maps</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Less obvious <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">text about places on maps</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">bestiary</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">travel rules</li> </ul></li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Provide metaplots <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">via setting text</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">via explicit callouts as the "point of the setting" - such as deadlands being [ISPOILER]the fight with The Reckoners.[/ISPOILER]</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">via tracking systems, such as Good vs Evil in AD&D 1e's DragonLance Adventures. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">via MetaConflict action systems such as Invasion system in Burning Empires.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">via linked adventure stubs to be expanded  by the GM.</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Provide Archetypes for players to pick<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">This can drive specific types of character goals, as is done in most Year Zero Engine games, especially strong in T2K 4.0..<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">T2K has players pick 3 personality statements, one of which is a goal. Pursuing it in play is a source of XP...</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">This can also, at least in less politically correct games, trigger certain character issues that in and of themselves are plot drivers. Such as someone running a proper Victorian setting, include a freed slave archetype, modeled after Mr. Frederick Douglass.  Or modeled after less noble but far more common situations.</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Provide things that players may want to face off with and/or seek out to experience<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">In Alien, one of my players was intrigued by the mention of the Arcturans, and wanted to go see them. this lead to jobs in that region of space being prioritized. (Didn't change a thing about how I used the mission generator, only changed which offerings he argued for; he also usually won those.)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">In the Ringworld RPG, the Ringworld itself is such a thing, but further, once there, the various canonical cultures can be quite interesting... or hazardous... goals of exploration. One bloke I knew who played it, his character sought out Speaker to Animals on the Map of Kzin... and upon his character escaping the Kzinti, wrote on a T-shirt, "My PC survived crossing the Map of Kzin" and drew the ringworld....</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">In any murder-mystery game, the methods of setting up those mysteries and how PCs get clues can be very much a setting element...<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">In L5R, the easiest way to solve a mystery is for a shugenja to ask the kami... but that's not admissable evidence, even if the kami in question is the previous emperor... I've had players resort to it to know how to find the clues needed to force a confession.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">in Blade Runner, the setting provides a number of means by which to examine clues that don't yet exist... changes the feel of a mystery.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">In a Party playing lawmen in Deadlands, you don't need to convince the judge of the varmint's guilt if you can goad him into drawing on you so you can quickdraw and drop him! (But you had better «bleep» well drop him!)</li> </ul></li> </ul></li> </ul>That help?</blockquote>

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