I sat down recently to watch Toy Story 2. And while watching it, something occurred to me.
In many movies (especially Kids movies), you'll have the overall plot be an adventure. But the adventure isn't one where the Hero has to overcome the Villain. It's merely the Hero Going Out! Doing Things! Often rescuing his friends from being lost, or just urgently needing to get from Point A to Point B, or reuniting with his family, or whathaveyou.
Now, calling this a villainless adventure is a bit of a misnomer - there are forces of opposition. But rather than being the antagonist, they are momentary obstacles or plot devices, rather than the person that must be Defeated to Succeed.
But besides the "Overcome the Natural Disaster" scenario, I can't think of any real good villainless adventures for an RPG.
And I think doing this in an RPG might be tricky. The movies' actual action sequences are brief - and typically involve a lot of athletic jumps/climbs/chases/scrambles/other adventurous stunts, and perhaps (brief) combat. The rest is merely Exploration and "Fish Out of Water", along with Comedy. For an RPG adventure, it's hard to hang your hat on that. Tension and Excitement and whatnot is often the pivotal point of the Adventure, and making that LAST longer than a few rolls, or a single scene, outside of combat is a challenge. Not to mention that the lack of a unified opposition or a strong task going through the whole thing, it can feel very much like a series of random encounters.
How would you go about doing such a thing? Or how HAVE you done such a thing?
In many movies (especially Kids movies), you'll have the overall plot be an adventure. But the adventure isn't one where the Hero has to overcome the Villain. It's merely the Hero Going Out! Doing Things! Often rescuing his friends from being lost, or just urgently needing to get from Point A to Point B, or reuniting with his family, or whathaveyou.
Now, calling this a villainless adventure is a bit of a misnomer - there are forces of opposition. But rather than being the antagonist, they are momentary obstacles or plot devices, rather than the person that must be Defeated to Succeed.
But besides the "Overcome the Natural Disaster" scenario, I can't think of any real good villainless adventures for an RPG.
And I think doing this in an RPG might be tricky. The movies' actual action sequences are brief - and typically involve a lot of athletic jumps/climbs/chases/scrambles/other adventurous stunts, and perhaps (brief) combat. The rest is merely Exploration and "Fish Out of Water", along with Comedy. For an RPG adventure, it's hard to hang your hat on that. Tension and Excitement and whatnot is often the pivotal point of the Adventure, and making that LAST longer than a few rolls, or a single scene, outside of combat is a challenge. Not to mention that the lack of a unified opposition or a strong task going through the whole thing, it can feel very much like a series of random encounters.
How would you go about doing such a thing? Or how HAVE you done such a thing?
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