What a great storytelling DM looks like

[Truename]

I was running one of my favorite old Dungeon modules for our 2e campaign; this would be roughly back in '93 or '94. The module is one of those "PCs are stuck at an inn during a blizzard, and at least one person is a murderer." In fact, two people are - and they're doppelgangers. The inn-keeper and his older son has been replaced, leaving his wife and youngest son freaked out by the differences in their personalities and scared by their anger. Everything comes to a head while people are snowed in.

I remember that module! Never got a chance to run it, but man, it looked awesome. (Why don't we get modules like that anymore?)

Instead, I ran "Old Man Katan and His Mushroom Band"... twice.

 

[Tav_Behemoth]

discovering things that are set up with the intention that you're probably not going to discover them is a source of delight

This is definitely a big thrill in our current campaign; Caverns of Thracia is full of stuff like that. I'm pleased that so many of them have in fact been discovered, but even before they had secret-door-detecting swords and the like I got a kick just from watching the PCs walk past hidden areas and thinking about the evil that lurked feet away from the unsuspecting adventurers, and I think "you mean that was there all along?" adds extra spice to the players' thrill of discovery.

As a player I'm very sensitive to intention. I'm uncomfortable if I think that what the GM does or doesn't intend for my character to experience is the major determinant in what happens in the game, and am willing to trade a high degree of inefficiency in getting what I want for the feeling that when I do it's wrested from a coldly objective universe by the virtue of my deeds alone.

 

[KidSnide]

As a player I'm very sensitive to intention. I'm uncomfortable if I think that what the GM does or doesn't intend for my character to experience is the major determinant in what happens in the game, and am willing to trade a high degree of inefficiency in getting what I want for the feeling that when I do it's wrested from a coldly objective universe by the virtue of my deeds alone.

Interesting. As a player, I'm very sensitive to whether or not what my character is doing matters, either to character development or in the game world. I'm willing to trade a ton of autonomy to make sure that my character is in a position so that my actions and decisions have meaningful consequences.

At the same time, I find it frustrating to wander around without an objective. (That said, killing things, taking their stuff and getting more powerful is pretty fun, at least while I'm still developing mastery of the system.)

-KS

 

[Tav_Behemoth]

Cool, thanks for the perspective!

I think the common ground would be that both of us would be frustrated with an environment that we couldn't prod and push and get traction on - "you're floating in Limbo and there's nothing around" - or with a situation where the GM is strongly signaling that there's only one possible outcome (me because I'd chafe at being steered there, you because the consequences don't really stem from your decision if there aren't enough alternatives to make it an actual choice).

 

[Barastrondo]

For my part, when I play it's a mix. I certainly expect the GM's intention to weigh heavily on what we do: even if he impartially runs a module, I hope he selected that module with the intention of showing us a good time. I like to pick what matters to my character rather than having something assigned; but I've had fun with pregenerated characters at con situations before, too. Some nights I really want to be the one driving the action, because I'm full of energy and ideas; other nights, I'm beat and I want to sit back and let the GM propel something at me. I'm not looking for the same thing every night, or with every system, or even with every character.

Mostly, though, I guess I want to play what my friends are good at. My brother runs a very intense game that doesn't easily fall on one end of the spectrum, so I expect a mix of narrative techniques and player-determined goals there. Another friend has a very exploration-rich world with piles of stuff going on without player input, which is fairly strongly sandbox, with the slight exception that he has so much stuff going on that we're frequently reacting to the world. So that makes him kind of storytelling, I guess?

So yeah, as a player, it's all good. It could be all bad with the wrong GMs, too, but hey, I'm lucky.

 

[The Shaman]

If someone were to create Jean-Louis from Scaramouche, for instance, I would probably create his rival the Marquis de la Tour d'Azyr after he created his character (or work with the player to create him, though perhaps withholding certain key plot twists that occur to me) rather than selecting a potential rival from those that already exist, if that makes sense.

Flashing Blades characters include Advantages and Secrets which do a very good job in emulating elements of swashbuckling source literature.

That said, Sworn Vengeance is perhaps my least favorite of the Secrets a player may choose for her character. I accept it because it's true to the genre and it's included in the rules, but I greatly prefer rivalries to come out of the shared experience of play around the table and not as background fiction.

If discovering things that are set up with the intention that you're probably not going to discover them is a source of delight, yeah, we would have incompatible gaming styles.

Sounds like.

I like puzzles and mysteries in roleplaying games, and the idea that the referee is simply changing the pieces around to 'tell a better story' honestly irritates me far more than the prospect of failing to solve the puzzle or mystery.

I don't play a "no surprises" game. Unexpected troubles and plotlines arise all the time, things the players don't choose. But I do keep tabs on what players are responding to with enthusiasm. If most of the group is actively disinterested in fighting against the forces of a given religion, then I don't push that conflict as something they absolutely must get involved with. The conflict doesn't magically vanish, but I make sure they have options to, say, get another faction of NPCs to handle the conflict so they don't have to worry about it.

Is it possible for no one to deal with it, and for the conflict to grow unchecked?

Essentially, I've been in the situation where I felt that in-character I was bound to pursue a Very Important Conflict, or bad things would happen, while as a player I had no real interest in that conflict or the antagonists that came with it. I would rather have been in another portion of the setting doing something else. I don't really want my players to feel that way. Wasn't much fun.

If the whole campaign was about the Very Important Conflict in which I wasn't interested, then I would simply beg off as gracefully as possible.

But if it's something that has a finite endpoint? Well, sometimes we do what we want, and sometimes we do what we must.

As a caveat, though, I play all-but-exclusively with existing friends. So I already know much of what they like, and what they find interesting. Letting one plotline fade gracefully into the background because nobody like the sound of it is a largely theoretical practice, because the situations I tend to set up are ones that the players generally get quite enthusiastic about.

That does make a difference.

Planting the seeds of the first session during character creation is indispensable, no argument here.

So would you start that first session with the question of "Where are you, and what are you doing?", or are you more inclined to get them all in one place first and see what happens? For that matter, would you encourage players to pursue goals as a group, or would you expect the average session to have them scattered across the city for most of the evening?

For Le Ballet de l'Acier, the game will begin in Paris in early February 1625. The players get a rundown of current events at both the macro (Cardinal Richelieu was named head of the king's council last August and is solidifying his control, a French expeditionary force is currently serving alongside the Savoyards against the Genoese and their Spanish allies, et cetera) and micro (the fair of St Germain is open, there's a new play premiering at the hotel de Bourgogne, et cetera), then they can decide where they want to begin and what they're doing.

During character creation I ask the players to create a network of relationships among their characters. Every adventurer doesn't need to know every other adventurer: A can know B and C, while B can know D and C can know E, for example. I do expect them to begin together, and to at least be convivial toward one another at the start.

As far as mutual goals, that's up to the players. I encourage them to be mutually supportive of one another's characters, but that's ultimately up to them and to be honest, given the genre, I'd actually be fine with some intense PvP conflicts in this particular game.

 

[Barastrondo]

I like puzzles and mysteries in roleplaying games, and the idea that the referee is simply changing the pieces around to 'tell a better story' honestly irritates me far more than the prospect of failing to solve the puzzle or mystery.

Not to "tell a better story," to meet the out-of-character needs of the players. It's the same reason that if my players have had a rough day at the office (even at our office, we have 'em) and want an obvious target for a dynamic conflict rather than an evening of subtle investigative legwork, I'll tweak a session to give them what they want. If the puzzle and mystery were the most important thing to my players, and they'd gladly risk a couple of hours of boredom and frustration to make sure that they get their answers the hard way, then yes, I would set things up so that the mysteries can only be solved by pre-determined fashion, and cut no slack.

Is it possible for no one to deal with it, and for the conflict to grow unchecked?

Yes, if that's their choice. However, it's been my experience that if players are actively disinterested in a given conflict, if you push it on them six months later, and it now will take more attention, time, resources, blood, sweat and tears to deal with, it doesn't generally become more fun to play through. If anything, it becomes more of a burden. I just don't want my players to feel like they wasted an evening of play doing drudge work, particularly in this post-college, some-have-kids, can't-game-all-the-time era. That doesn't mean "no adversity you don't specifically request" or "whatever decision you make is the correct one." It just means I'll try to give them the flavors of adversity they're most interested in dealing with.

If the whole campaign was about the Very Important Conflict in which I wasn't interested, then I would simply beg off as gracefully as possible.

But if it's something that has a finite endpoint? Well, sometimes we do what we want, and sometimes we do what we must.

I totally agree, as far as the characters are concerned. But if the players aren't doing what they enjoy, why are they playing in the first place? If a player absolutely hates romantic subplots I'm not going to force one on him no matter how realistic it might be that a given NPC would fall in love and bring a lot of complications along. It's the same principle, just in terms of overall conflict arcs.

Again, though, I can afford to play exclusively with friends with similar interests, so I rarely have to make that call. But (to pick a random example), if I said "There's an encroaching fleet of spelljammers that are going to pillage half the world if nothing's done" and then half the group said they really didn't like the concept of spelljammers, I'd try to work something out. I would rather they didn't feel like I was punishing them for not beating their faces against a spelljammer-shaped wall until they could get back to the storylines they wanted to play.

During character creation I ask the players to create a network of relationships among their characters. Every adventurer doesn't need to know every other adventurer: A can know B and C, while B can know D and C can know E, for example. I do expect them to begin together, and to at least be convivial toward one another at the start.

Have you seen the Spirit of the Century approach? Not that I'd recommend it for your game (it's definitely keyed more toward a deliberate literary emulation than the simulation of the world's in-character rules), but it's a clever method of encouraging players to have fun coming up with character connections.

As far as mutual goals, that's up to the players. I encourage them to be mutually supportive of one another's characters, but that's ultimately up to them and to be honest, given the genre, I'd actually be fine with some intense PvP conflicts in this particular game.

Sounds pretty solid. Good luck with it!

 

[SteveC]

The idea that a "sandbox" and a good story are opposed to each other is, perhaps, a fallacy.

The link in my sig - the Burning Empires game - is an example of me learning to run games in a "sandbox" mode. The story (and I think it was a decent story, sometimes, though lacking a satisfying conclusion) was about PCs and their agendas conflicting with NPCs and their agendas.

All one needs to create a good story is characters who want something and characters who will resist that. From the interplay between characters, goals may shift and there is an understanding of what the players think about human nature.

However - I don't think that the DM can tell a story and still have the players create protagonists for that story.

I think this is a good point: the notion that sandbox and storytelling are diametrically opposed to each other is at the very least an oversimplification. In my estimation, a good GM and a good campaign will have elements of both.

I also own Burning Empires...and I think it's a very odd duck of roleplaying games. It is highly structured and controlled gameplay, which makes you think it's going to be railroading, but at the same time it's all about player choices and what to you do in a particular situation. It is definitely one of the most unusual RPGs I've ever come across, and does a good job of throwing most game theory on its ear.

To address another point, in the Burning Sky campaign, for example, the first few adventures are somewhat railroadish, as they definitely take the group in a very specific direction. At the same time, within that framework, they offer tremendous freedom as to how to get there.

In the Scouring of Gate Pass, the group has the goal of getting the Maguffin and then getting out of town heading in a particular direction. That is bordering on railroading on the surface. The reason the adventure worked for me (and I've run it successfully for two different groups) was that given that context, a group is given given complete freedom as to how to accomplish that. The adventure suggests several options and gives enough information to the GM so that they can react quite well to what a particular group wants to try.

At the same time, it presents a number of set-piece encounters that the group is likely to go through, which again may make some groups think of it as a railroady adventure. At the same time, my two different groups avoided some of the encounters and did some others entirely out of order for what the adventure assumed would happen...and it worked out just fine.

The Fire Forest is even more of a structured game environment (an almost entirely artificial one) but it also offers tremendous freedom in terms of the choices the group is offered. I think some groups might simply have a problem with how they are forced to make those choices.

I would classify Burning Sky as more of a storytelling adventure path, but it is definitely not a linear approach...groups are given a lot of freedom about how to get to where they need to go, but ultimately some may not like the notion that there is a particular direction to go in the first place.

So it isn't just as simple as an either/or scenario to be certain. I would say that the only thing that's definite about a story telling game is that there is a story...something larger than the group and something that exists outside of it going on.

 

[Ariosto]

As a player, I like to use my autonomy to make sure that my character is in a position so that my actions and decisions have meaningful consequences.

At the same time, I find it frustrating to wander around without an objective. Therefore, I choose an objective.

... only with storytelling techniques added to the arsenal.

The question is, what are those additional techniques?

Remember, "the story" is not a predetermined outcome. It's something that is built in play.

That is the case in the non-storytelling game. The question is, what is different about your storytelling game? Well, as a matter of fact some prior concept of "the story" is necessary in order to "guide" anything toward it and away from something else. You've got to know the way to San Jose before you can choose it on that basis! Otherwise, you're right back to the old "non-storytelling" game in which whatever happens is -- after the fact -- identified as "the story". The arrow of time and causality here is a fact of life.

Play with a GM you trust, basically. Since things are often ad-libbed, there is no player ability to audit the books.

Again, no difference is addressed. The difference that I would like to see addressed is that you are moving the GM from a disinterested judge to a judge with an agenda. The exceptional powers remain, but not the critical distinction in role.

There's actually ...

So many words, completely to avoid the question! When a GM is forcing events to conform to a "story", he or she is acting like a theatrical director -- not a game umpire. The contrast between what the 'players' are allowed by Orson Welles and the decisive decision-making many people associate with playing a game is the point here.

The group's desire to play Dungeons & Dragons.

Yet more avoidance of actual dialog? It is frustrating ... depending on what your definition of 'is' is, Senator. I am not talking about whipping out Game X and calling it "D&D" just because one happens to be Bill Slavicsek. I could whip out the same game and call it Macaroni, obviously.

Someone could "have a desire for his tractor to fly". However, simply repeating that statement of desire would not answer the really interesting interpretation -- the common-sense interpretation, I think -- of the question, "What makes a tractor a vehicle of choice for flight?" The restatement adds nothing to the conversation!

This is a question about practical matters of game implementation, where "the rubber hits the road" -- where new 'editions' might possibly have some justification related to playing the game.

It hies back to people not playing D&D the same way.

As opposed to everyone playing all those other games the same way? I don't see that. Neither do I see how that is any argument at all for doing a 'makeover' of D&D instead of trying to do storytelling with, say, The Storyteller System. Last but not least, I do not see how "people not playing the same way" gives such self-evident -- for so you treat it -- privilege to those who think that playing it as the designers designed it to be played sucks. How is that a warrant for them to dictate what the game shall "Officially" be to those who have made the mistake of choosing the game because (madness of madnesses!) they actually like it as it is?

Help me out here; throw me a bone of logical reasoning. Somehow, it does not appear to me that AD&D became the #1 RPG on the basis of how many people thought it was the wrong design with the wrong design goals. Nor have I seen people flocking to White Wolf because they find the "storytelling" thing such a drag as to demand spending their hard-earned cash on it.

 

[Ariosto]

I think there's a chapter in the DMG2 devoted largely to this subject.

Yes; the very first chapter. Has anyone here read it? (I think they got Robin Laws to write at least a portion.)

That said, a good story teller GM might have multiple dramatic moments that he is guiding the plot towards, with the caveat that - as a good story teller GM - the PCs are given the freedom to choose actions that don't lead to those moments. Those moments (or NPCs, or encounters) are all potentially a part of "The Story."

So, the difference looks to me like this: In the "non-storytelling" game, the player makes a choice and consequences follow; the freedom to choose is directly actual. In the "storytelling" game, that really just presents a choice for the GM: whether to allow the consequences or to replace them with 'guidance'.

In another kind of "storytelling" game, player choice is in a sense even more direct. Instead of choosing actions for a particular character, the player chooses outcomes -- changes in state for the wider world. A seemingly classic example is the player whose choice is not "I look in the wall safe" but rather, "I find the Maltese contract," or even "I find something that causes a scandal that removes my rival from the political arena."

The outcome, then, is not a consequence of choices of action; it dictates creation of a narrative of actions that rationalizes after the fact how the new state of affairs came to be.

On the continuum of those three kinds of game, the imagined world of space, time, identity, and causality becomes increasingly amorphous.

I'm not sure what there is to reconcile. Acting as a strictly neutral arbiter and/or scenario builder aren't the only things GMs can do. They can also act as editors or directors.

To some of us those are most definitely different things, the question of just which we're getting into being in fact the essential question! This is a position very well founded in a long and well documented history, so conventional as to be about as trivial a thing as I can imagine. Prefer away, whichever you will! Denial of the fact of alternatives is not helpful, though.

Players are players of the game because (unlike actors) they make meaningful decisions that have significant consequences.

The question is how they get to "make meaningful decisions that have significant consequences." I can make vague and unsupported generalizations for myself; I ask a question of someone else to be informed! Was the USSR "a democracy"? Citizens in the Soviet Union got to vote for the Communist Party candidate of their choice. The devil is in the details, not in the hand-waving.