What are the basic building blocks of your games?

[steenan]

The main and most important building blocks of my games are NPCs. It is their relations and goals, but also their specific abilities or powers and quirks of their personality and looks. These do not, usually, require long descriptions: up to 3 paragraphs for the important ones, one or two sentences for extras.

The interactions between PCs and NPCs, the choices taken by players and their consequences is what shapes my game sessions. My notes often consist of a list of NPCs with their fluff and crunch, half a page or less detailing initial situation and nothing more. The whole storyline is created by my players through their PCs and by my NPCs pursuing their agendas.


There are also other building blocks, that are not present in every game I run, but show up quite often. They are, in order of importance:

History and religion
I love to tie my scenarios strongly to the setting background - or create my own pieces of background to detail it.
Sometimes, the characters explore an exotic culture and must learn its ways to reach their goals. Sometimes, a historical or mythical event is a key to understanding current situation and changing it. Sometimes, relations between gods or a structure of religious hierarchy may be used by PCs for their own ends. Sometimes, learning a piece of history creates a surprising plot twist, showing the situation in different light.

Visuals
I often have some images stuck in my head that I try to work into a game. They are not whole scenes - this would be impossible to include without heavy railroading. It may be an item, a face, a weather phenomenon, a room. Sometimes they are taken from a book or a movie, sometimes something seen in real life, sometimes just a creation of my imagination. In rare cases, the thing I want to include is not visual - like a line of text or a musical motive.

Mechanical concept
Sometimes, I find a monster, a spell or ability so interesting that I judge the mechanics alone as a good reason to include it in a game. I build a situation or a challenge based on it, and then find an in-game reason for it to exist. A few of the sessions I ran have been born from such mechanical ideas that the whole story arose around.

 

[Ant]

My core building blocks are the players.

They are the adventure, the world, the antagonists and protagonists. Their fears and hopes weave the fabric of what happens around them.

If I can come to the table with just a flame of an idea and the players then fan that flame into a roaring session of action, fun and excitement then I've done my job and I've done it well.

And the seed has been planted ...

 

[Derulbaskul]

Thank you for all your thoughts so far. The discussion has helped me identify what I would consider a fourth basic building block, namely, Lore. (snip)

I totally agree.

I have always run my games in FR since the Grey Box first came out. I'm certainly no setting-Nazi but it is my habit when planning out a new campaign to find as much of the extant lore about the location(s) as possible. For me this isn't some sort of creativity-sapping straitjacket. Rather, it's one of the best ways for me to get the creative juices flowing.

I don't necessarily use all of it but by having a really good idea of the background etc... I am in a much better position to "wing it" if my campaign takes an unexpected turn.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I have built campaigns on broad themes (individualism, destiny, etc.), and always have them in the back of my mind as the foundation for everything.

More practically, my building blocks are PCs, NPC/monster statblocks, and dramatic moments. I go into a session with a bunch of monster stats and an idea of some major events catered to each PCs capabilities and story (PCs ship grounded by storm, nearby town attacked by undead, NPC makes romantic advace on PC, etc.). I construct the session by trying to get to those few planned events in the most natural and intuitive way (modifying, recycling, or abandoning elements as needed).

 

[The Ghost]

There are four things that most of my games are built on: a hex map, a couple of random encounter tables; a dozen well developed NPCs; and a list of rumors.

I generally start by creating a map. I prefer to keep the map roughly twenty-five by twenty-five hexes with hexes being between two and six miles each. I try to keep the terrain pretty varied with mountains, forests, plains, hills, swamps, water, and villages; although occasionally I will leave one or two of those terrain types off the map.

Once I have finished making the map I divide it up into smaller regions with each region getting its own random encounter table. Random encounter tables are built with both hostile and non-hostile encounters on them. For example, a random encounter could be an ambush by orcs; a merchant with a broken wagon; a pile a dragon dung; or an old wood cutter's lodge long since abandoned.

Once the map and random encounter tables are finished I start to think about who the major NPCs are in this region. What are their goals; personalities; resources? What are their relationships toward each other? What are their relationships towards the elements on the random encounter tables? I generally write up about a dozen or so NPCs in detail.

Finally, I will write up a list of rumors about the region. Some true, some partly true, some false. Each player then is then randomly given a couple of rumors and let loose in the world. All I do after that is react to the players.

 

[MortonStromgal]

I would say events and npc motivations. I may have something like

xolo the sorcerer wants to be king
fangrad the mad finds a magic ring
its unusually cold this year freezing crops

Then work them into the game as things happen. I like to react to what the PCs are doing rather than push the story on them.

For example the PCs were protecting the town from goblins raider and stumbled on a crypt of ghost who were more than willing to help the town defeat the goblins if the PCs would recover an artifact to release them from being bound to this world. The PCs could then choose which path they wanted. Things like that, present them with several options and let them present new options I didnt think of and see where it takes us. Setting up NPCs with goals and motivations as well as events that may hinder or help the PCs along their way.

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

Major NPCs - have goals & motivations, as well as a well-defined plan for the future.

The world - defines the framework in which the NPCs interact with their goals, with each other, and with the PCs.

Interactions - between the PCs and the NPCs within the world, and between the PCs and the world itself, including combats, social encounters, environmental challenges, and all the other conflicts & encounters. This is really what defines the "game" itself.

Hooks - to serve as reasons for PCs who need a little push; back up plans for adventures gone awry; tangents to give players some flexibility in controlling the game if they want it; and other random bits to keep things surprising for the GM.

 

[pemerton]

Thank you for all your thoughts so far. The discussion has helped me identify what I would consider a fourth basic building block, namely, Lore.

<snip>

Games which focus on lore may resemble exploration-themed games, but the emphasis is on learning and discovering instead of interaction.

I would add to this: some lore isn't about discovery, but rather revelation of the stakes in the campaign. By gradually giving the players the chance to find out what is at stake in the world, they are able to choose sides and make thematically meaningful choices for their PCs.

This is a technique that, at least for me, works well in a game like D&D that is based around lengthy campaigns with steady level progression. In a different sort of game it might make more sense to reveal all the stakes from the get-go.

 

[howandwhy99]

The game rules hidden behind the screen. The "code", of sorts, to be recognized and decoded by the players. It determines how everything else is converted into the game.

 

[Lanefan]

If I can come to the table with just a flame of an idea and the players then fan that flame into a roaring session of action, fun and excitement then I've done my job and I've done it well.

You're lucky.

My players would put the flame out, start another fire or two somewhere else, blow something up just for fun...and then ask me why I'm so confused.

Lan-"and I wouldn't have it any other way"-efan