What are your favorite Non-Combat Gadgets?

As we come down from GenCon, lets take a quick look at ideas for game-supporting gadgets that serve the non-combat pillars of our games -- exploration and roleplaying.


GenCon's over. I've written a couple versions of a post-GenCon column, and each time I've ended up trashing it. Too much of the same old stuff everyone has been posting all week.

It was awesome. You should go. I should get over it. 25 more weeks until the next GenCon.

But there are some insights and ideas from GenCon that do pertain to gadgets and technology. But to get there, I need to start with one of the insights pulled from my Post-GenCon trash heap.

Innovations are in Games, not Gadgets this year

This isn't a hard and fast rule, but a clear trend. A combination of factors like the D&D Fallow year, the rise of kickstarter, and a variety of other things have conspired to create a situation where it's not a great time to be trying to innovate in terms of gadgets to support combat encounters in games -- not the way it was a few years ago.

Alea tools, with their magnetic discs were still at the Con, and you're seeing their stuff everywhere. At D&D tables I saw more DMs and players using these disks than ever. And Paizo still has an excellent selection of their gamehackery aids. But Pathfinder, as a game, doesn't introduce new challenges for innovators to solve with gadgets -- the challenges in running Pathfinder are the challenges we've had for the past ten years, by and large. And there isn't another dominant game that is big enough to draw serious gadget innovation.

All of that innovation energy isn't gone, it just seems to have been poured into Kickstarter in terms of new RPGs, and other products.

Looking A Bit Deeper

If we take a closer look at a bunch of trends, there's another trend going. The D&D playtest is trying to make sure the game serves all three "pillars" of the game -- combat, of course, but also exploration and roleplaying. Meanwhile, games that are getting a lot of attention this year -- or have been coming out in the past few years -- seem to be focusing on those non-combat pillars.

Gumshoe-based games are all about investigation and mystery. FATE is a game that's a lot more about storytelling and roleplaying than it is about combat. And so on.

What Have We Been Missing?

In our headlong, 4e-fueled obsession with combat encounters, we've been paying very little attention to the sorts of game aids that support the other pillars. What sort of game aids are there out there that support Exploration? What do they look like? If they're not there, what would we like to see?

And then there's Roleplaying and story. D&D players are not universally comfortable speaking in character and roleplaying -- many of us reach for the dice as soon as some sort of social confict comes up. There are thorny problems there waiting to be solved by the same sort of innovation energy that created Alea Tools.

Good gadgets solve a problem, make something easier, or scratch an itch in our game experience. Alea Tools, my running example of a combat gadget, makes it easier to track conditions and other information about PCs and NPCs on the map. So, what gadgets are out there solving problems for the other two pillars?

Gadgets for Roleplaying

Roleplaying is, by and large, something that doesn't change much from one game to another. Some games rely more on it, some less, but not many games actually have robust, complex mechanics for roleplaying -- at least not the games that have large audiences.

There are exceptions, of course. The various Game of Thrones variations that have come out have all hard to come up with systems of intrigue and influence to try to gamify some of the more complex social activity in those books. The "Crafty" series of games, born of the old d20 Spycraft game, had elaborate social conflict rules. But those are exceptions, and in both cases I'd argue that their audiences are small enough to make them unlikely targets for entrepreneurship.

But giving players subtle help to remind them of their characters, and help them play in character -- that's an interesting challenge. There's also plenty of room for aids to help DMs with their own roleplaying -- how do you manage to give each important NPC his own voice, his own personality, in your roleplaying?

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One obvious solution pops right out as you walk around the vendor hall at GenCon. Props. I'm not a LARPer, the only Cosplay I'm suited to is Tweedle Dee (not butch enough for Tweedle Dum), but the idea of a couple of iconic props for your game and PCs is an interesting one. Perhaps each player gets a iconic item -- a foam sword, a toy wand or shield, a holy symbol, anything at all that the player can fidget with while he plays. And as DM, you might want to think about things that you could pick up and hold while you're speaking for specific NPCs.

Gadgets for Exploration

Here's a place where I don't think we have a whole lot of existing gadgetry. One thing that we do have is VTT software, which makes it easy to expose maps based on what the players have explored, etc. Using a VTT in your face to face gaming could be a real boon when it comes to exploration tasks, but it's far from perfect.

Part of the problem we have is that the exporation systems are not clear and robust yet, by and large. At least not in the case of D&D and the playtest. For 4th edition, no one bothered to invent better gadgets for managing Skill Challenges -- probably because those challenges were so diverse, it was hard to come up with a tool that would be useful for all of them -- more useful than a stack of poker chips, anyway.

So, I think there's a lot of room for innovation here, but odds are that innovation doesn't have a clear set of problems to try to solve like tracking conditions.

What do YOU have in your bag of tricks?

What other ideas do you have -- either from GenCon or elsewhere -- for Gadgets that support Exploration or Role Playing in your games?

 

[Argyle King]

Does a pencil and some paper count as a gadget? I'm not a great artist by any means, but sometimes I simply make a quick sketch of something if I want to to help visualize part of a exploration or roleplaying encounter. If a certain NPC is important enough to have a unique voice, I write down the distinguishing characteristics that make the voice unique. If I can play/speak with those characteristics I do; otherwise, I describe the voice of the npc. I believe many DMs (including myself) get stuck thinking of descriptions in visual terms. Describing what the PCs smell, hear, feel, and even taste opens up a whole new set of tools, and this is especially true during roleplaying encounters when you have freedom to describe what PCs sense when around an important NPC.

To be honest, I suppose I'm a little unclear of what is being asked here. What is the problem which is trying to be solved when it comes to "exploration"?

 

[Radiating Gnome]

To be honest, I suppose I'm a little unclear of what is being asked here. What is the problem which is trying to be solved when it comes to "exploration"?

Well, I think that's part of what makes this challenging. There are lots of obvious pain points in most combat systems -- fiddly bits to track, etc. But for the most part, exploration systems for our games are so abstract and high level they tend to not develop those sorts of pain points.

An exception to that might be mapping. Striking the right balance between levels of detail, levels of scale, and dealing with our various skill levels -- nevermind the challenge of producing a map on the fly during a game -- those can all be tricky pain points worth solving.

High-end software like Campaign Cartographer may make possible to create detailed, interesting, attractive maps at many different scales, but there's a learning curve there, and a lot of work to be done. Going back to a sheet of graph paper and a pencil is the other end of that spectrum. But in some cases even that may be more than you need -- and it assumes that you have an idea of what you want to share with the players. What about those times when you're at a loss.

And then there's the challenge of "Random" encounters while you're in those exploration phases. Earlier editions of the game used them a lot, but 4e dispensed with them almost entirely because encounters were elaborate affairs and combat took a long time. Are there gadgets or hacks that can help add some of that random hazard flavor to the game word without having to dedicate half a session to getting somewhere so you can get back to your story? In my 4e games I used skill challenges -- and even a modified skill challenge system for minor combats so they could be resolved in a matter of minutes instead of an hour, but that makes them a lot less satisfying as encounters. What sort of tricks have you found there?

So.... things like that.

-rg

 

[Argyle King]

Well, I think that's part of what makes this challenging. There are lots of obvious pain points in most combat systems -- fiddly bits to track, etc. But for the most part, exploration systems for our games are so abstract and high level they tend to not develop those sorts of pain points.

An exception to that might be mapping. Striking the right balance between levels of detail, levels of scale, and dealing with our various skill levels -- nevermind the challenge of producing a map on the fly during a game -- those can all be tricky pain points worth solving.

High-end software like Campaign Cartographer may make possible to create detailed, interesting, attractive maps at many different scales, but there's a learning curve there, and a lot of work to be done. Going back to a sheet of graph paper and a pencil is the other end of that spectrum. But in some cases even that may be more than you need -- and it assumes that you have an idea of what you want to share with the players. What about those times when you're at a loss.

And then there's the challenge of "Random" encounters while you're in those exploration phases. Earlier editions of the game used them a lot, but 4e dispensed with them almost entirely because encounters were elaborate affairs and combat took a long time. Are there gadgets or hacks that can help add some of that random hazard flavor to the game word without having to dedicate half a session to getting somewhere so you can get back to your story? In my 4e games I used skill challenges -- and even a modified skill challenge system for minor combats so they could be resolved in a matter of minutes instead of an hour, but that makes them a lot less satisfying as encounters. What sort of tricks have you found there?

So.... things like that.

-rg

I'll have to give it some more thought. Some of the obstacles presented aren't as prevalent in the other games I play as they are in D&D. That's not to say those other games don't have problems; they do, but what you mention about long grindy combats tends to be (in my experience) somewhat unique to D&D for reasons which are born of the system and not from the concept of exploration. What follows is a collection of random thought; things that came to mind while trying to contemplate the question more as I was typing this.

I agree that mapping programs take work. Some of those programs are awesome, but they somewhat require that you have a solid idea in mind as to what your world looks like. I'll be honest and say that -when I have time- I'm something of a detail freak. I've had to start breaking myself of the habit of over-preparing so that I'd have more time to spend on other things, and because I wanted to force myself to learn some of the DM skills for winging it and improvising.

If you have a good idea in mind about what your world looks like, but one that is not quite solid enough to be fully mapped at the level of detail a mapping program would provide, that is where I feel doing things the old fashioned way starts to become better. If I have a general idea that I want part of the world to be a large arid wasteland in which nocturnal goblin marauders and poisonous giant scorpions dwell, that gives me something to work with. I then can ask myself questions about the fact that I've established, and let the answers I come up with flesh out the world further. Does this arid wasteland follow some semblance of the same geographical rules as what is found here on earth? If yes, I can reasonably assume there is a rain shadow -meaning mountains in a particular direction- or some other factor (depending upon the type of desert I have in mind.) If no, why? Is it a magical effect? If so, maybe it is artificially created by a desert witch who desires an age of perpetual heat and dryness.

If I reach a point where I have little to no idea about what should happen or if I just want to (as the DM) be surprised, I think the idea of random encounter tables starts to shine. The "problem" with random encounters is one that you mentioned -they may take a long time, but that is again something which is somewhat due to the mechanics of the game system being used, and not an inherent property of the idea itself.

If we're talking specifically D&D 4th Edition, I think skill challenges are a good way to handle it. Perhaps random encounters cause the trip from point A to point B to simply take longer. Perhaps some healing surges are lost. Perhaps a future planned encounter is made more difficult because the BBEG's scouts see the PCs and inform him that they're coming. The range of possibilities is pretty broad. Though I do agree that it is somewhat unsatisfying. It's a conundrum which is difficult for me to answer... Do I choose a method of resolution which is possibly less satisfying or do I choose one which eats up game time? ...or am I stuck ditching the idea of random encounters completely? Do I try playing a different game system which may possibly work in a way which is better suited to some of the things I want to do?

As I'm typing this, a thought occurred to me that this might be an area in which I might steal the narrative dice from Star Wars: Edge of The Empire for a moment, and roll those to add some context to the situation. Success would mean the party succeeds at getting to where they are going; failure means failure. However, if you're unfamiliar with those dice, I'll explain that they do not have numbers on them. They have symbols which mean success and symbols which mean failure, but there is also the concept of advantage and threat. You might roll a successful check, but also roll a lot of threat symbols which means you succeed at what you were trying to do, but something about the situation around you is threatening to you in some way. So maybe you successfully navigate to where you are going, but you attract unwanted attention in some way or perhaps a party member sustains a minor injury of some sort. It is also possible to fail a check, but generate advantage. So perhaps you get lost, but stumble into an abandoned keep which would make a nice base of operations. It would take some work to figure out how to generate a dice pool (in SW, your characters skill helps determine how many dice to roll) and translate the idea into D&D stats, but I think it would work. I also think it would work for other games. (As a side note, Obligation is also a concept I'm thinking about stealing from SW:EoTE.)

One of the resources I've found myself using a lot is found right on the WoTC website. Vicious Venues is a great place to find some pre-made things to plug into your game. It may not be easy to find now that 3rd Edition is two editions removed from being current, so I will provide the link here: https://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/arch/vv
There you can find a wide variety of ideas to plug into a game. You need not necessarily use the ideas as is either; I've had success with looking at those as an initial motivation, and then changing some of the details to better fit what I wanted. Sometimes, all you need is to give the creative wheels of your mind a slight push to get them moving, and then the rest flows naturally once the game gets moving.

While Vicious Venues is a great resource, it is also important to realize that resources are useful no matter where they come from. I play a variety of games, and I have a variety of interests outside of tabletop gaming. Those interests; the games I play and the things I do are resources as well. I might pick up a cool trap idea from a Skyrim dungeon for GURPS fantasy game, or perhaps I like the way the Dwarves are portrayed in Dragon Age: Origins and decide to create an alien race which has that mentality in a sci-fi game. I remember years ago using the story line from the Halo games while running D&D 3rd Edition. Sure, I had to change some things and make some modifications, but it worked surprisingly well. Instead of the Covenant being aliens, they were aberrations from a different dimension, and, instead of using spaceships and slipspace drives, they used arcane portals to invade the world in search of a religious artifact; viewing the races of the prime material realm as being demons who needed to be eradicated before they (the aberrations) could embark on The Great Journey. You'd be surprised how much a simple minor change to a well known idea makes it seem like something completely new to your audience (the players.) For example, you may not have noticed that the idea of a desert witch mentioned a few paragraphs ago was completely based upon Jadis (The White Witch) from The Chronicles of Narnia; all I did was associate the idea with an arid desert instead of snow and ice.

Looking back across what I've written; what has grown from a small thought which I believed would only be a few sentences, it seems to me that I still have not really answered the question I suppose, and I'm veering away from what I believe is the intent of the thread. For that I apologize, but I'm not sure what to say when asked what my favorite "gadgets" are for the exploration portion of tabletop gaming. I try to use what I know. What I know is constantly evolving. I visited the Grand Canyon earlier this year, and -while I had seen pictures of it and knew what to expect- it was mind blowing to stand there and see it for myself. It opened up a whole new world of possibilities for me when it came to imagining my own worlds and what might be found in them. Obviously, this varies, and what I know and how much of what I know is applicable can be modified by the game I'm playing. Some of the things that make sense in a particular edition of D&D might make less sense elsewhere due to differences in how the game worlds work via mechanics. (Note: I'm someone who believes system does matter to some degree.)

If we're talking strictly gadgets in the sense of programs, iPads, and the like, I'll admit to being unable to provide an answer which would satisfy others. I'm admittedly behind the tech curve of the world I live in. I'm not inept at using technology; I have a smart phone, an XBox, and a variety of other gadgets, but I simply do not use a lot of it compared to what seems to be the growing norm in the world around me. This is especially true when it comes to tabletop rpgs; I still prefer to make my D&D characters by hand; with a pencil and a character sheet. Though, I'm interested to hear what others do. I may learn of a gadget or a method I do want to use. I'm always open to the possibility of adding things to the toolbox I have available to me in hopes of running a successful game.

 

[Radiating Gnome]

If we're talking strictly gadgets in the sense of programs, iPads, and the like, I'll admit to being unable to provide an answer which would satisfy others. .

I don't think we need to limit ourselves to actual gadgets -- or, at least, not physical ones. My column tries to be about gadgets, yes, but also about doing exactly what you've suggested doing with the dice pools from Star Wars -- stealing ideas and mechanics from other games and using them in your home game to solve a problem or add some flavor. So, it's a big tent.

Now I'm going to have to check out Star Wars -- I've been trying to come up with a good reason to buy those books, and now there's a mechanic I might want to steal?

I've used skill challenges a lot in the past -- and I actually like the mechanic quite a bit. There are similar mechanics in Savage Worlds, and a few other systems. I think the first time I remember a complex skill check sort of mechanic was in Altenity, but it might have been around long before and I just never noticed.

-rg

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

The 10' pole.

Or did you mean metagame gadgets, vice in-game gadgets? Since combat is an in-game concept, my reply assumes in-game gadgetry.

 

[Argyle King]

Now I'm going to have to check out Star Wars -- I've been trying to come up with a good reason to buy those books, and now there's a mechanic I might want to steal?

-rg

At first, I was unsure how I was going to feel about the dice in Edge of The Empire. After using them, I like some of the concepts. I'll try to explain the concept briefly.

There are no numbers on the dice. Instead, there are four general types of symbols. You have success symbols, failure symbols, advantage symbols, and threat symbols. When you roll the dice, success and failure cancel each other; likewise, advantage and threat cancel each other. To succeed on something, you need to be left with more success than you have failure. However, as said, you also have advantage and threat. Advantage generally means something good came out of your efforts, and threat generally means something bad came from your efforts, but that is completely independent of whether you succeeded or failed.

For a quick example, let's say I roll the dice and the result is 2 success, 1 failure, 1 advantage, and 2 threat. The 1 failure I rolled would cancel one of my success symbols, but I still have one success left, so I succeed. The 1 advantage I rolled is cancelled by one of the threat I rolled. There is still one threat left, so that means -even though I succeeded- there is something else that happened which caused the situation to change in a bad way. Usually, the greater the threat, the worse the negative effects are. For advantage, the opposite is true, and more advantage means a more positive result. Narratively, this might be explained by saying you were firing at a storm trooper, and you succeeded by hitting him, but as he fell his body hit the control panel for a vehicle, and now it's speeding toward you out of control -a threat.

There are also two special symbols called Triumph and Despair*. Both do pretty much exactly what you'd expect from the descriptive terms used for them. Triumph is something especially good, and despair is something especially bad.

There's a bit more to the mechanic than that, but that's the basic idea.

 

[Radiating Gnome]

The 10' pole.

Or did you mean metagame gadgets, vice in-game gadgets? Since combat is an in-game concept, my reply assumes in-game gadgetry.

I meant gadgets to facilitate or support play -- the same way Alea Tools' magnetic discs facilitate combat. So, the 10' pole isn't quite what I was looking for, unless your players use it to move their minis around the table. In which case you've got a really big table.

But, over the almost-a-year of writing this column, my definition of "gadget" and/or "tech" has gotten to be REALLY loose. So, stealing an idea or mechanic from another game counts, as far as I'm concerned, just as much as an actual iphone app.

-rg

 

[Stormonu]

One of the things I've come to see as I prepare adventures as a DM is that graph paper is extremely limiting. Nowadays, I mostly plan my adventures via flowcharts. If I need a setpiece battle, I can draw just the map of the area I expect the fight to cover. I don't need complex overland maps or twisting, turning 5' dungeon halls. Just a line from one adventure point to another with a brief description "twisting, musky corridor", "wind-riddled tunnel", "Farmer Brown's house, 5 miles" and such. Sure, detailed maps can be nice, but I think D&D has gotten too drawn up into partitioning the world off into 5' squares.

I'd love to see someone redo the Caves of Chaos as a flowchart adventure, in place of the current map.

 

[Radiating Gnome]

One of the things I've come to see as I prepare adventures as a DM is that graph paper is extremely limiting. Nowadays, I mostly plan my adventures via flowcharts. If I need a setpiece battle, I can draw just the map of the area I expect the fight to cover. I don't need complex overland maps or twisting, turning 5' dungeon halls. Just a line from one adventure point to another with a brief description "twisting, musky corridor", "wind-riddled tunnel", "Farmer Brown's house, 5 miles" and such. Sure, detailed maps can be nice, but I think D&D has gotten too drawn up into partitioning the world off into 5' squares.

I'd love to see someone redo the Caves of Chaos as a flowchart adventure, in place of the current map.

Essentially, this is what a lot of 4e was, just without the nice flowcharts. Most encounters were disembodied tactical zones. It works just fine that way. But it's also something that has been complained about a lot over the 4e years.

In our home game, we played a lot of Paizo content, but with 4e rules, and had to throw out a lot of minor encounters and focus on the big stuff.

But Next does seem to at least intend to provide rules that DMs who are so inclined can use to manage dungeon exploration in that sort of way. Might not need to be mapped to use those rules, though -- certainly they could be used in the flowchart format as well.

-rg