What happened to the story?

[Desdichado]

So, what elements of plot do you enjoy? What RPG sources do you find have the best ideas in them for using in your game? And am I wrong that there is not enough story talk or is it just too difficult to include on boards?

I think you're wrong, personally. I see plenty of threads on story. Check out the Conspiracy Fantasy thread, for instance. I guess it's a matter of what you look for. I tend to avoid the rules-based threads entirely, so my perception is that it's not a major component of the discussion here.

I mean, I'm not so naive to not know that actually it is, but my point is, there's plenty of story-based discussion too. Heck, we've got an entire forum devoted to telling campaign stories.

 

[reanjr]

One thing I always used to like in the old Judges Guild setting products was the list of rumours/legends which did not necessarily tie into anything that was published other than using names from the setting and which could give huge numbers of potential hooks.

Example:

"Debienna the amazon is searching for the Helm of the Heartstone a helmet of telepathy stolen by a zombie"

Lots of hooks - how did the helm get its name?, do the players help Debienna?, was the zombie being used by an evil cleric or a necromancer?, etc

I'm not familiar with Judges Guild, but that's the type of stuff I love. My favorites for that srot of thing were Dark Matter and (more subtley) Planescape.

 

[reanjr]

I guess I don't see the problem. We do have a storyhour after all.

See, story hour is the antithesis of what I want. They're long, detailed, drawn out stories with lots of background and assumptions. I'm looking for one sentence to one paragraph situations or backgrounds. Even evocative names. I know Expeditious Retreat Press was asking for submissions like this a while back. I wonder what happened to them...

 

[Henry]

Quick note about the Plots and Places forum:

We merged it with General Discussion because traffic had consistently fallen to exceptionally low levels, to the point where it wasn't getting any attention from anyone but a dedicated few. But ever since we merged it in, plot-help related threads have to my perception been doing very well in General. I myself posted for plot help about a month ago and got two or three pages of help on a very small part of my game, and I consistently see people asking for campaign help,l and getting results. Not as much as the game-centered threads, but that's to be expected.

If there were a large outcry to have a separate plot-and-story brainstorm forum over in Meta, we'd bring it back for certain. I'm not talking "Eh, I wouldn't mind seeing it again", but more like people saying, "We need this forum back!" We try to be responsive to users.

So, if you are genuinely interested in seeing Plots and Places or a similar forum back, bring it up in Meta and proselytize.

Hijack of thread out.

 

[JoeGKushner]

unfortunately, the mechanics of the game have gotten in the way of story.

so describing the cool move of a swordmaster slicing his way thru one opponent and into the next has been shortened to cleave. it is just boring to read now and the image it paints doesn't match the original concept.

half the time new DMs are left trying to describe it and just fall flat. so they just restate the obvious rule mechanic.

DM: You cleave.
Player: zzzzzzzZZZZzzz

Gotta disagree with you 100%. That's just a GM who has no imagination. Add something like Stunting from Exalted if you want more descriptions. And I guess, in your example, I'd actually expect the player to describe what he's trying to do and then tell him how he suceeds based on damage, etc...

Then again... I'm one of those people who when he reads about how GMs should keep the suspense of the game by adding tons of description to every monster and not state their name laughts. Yeah, I'm going to spend twenty minutes describing how terrible an orc looks so that the players dont' know it's an orc. I've got better things to do like game. If I want description, I'll go read some fiction.

 

[JoeGKushner]

See, story hour is the antithesis of what I want. They're long, detailed, drawn out stories with lots of background and assumptions. I'm looking for one sentence to one paragraph situations or backgrounds. Even evocative names. I know Expeditious Retreat Press was asking for submissions like this a while back. I wonder what happened to them...

You really need to check out Phil Reed's Rumors line.

Too short for my taste but it sounds exactly like what you're looking for.

 

[el-remmen]

I think complaining that 3E's rules have gotten rid of description of action and story elements in the game is a total cop out.

There is nothing in the rules as written that keeps any of that from happening and there was nothing specific to 2E or 1E mechanics that particularly encouraged that.

The dramatic desciption of any action in the game is in the hands of the GM and the player's. They, as a collective, makie scene vivid by endowing them with colorful description, language and heroic action. The rules don't really have much to do with that - the problem is a bland recitation of what rules are being used as they come up - which is not necessary.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

It fragmented.

See all those new settings? BCCS? Grim Tales? Blue Rose? Iron Kingdoms? Eberron? Etc. Stories work differently in each setting, so it's difficult to write stories that will appeal to everyone.

Story fragments might work, but there needs to be a lot of them.

 

[Rel]

I won't really speak to the issue of "story oriented published materials" (though the paucity of such materials may relate to what I write below) but I have a theory about why there are fewer threads about such things on the boards here.

Basically "crunch" as it applies to the RAW concerns everybody who plays the game. Even if you disregard some of the rules you usually have considered them and would probably be somewhat inclined to post in a thread about them, if only to say, "We chucked those rules." If there is a crunch oriented thread about rules that you like or have worked well for you then you might be inclined to post in a thread about those too. If you're like me then you are particularly inclined to post in a thread (or originate one) about areas of the rules that you don't fully understand. My point is that crunch threads appeal on some level to a large portion of the population here at ENWorld.

"Fluff" or Story threads appeal only to the portion of the population here that have an interest or opinion on the particular focus of a given story idea. If you post a thread about getting ideas for adventure hooks for the city of Sharn in Eberron then you won't get all that many replies because lots of people aren't focused on Sharn in their Eberron campaigns and many others aren't using Eberron at all.

I think you'll also notice that the Views to Posts ratio of Story threads is rather high. Lots of people may look at the thread to see if the Story idea interest them. For some it won't interest them. For some it will be interesting but they won't feel a need to comment. For a very few they will be interested and feel that they have something to add.

As a result I think that most Story threads here in General tend to fall off the front page fairly quickly and this is no big secret to those that post them or those that post in them. Over time I think that many folks will tend to take the position that it may not be all that worth it to try and post Story threads here. That's the position I'm starting to come around to.

Obviously there will be exceptions to this rule but I think it holds fairly true most of the time.

 

[Toben the Many]

A great game source for me has been the d20 Menace Manual. Overall, the book is an excellent resource with a great balance of fluff and crunch. The crunchy bits provide monsters and critters. But the great fluff discuss various organizations like the CIA or secret societies that are awesome for adventure ideas. The NPCs they provide can be used for convienient stats, but the NPC teams are just the thing to make the brain go 'tick'!

Another great resource has been the d20 Future book. Another awesome book that makes the brain go 'tick'! Basically, balanced between the tons of crunch are little snippets that give you ideas.

Now, none of those examples really helps the typical D&D player. :/

I also feel that too many of the 3rd Edition books have focused too much on crunch. From what I've seen, though many profess to want more crunch, the books that are really successful have a good balance of fluff vs. crunch.

Look at the very successful Iron Kingdoms campaign setting, for instance. The flavor is high in that campaign setting. Very high. But they also back it up with rule sets and unique rule templates for there setting.

Another great example of a great balance of both fluff and crunch is the Conan d20 setting. Lots of flavor, but lots of rules too. It doesn't have to be one or the other. You can have both.