{"id":284,"date":"2011-09-12T13:04:31","date_gmt":"2011-09-12T21:04:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/?p=284"},"modified":"2011-09-12T13:04:31","modified_gmt":"2011-09-12T21:04:31","slug":"game-wrap-travel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/?p=284","title":{"rendered":"Game Wrap – Travel"},"content":{"rendered":"

I got a lot more mileage than expected out of the Game Wrap posts.\u00c2\u00a0 This last topic (for values of “last” pertaining to the original list of Game Wrap topics.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll probably come up with more thoughts and observations later.\u00c2\u00a0 For now this is the end though) is something I’m still struggling with, because it’s something I’m still torn on.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I sent my players all over the map.\u00c2\u00a0 My standard fare is to keep them in a city and maybe send them into the wilderness once or twice.\u00c2\u00a0 Travel is necessary if you’re going beyond the scope of local heroes.\u00c2\u00a0 You can’t ever feel like you’re saving the world if you never leave the city walls.\u00c2\u00a0 As I mentioned in my campaign settings post, I really liked discovering new things as the players wandered into weird new territory.<\/p>\n

Anyway, there were a couple<\/s> few problems with travel from my point of view.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Establishing NPCs.\u00c2\u00a0 I tried really hard to make long term NPCs.\u00c2\u00a0 My goal was that I could speak as an NPC and the players would know who it was without an introduction.\u00c2\u00a0 But long term NPCs were the exception rather than the rule.\u00c2\u00a0 The players met new people and immediately left them behind, never to return.\u00c2\u00a0 Even if I did act out the NPCs as well as intended, the players weren’t around them long enough to notice.<\/li>\n
  2. Completing quests.\u00c2\u00a0 When one quest ended, another began.\u00c2\u00a0 The players following an endless stream of trouble.\u00c2\u00a0 I wrote that way on purpose, because, well, it’s what I do.\u00c2\u00a0 But many players like that feeling of accomplishment when they know that a task they set out to do as been taken care of.\u00c2\u00a0 They never got the chance to return home, tell someone the work is done, and get a reward.\u00c2\u00a0 They actually complained several times throughout the game that it felt like they never got anything done, because there was no completion at the end of a task.\u00c2\u00a0 Had the players been in the same place as the person who gave them the task, they could have had those moments and felt better about themselves.<\/li>\n
  3. Interrupting plot.\u00c2\u00a0 I really like plots that interrupt the players.\u00c2\u00a0 While I’m still coming down from the excitement of this game, there’s no doubt that my Game of Thrones campaign was better written.\u00c2\u00a0 A big part of that was because the players were stationary.\u00c2\u00a0 They stayed in one place and plot came to them.\u00c2\u00a0 Even if they did nothing, messenger ravens showed up with new information on each of the plots that was happening.
    \nThis wasn’t possible with a traveling game.\u00c2\u00a0 I guess I could have had people use magical sending rituals more often, but because the players traveled, they didn’t set up meaningful relationships that warranted ritual communication.\u00c2\u00a0 The PCs were also paranoid enough that they were always traveling in cognito.\u00c2\u00a0 It was impossible for plot to follow them.\u00c2\u00a0 The effect of this was that I was always introducing new plot hooks, instead of providing continuations for the existing plots.\u00c2\u00a0 This was stressier.\u00c2\u00a0 Much less fun for me.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Anyway, I’ve had a couple thoughts about how to fix this.<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. A home base is necessary.\u00c2\u00a0 I can live without plot updates for an adventure or two.\u00c2\u00a0 But the players should have a home to return to after a mission.\u00c2\u00a0 And there should be adventures around the home base, for when I do feel like including interruptions.\u00c2\u00a0 Travel added quite a bit to the game, so I’d like to keep it.\u00c2\u00a0 I’d just also like to keep the home base.\u00c2\u00a0 I wonder if I can pull off both.<\/li>\n
    2. Cell phones.\u00c2\u00a0 No, not in D&D.\u00c2\u00a0 I think I’d be happier with a modern game, where everyone has instantaneous communication across the world.\u00c2\u00a0 If I want plots to keep popping up so the players are always busy, why am I restricting myself to carrier pigeons?\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll give all the PCs twitter accounts instead.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      I got a lot more mileage than expected out of the Game Wrap posts.\u00c2\u00a0 This last topic (for values of “last” pertaining to the original list of Game Wrap topics.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll probably come up with more thoughts and observations later.\u00c2\u00a0 For now this is the end though) is something I’m still struggling with, because it’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,8,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dnd4e","category-observations","category-self-improvement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=284"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":286,"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284\/revisions\/286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gm.sagotsky.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}