So in my last Story Time entry I talked about how to give someone who wants to go off the rails something to be interested in, even if it's just for a single session, and a lot of my ideas used undead, why, I like the undead, especially mindless undead, as a minor threat. Why? there are so many options, especially at low to medium levels.
For example, and I've used this encounter to great effect, the party is walking through an old Forest following an overgrown trail and they come upon an abandoned temple (any god, but I used Pharasma), the interior is gloomy and poorly lit by intermittent beams of light coming from Ivy covered holes in the ceiling, just inside the door, there are three crumbling pillars each 10ft apart from each other and the walls. Beyond the pillars (about 15-20ft) lies a 4 foot tall wall that surrounds a murky, stagnant pool, almost 20ft wide and 40 ft long, its surface covered in rotting leaves, and thick scum, the water laps several inches below
As the PC's approach the Pillars, rotting hands grasp at the wall around the pool, and several waterlogged, swollen Corpses pull themselves from the pool and start shambling towards the PC's.
Looking at my notes from that campaign, the only difference I made to the Zombies in that encounter was to give them Fire Resistance 5, and yet those 5 Sodden Zombies were one of the hardest fights of that campaign for a group of lvl 2 PCs.
Alternatively, and this is an idea I've yet to fully expand upon or write down, was the PC's have to go through a narrow cramped dungeon before finally ending up in a wide antechamber where the McGuffin, or treasure or plot-device is on a plinth in the centre of the room. When a PC picks up the item the walls start spewing out bones, which coalesce into multiple Skeletons (Use the Exploding Skeleton template for extra fun) before any PC's who are in the room are surrounded. and the doors to the room slam shut.
Using the Explosive Skeleton template in this fight, with its cramped conditions makes for a fun potential chain reaction when the first Skeleton goes down.
And these are just the 2 most common types of undead, I can think of off the top of my head, I haven't even got into Ghouls, Ghasts, Draugr, Wights, Mummies, Haunts, Dullahans, Crypt Things, or anything else.
So I suppose what I'm saying is that, get grave-digging you'll never know what you might come up with.
Showing posts with label Story Time. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Story Time. Show all posts
Tuesday, 25 November 2014
Friday, 14 November 2014
Story Time: You Find...
Okay, this is a continuation of my last post, sort of.
For those of you expecting another character journal, game got called this week on account of schedule, and so I decided to bless you with another story Time post, so ... are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.
So in my last post I talked about how the DM for that campaign took the time to make what is quite literally the first full world map I have ever seen for any homebrew campaign, and I love that fact, it helps the world feel real, and gives me a point of reference when the game is happening, even if he doesn't really use it, I'm grateful for the fact that he even took the time to make it.
Now here's the crux, what does the map have? Town names, Forests, Mountains, Rivers, Lakes, and Political Borders.
In other words, the bare minimum that a map should have if you're making a map that goes into an atlas.
I did talk to him about putting roads in at one point, I can't remember when, and he said that "It's kinda obvious where the roads should be man" and I couldn't argue with him, because 1) it kind of is obvious, and 2), well if there's nothing in the way then the road goes in a mostly straight line, otherwise it follows a river, the coast, or contours around the mountains, not really necessary to draw a bunch of straight lines all over your shiny new maps.
Here's where my point comes in.
Let's say you're a player, and your party is travelling down one of these straight line,empty plains roads, your DM is grabbing his notes on the next city while you and the others maybe describe the journey, maybe chat amongst yourselves in character or out of character, and one of you decides that he wants to describe one part of the landscape, or go off the rails. And so he says loudly.
"I spot a stone circle/ copse of trees/ abandoned structure a short distance from the road" before calling the groups attention to it and going to explore it. The rest of the group, motivated by loot, exp, or RP may follow or not.
Now as a DM your first inclination may be to just go, you find this place, but it's mostly abandoned, except for a nest of starlings/ Bats/ Mice or some other harmless creature entity, and if your players do this a lot, then I'd recommend doing this roughly 2 out of 3 times, it's not like the entire world is festooned with dungeons, abandoned temples full of loot, secret wizard towers or hidden dens of rare monsters. But this tells you 2 things, 1) your players, at least one is interested enough in your world to want to explore and 2), that player is bored enough to start trying to force exploration.
At this point you've got 2 options, 1) the above option where you deflect the exploration, and get your players back on the rails or 2) drop your city notes, and see if you've got a random dungeon ready to go, or make one up on the spot, before using the completion of the dungeon to push the players towards the town where you wanted them, either to sell their shiny new loot, or to lick their wounds depending on how well they did.
Now I'm aware that no everyone is amazing at improvisation so I'll put down a couple of examples that anyone can use.
Ancient Barrow: A player spots a Barrow several hundred meters from the road before running over to inspect it for loot, or check it for the unquiet dead, the classics here would be Barrow Wights, Sword Wights, and Cairn Wights, although if you wanted to have some fun, there could be ghouls that have settled here and use the Barrow as a home base from which to attack travellers who camp nearby.
Stone Circle: Players with decent perception (+8 or higher) notice that there's a breeze coming from the base of an altar in the centre of the circle, any player who can move the altar will find a circular chamber with a powerful planar seal. Natural constructs, wood Golems or elementals try to force the players away without them disturbing the seal, turning violent if the PC's try to use force, or Undead sealed within the chamber try to use the PC's to break the seal holding back a powerful Lich or Demon which becomes a extended sub-plot throughout the campaign.
Huntsman's Cottage: A PC who notices this cottage can approach and knock on the door, either meeting a friendly old woman who offers them come inside, have some food, and rest for the night, eventually her husband comes back with a dead deer/wolf and offers to sell the PC's the hide for crafting purposes at a fairly low price if the PC's tell him stories of their adventures, alternatively the PC knock on the door, and is greeted with silence, entering the cottage he sees the dead body of an old man and woman, before their killer ambushes him.
Abandoned Tower: A PC who draws the parties attention to an old, derelict tower, after venturing inside they trigger a magical summoning trap which creates a number of suitable creatures for Summon Monster IV or V, that last for 11 rounds, or they find why the tower is derelict, one of the owners experiments escaped, and has made this tower its home that it defends with its life.
Stand of Trees: A PC who suggests a stand of trees as a good camping spot may by accident have set up shop a stone throw away from a den of wolves who are sleeping at the moment, or Pixies and Sprites come in the night and start playing pranks on the Party.
Broken Wagon: A classic, whether done by bandits, the wagon owner transporting dangerous animals and magical beasts that have broken free, or just a wagon breaking down and needing repairs.
Moorland Pool:A PC stops to fill up his canteen from a quick running stream that feeds into a small pool, if the PC's all decide to stop and water their horses for a short while, then whatever has made that pool its hunting ground attacks.
... and with that I'm out of ideas for now.
Just remember, the wasteland holds more adventure than just the plot, and exploring can reap great rewards.
Best of luck.
For those of you expecting another character journal, game got called this week on account of schedule, and so I decided to bless you with another story Time post, so ... are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.
So in my last post I talked about how the DM for that campaign took the time to make what is quite literally the first full world map I have ever seen for any homebrew campaign, and I love that fact, it helps the world feel real, and gives me a point of reference when the game is happening, even if he doesn't really use it, I'm grateful for the fact that he even took the time to make it.
Now here's the crux, what does the map have? Town names, Forests, Mountains, Rivers, Lakes, and Political Borders.
In other words, the bare minimum that a map should have if you're making a map that goes into an atlas.
I did talk to him about putting roads in at one point, I can't remember when, and he said that "It's kinda obvious where the roads should be man" and I couldn't argue with him, because 1) it kind of is obvious, and 2), well if there's nothing in the way then the road goes in a mostly straight line, otherwise it follows a river, the coast, or contours around the mountains, not really necessary to draw a bunch of straight lines all over your shiny new maps.
Here's where my point comes in.
Let's say you're a player, and your party is travelling down one of these straight line,empty plains roads, your DM is grabbing his notes on the next city while you and the others maybe describe the journey, maybe chat amongst yourselves in character or out of character, and one of you decides that he wants to describe one part of the landscape, or go off the rails. And so he says loudly.
"I spot a stone circle/ copse of trees/ abandoned structure a short distance from the road" before calling the groups attention to it and going to explore it. The rest of the group, motivated by loot, exp, or RP may follow or not.
Now as a DM your first inclination may be to just go, you find this place, but it's mostly abandoned, except for a nest of starlings/ Bats/ Mice or some other harmless creature entity, and if your players do this a lot, then I'd recommend doing this roughly 2 out of 3 times, it's not like the entire world is festooned with dungeons, abandoned temples full of loot, secret wizard towers or hidden dens of rare monsters. But this tells you 2 things, 1) your players, at least one is interested enough in your world to want to explore and 2), that player is bored enough to start trying to force exploration.
At this point you've got 2 options, 1) the above option where you deflect the exploration, and get your players back on the rails or 2) drop your city notes, and see if you've got a random dungeon ready to go, or make one up on the spot, before using the completion of the dungeon to push the players towards the town where you wanted them, either to sell their shiny new loot, or to lick their wounds depending on how well they did.
Now I'm aware that no everyone is amazing at improvisation so I'll put down a couple of examples that anyone can use.
Ancient Barrow: A player spots a Barrow several hundred meters from the road before running over to inspect it for loot, or check it for the unquiet dead, the classics here would be Barrow Wights, Sword Wights, and Cairn Wights, although if you wanted to have some fun, there could be ghouls that have settled here and use the Barrow as a home base from which to attack travellers who camp nearby.
Stone Circle: Players with decent perception (+8 or higher) notice that there's a breeze coming from the base of an altar in the centre of the circle, any player who can move the altar will find a circular chamber with a powerful planar seal. Natural constructs, wood Golems or elementals try to force the players away without them disturbing the seal, turning violent if the PC's try to use force, or Undead sealed within the chamber try to use the PC's to break the seal holding back a powerful Lich or Demon which becomes a extended sub-plot throughout the campaign.
Huntsman's Cottage: A PC who notices this cottage can approach and knock on the door, either meeting a friendly old woman who offers them come inside, have some food, and rest for the night, eventually her husband comes back with a dead deer/wolf and offers to sell the PC's the hide for crafting purposes at a fairly low price if the PC's tell him stories of their adventures, alternatively the PC knock on the door, and is greeted with silence, entering the cottage he sees the dead body of an old man and woman, before their killer ambushes him.
Abandoned Tower: A PC who draws the parties attention to an old, derelict tower, after venturing inside they trigger a magical summoning trap which creates a number of suitable creatures for Summon Monster IV or V, that last for 11 rounds, or they find why the tower is derelict, one of the owners experiments escaped, and has made this tower its home that it defends with its life.
Stand of Trees: A PC who suggests a stand of trees as a good camping spot may by accident have set up shop a stone throw away from a den of wolves who are sleeping at the moment, or Pixies and Sprites come in the night and start playing pranks on the Party.
Broken Wagon: A classic, whether done by bandits, the wagon owner transporting dangerous animals and magical beasts that have broken free, or just a wagon breaking down and needing repairs.
Moorland Pool:A PC stops to fill up his canteen from a quick running stream that feeds into a small pool, if the PC's all decide to stop and water their horses for a short while, then whatever has made that pool its hunting ground attacks.
... and with that I'm out of ideas for now.
Just remember, the wasteland holds more adventure than just the plot, and exploring can reap great rewards.
Best of luck.
Sunday, 9 November 2014
Story Time: Empty Spaces & Loneliness
Empty Spaces, what are we playing for?
For those of you who are reading these posts in order, trawling through whatever mess of an archive I have, firstly I apologise, secondly, if you read the massive "Real Talk" segment from Seltyiel's last journal entry, may have gleaned that I'm both annoyed with my DM, and bored/confused with his campaign, I should probably clear this up in my normal rambling, tangential, circular manner.
Firstly I should probably talk about what the DM said he was trying to do with the campaign. He was, and I paraphrase "Trying to get a very "Game of Thrones" style sandbox campaign with the big bads being the Seven Sins" now this being his first campaign I sent him two APs, "Kingmaker" and "Rise of the Runelords" both having themes that touch with what he was/is trying to do.
Secondly, he's only, as far as I know, watched the "Game of Thrones" series on TV. Now I'm not being some kind of elitist reading snob, there are plenty of positive sides to telling a story through a televised series, for one thing it allows the environments and world to feel solid and tangible, and it makes the action far more visceral, however I think "A Song of Fire and Ice" lost something very important in its translation to the small screen; scale.
Watching the TV series and reading each book side by side, the world feels somehow smaller, like cramming the books into 10 episodes, 60 minutes of runtime each means that a lot of the non-essential world building has to be thrown to the roadside so we can have more sex, violence, politics, and memes. I feel like I'm watching a world in snippets only being shown the bare essentials where the only things happening on screen are vitally important to the plot.
Now I know that's not fair, if you're going to take the time out of your schedule to read a 600+ page book, and a 1 hour TV show you obviously have differing amounts of free time, and you can't have an episode where all the characters do is ride on horseback and make small talk about how nice the weather is, or how they're interested in old books, while dedicating several pages in a book to such activities is much easier, if no less boring when done incorrectly; but Pathfinder is neither a TV show or a Book, it is an RPG.
It is equally reliant on the players and the DM to tell the story. A story that can change with the roll of a dice.
It is a game reliant on clear, concise, communication.
It is a world populated by one person.
It is easy to fuck up.
So let's start at the beginning.
Campaign begins, M, K, and S are in a battle with their NPC charge, a prince. the battle goes poorly and they flee into the forest, where they eventually meet Me, C and V's original character, and get to the city of Kentonborough within a day. After staying the night at Kentonborough, we get a cart to the Capital city of Rhuen, along the way we are attacked by a mysterious assassin after the life of the Prince. We keep the prince alive as we travel to Rhuen, and spend the night there, before leaving the next day, the prince rewarding us for escorting him and saving his life. It takes us half a day to make our way to Bastion Zenith (which considering it's twice the distance on the map from Kentonborough to Rhuen astounds me) where M, S, C and K are given their continuing orders, M has a duel to the death because he felt insulted and wins because he cheated, before we rest another night, M and V perform a blood sacrifice to an unknown deity that whispers 2 days in their heads, before M, breaks all of his vows and breaks a small girl out of jail. We continue on towards High Haven, a journey that takes another 1/2 day despite what the map says, and pick up another jail-breaker on the way. Once we reach High-Haven we don't rest for the night, except Seltyiel who makes the most of his Ring of Sustenance and naps for 2 hours on a rooftop, before we are kicked out of the city to deal with the Von Heltzer Army that is laying siege to the city, which we do in one night, as the Lord of High Haven, and Sij, V's original character are killed by an assassin. We are then given a night of rest, and leave the city for the 4 hour road trip back to bastion Zenith which I have ceased caring about because space is warped and time is bendable, where M reports back to his boss, and is told to go conquer High Haven in the name of the Queen, which we do in probably the most violent and bloody way possible, because of course D'n'D has to bloody and violent, what's this diplomacy shit you keep talking about, and that's where we got up to.
If you've noticed one thing missing from this wall of text, it would be, we take the day to recuperate, relax, craft some potions, try and find some better gear; additionally, although the DM took the time to make what is quite literally the first world map I have seen made for any of our campaigns, he refuses to use it, instead warping distances so we arrive whenever he wants us to, and removing any chance for world building, or learning about the world, instead just throwing us into combat after combat, not realising that all he's doing is basically running a dungeon crawl with no roof.
Empty space is incredibly important for setting atmosphere and setting, allowing characters to slowly get invested in a world, especially when your players know next to nothing about the world they're in, good examples of this would be Dark Souls and Fallout 3, both massively empty games, full of desolation, monsters, and a storied history that you're only going to find out if you explore; this is especially important for PC's who are already separated from the game world by the 4th wall, unable to know what their character feels, tastes, smells, sees and hears, except what snippets are told to them by the DM.
Empty space also allows PC's and Players to rest, recover, absorb what just happened, there has to be a calm point, an up to a down, a yin to a yang. If all you eat is chicken mcnuggets then your body is going to go, get the fuck out, and throw them out, possibly shut-down completely.
The point I'm trying laboriously to get to is this, Pathfinder is not a TV show; without empty space or rest time you confuse and tire your players, and lessen the importance of your campaign world. I could tell you more about the seaside, mining town we spent three days in, than I could tell you about A's entire world, and it's all because we had to wait there with nothing to do but explore.
Leave your world empty, it'll be that much more fun to explore, for both you and your PC's.
For those of you who are reading these posts in order, trawling through whatever mess of an archive I have, firstly I apologise, secondly, if you read the massive "Real Talk" segment from Seltyiel's last journal entry, may have gleaned that I'm both annoyed with my DM, and bored/confused with his campaign, I should probably clear this up in my normal rambling, tangential, circular manner.
Firstly I should probably talk about what the DM said he was trying to do with the campaign. He was, and I paraphrase "Trying to get a very "Game of Thrones" style sandbox campaign with the big bads being the Seven Sins" now this being his first campaign I sent him two APs, "Kingmaker" and "Rise of the Runelords" both having themes that touch with what he was/is trying to do.
Secondly, he's only, as far as I know, watched the "Game of Thrones" series on TV. Now I'm not being some kind of elitist reading snob, there are plenty of positive sides to telling a story through a televised series, for one thing it allows the environments and world to feel solid and tangible, and it makes the action far more visceral, however I think "A Song of Fire and Ice" lost something very important in its translation to the small screen; scale.
Watching the TV series and reading each book side by side, the world feels somehow smaller, like cramming the books into 10 episodes, 60 minutes of runtime each means that a lot of the non-essential world building has to be thrown to the roadside so we can have more sex, violence, politics, and memes. I feel like I'm watching a world in snippets only being shown the bare essentials where the only things happening on screen are vitally important to the plot.
Now I know that's not fair, if you're going to take the time out of your schedule to read a 600+ page book, and a 1 hour TV show you obviously have differing amounts of free time, and you can't have an episode where all the characters do is ride on horseback and make small talk about how nice the weather is, or how they're interested in old books, while dedicating several pages in a book to such activities is much easier, if no less boring when done incorrectly; but Pathfinder is neither a TV show or a Book, it is an RPG.
It is equally reliant on the players and the DM to tell the story. A story that can change with the roll of a dice.
It is a game reliant on clear, concise, communication.
It is a world populated by one person.
It is easy to fuck up.
So let's start at the beginning.
Campaign begins, M, K, and S are in a battle with their NPC charge, a prince. the battle goes poorly and they flee into the forest, where they eventually meet Me, C and V's original character, and get to the city of Kentonborough within a day. After staying the night at Kentonborough, we get a cart to the Capital city of Rhuen, along the way we are attacked by a mysterious assassin after the life of the Prince. We keep the prince alive as we travel to Rhuen, and spend the night there, before leaving the next day, the prince rewarding us for escorting him and saving his life. It takes us half a day to make our way to Bastion Zenith (which considering it's twice the distance on the map from Kentonborough to Rhuen astounds me) where M, S, C and K are given their continuing orders, M has a duel to the death because he felt insulted and wins because he cheated, before we rest another night, M and V perform a blood sacrifice to an unknown deity that whispers 2 days in their heads, before M, breaks all of his vows and breaks a small girl out of jail. We continue on towards High Haven, a journey that takes another 1/2 day despite what the map says, and pick up another jail-breaker on the way. Once we reach High-Haven we don't rest for the night, except Seltyiel who makes the most of his Ring of Sustenance and naps for 2 hours on a rooftop, before we are kicked out of the city to deal with the Von Heltzer Army that is laying siege to the city, which we do in one night, as the Lord of High Haven, and Sij, V's original character are killed by an assassin. We are then given a night of rest, and leave the city for the 4 hour road trip back to bastion Zenith which I have ceased caring about because space is warped and time is bendable, where M reports back to his boss, and is told to go conquer High Haven in the name of the Queen, which we do in probably the most violent and bloody way possible, because of course D'n'D has to bloody and violent, what's this diplomacy shit you keep talking about, and that's where we got up to.
If you've noticed one thing missing from this wall of text, it would be, we take the day to recuperate, relax, craft some potions, try and find some better gear; additionally, although the DM took the time to make what is quite literally the first world map I have seen made for any of our campaigns, he refuses to use it, instead warping distances so we arrive whenever he wants us to, and removing any chance for world building, or learning about the world, instead just throwing us into combat after combat, not realising that all he's doing is basically running a dungeon crawl with no roof.
Empty space is incredibly important for setting atmosphere and setting, allowing characters to slowly get invested in a world, especially when your players know next to nothing about the world they're in, good examples of this would be Dark Souls and Fallout 3, both massively empty games, full of desolation, monsters, and a storied history that you're only going to find out if you explore; this is especially important for PC's who are already separated from the game world by the 4th wall, unable to know what their character feels, tastes, smells, sees and hears, except what snippets are told to them by the DM.
Empty space also allows PC's and Players to rest, recover, absorb what just happened, there has to be a calm point, an up to a down, a yin to a yang. If all you eat is chicken mcnuggets then your body is going to go, get the fuck out, and throw them out, possibly shut-down completely.
The point I'm trying laboriously to get to is this, Pathfinder is not a TV show; without empty space or rest time you confuse and tire your players, and lessen the importance of your campaign world. I could tell you more about the seaside, mining town we spent three days in, than I could tell you about A's entire world, and it's all because we had to wait there with nothing to do but explore.
Leave your world empty, it'll be that much more fun to explore, for both you and your PC's.
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