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An Enemy Spy
2009-04-11, 02:24 PM
A couple weeks ago I was at my friends house for a science project and decided to bring along my D&D books. This was the first time either of us had ever played the game. So after making his Halfling Sorcerer and saddling him up with an NPC Cleric, we were ready. Except for one seemingly insignificant but ultimately crucial thing. I hadn't come up with a plot. So I reached into my magical repository of ideas that also serves as a cushion and pulled a game out of my ass. I literally made the game up as I played. I would begin a sentence not even knowing how it would end. And amazingly it was pretty decent. I had a story about an evil necromancer who had been slaughtering entire villages and raising them as zombies and skeletons and actually had pretty good dialogue that was completely made up on the spot. I actually plan to do the whole campaign like this. Is this a good idea or a disaster waiting to happen?

BlueWizard
2009-04-11, 02:28 PM
I only recommend it for experienced DMs.

I am always prepared for my PCs to run off in some direction I don't have planned. It makes the game more fun for the players, because they feel they actually live and control what their PCs are doing.

If you get time you might want to get a name list going or even stats set for anything.

Anyway, it sounds like you have the right feel for it.


Though saying this, planning always makes things easier. :smallcool:

Dogmantra
2009-04-11, 02:31 PM
It will lead to some... strange situtations.
If you want to do it, go ahead, but I'd suggest you make some sort of preparation (even if it's just an A4 sheet of bullet points on roughly where you want the campaign to go). Or you could make little cards with plot hooks for when you're stuck.

Weezer
2009-04-11, 02:31 PM
It can work and can result in very fun campaigns but you have to be careful not to talk yourself into a corner. I have a tendency to run my games like this, with maybe an idea of the overarching plot. I have though accidentaly added in aspects that I never intended to add in, like one time I accidentally created a steampunk society inside of a more traditional fantasy world. So it can be a good way to play but don't say stuff that you don't want to remain as a major plot point.

TheCountAlucard
2009-04-11, 02:32 PM
It's very workable. I usually do some improvisation when my players start to get creative. One thing you might want to do is write everything down, so that you don't lose track of the finer details and have stuff like this happen...

Player: "I head back to the tavern."
DM: "Steve the bartender greets you as you walk in the door."
Player: "Wasn't his name George?"
DM: "..."

Although, admittedly, you could simply improvise things further if that sort of thing comes up.

DM: "Err, yeah. This is his brother and co-owner of the bar."

Olo Demonsbane
2009-04-11, 07:09 PM
My brother plays like this all of the time. He is a pretty good DM, and he hasn't even used the Monster Manual once or the DMG for anything but magic items.

Shpadoinkle
2009-04-11, 07:39 PM
If it works for you, awesome. If it doesn't, no big deal, you can always try it the other way. If you're good at making things up on the fly (which is something DMs are pertty much required to be able to do anyway), it can lead to a great game, and even if it doesn't it can still be fun.

But yeah, you have to be aware that it's possible to paint yourself into a corner this way without even realizing it for a while. Of course, you could handwave it as the PCs getting a skewed or inaccurate view of events, but you want to use this sparingly, or else your players could start to wonder what the point of doing anything is if nothing is what it looks like.

FoE
2009-04-11, 07:43 PM
I played a Rifts game once with a DM that made it up as he went along. For a while, it went pretty well. Where things went absolutely insane was at the end, when he put us up against a foe we couldn't possibly defeat (a huge army of MD damage-dealing monster monsters). Despite throwing some nifty gear at us that we could have used to beat them, the rolls stopped going our way and we were hopelessly outmatched. In the end, we had to call in the calvary and basically sit by as we watched the Glitterboys lay the beat-down on this big army. It got very boring, and in retrospect, I felt like we were either easily steamrolling enemies or we were being steamrolled by them. There was no consistency.

In conclusion: when playing off the cuff works, it works. When it doesn't, it all goes horribly wrong. I wouldn't do it, but I'm not the greatest DM.

DArva
2009-04-11, 07:55 PM
Improvisation is how i ran my games when i was the story teller for vampire. I had a vague overarching plot, but i relied on the players to drive it and actually make things happen. The amazing part was I was still young enough to have a good enough memory to dredge up events that happened 3-5 years ago in real life and weave them back into the present course of the chronicle in a believable fashion. Heh, i miss storytelling.

Mushroom Ninja
2009-04-11, 08:35 PM
Improvisation can be a very powerful tool if used properly. Some of the best sessions that I've run have been largely improvised. (Don't tell my PCs, they think i plan everything :smallwink: ).