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Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 11:38 AM
So... my current campaign is hitting the skids - plot wise - but the Players are still having fun. Consider this post part meditation and part advice-seeking.

BACKGROUND
For a change of pace, I wanted to run a more sandbox-y world than I usually do. I tried to get a sense of PC motivations with a pre-game survey (a good idea!) but I botched it by not spending enough time explaining the world to the Players. The world wasn't that different from base D&D, but I had several novice Players who could clearly could have used some more guidance. In the end the responses I got from everyone were too vague and varied for me to use. So I went with the second best approach: everyone is in this together - we'll figure out other motivations later.

This campaign has been going on for about six months now and I've thrown a variety of hooks in their general direction. This have, so far, worked poorly

- The overarching plot based on the hook "Track down X, return him to Us" has suffered from the death of plot-important NPCs and an indifferent approach to its pursuit by the Players. Fine, it's a sandbox - let them play elsewhere until I can get a solid hook up they won't just kill :smallannoyed:

- The Constant Companions from the "caravan to explore the world" portion seemed to be of interest at the time, but now everyone has forgotten them.

- The hook to get them tied into a Order of Heroes was working fine until half the party just publicly quit said Order because some drunks in a bar made fun of them.

- The hook to get them working on some political intrigue (and legacy building) in a frontier town was largely ignored - even when I gave them implicit permission to rebuild a border fort!

I had a discussion with three of my Players last night to see what was going on. It turns out their motivation (respectively) are:
- Doing Something (Anything!)
- Killing Guys
- Free-form RP

My two other Players are a mixture of Plot Progression and Social Gaming - neither of which are particularly aggressive about it. In the end this means that two of my Players are apathetic to the (any?) Plot, while the other two are more passive - and so a lot of the game revolves around asking themselves "what do we do now?" while not actually interacting with the world in such a fashion that I can give them information.
In the end, my Players (collectively) have said they wanted some more structure - but not too much. It's odd to me that even after 5 levels of the campaign none of the Players seemed much interested in pursuing their characters' intersts. I've asked if they feel like I'm not giving them enough "free time" and they insist it isn't that - they just don't think about their characters' interests.

So, what to do? At this point, I'm tempted to just write up a classic Adventure Path (e.g. treasure map -> journey to dungeon -> killing monsters -> phat lewts) but that's not really what I'm interested in running. They're a lot of "work" (e.g. stat creation, treasure selection) without much fun (i.e. plot & character development) from my perspective. However, I have the hope that if I run these Players through a solid "shake-down" mission they might start having an interest in their characters.

Well, what do you think? Do I keep the "sandbox" open and just try to be a bit more aggressive with my plot hooks? Or should I book them passage on a Train to Adventure, appealing to the base instincts of "killing stuff" and "lewt?" Or is there a third way I haven't even conisdered?

Crow
2011-01-14, 12:02 PM
If anybody comes up with something, I will appreciate it as well. I am trying to get a sandbox off the ground, but can't get my players to bite any hooks even though they are engaging the NPCs more meaningfully than I expected.

Sometimes I feel like I have to force-feed plots to them. I really don't want to railroad my players, damnit!

Sipex
2011-01-14, 12:04 PM
Ask your players to revise their in character goals. In addition, ask for backstories from each of them and integrate them into the future. You will have to modify your world a bit (ie: place some towns if players expect them etc) but it may work.

Also, don't be afraid of tropes unless your players are vehimently against them. In my experience players love tropes because they understand what's going on and it's always awesome to hear about something then finally be a part of it.

(edit: Some railroading is necessary at first. You get your players interested in things then give them lots of options to cover sandbox after they've become more involved)

TalonDemonKing
2011-01-14, 12:13 PM
Rather than -make- them do anything, present something that will make them -want- to do something.

Write up a dungeon. Treasuremap -> Kill things -> Phat lewt.

Except at the end, you introduce an individual. Make him kick their puppies, insult their hair color, whatever. If they get upset over a couple of drunks, you can make them get FURIOUS at this guy. Maybe have them fight.

Then have him escape.

The players will now have motive and drive to hunt down this individual. Wrap them in this story of revenge -- If they save the world on the way, whatever. This way they'll focus more of their free time on trying to find clues, hunting down individuals, maybe taking out his lesser lieuts, or generally aiming to take down this individual.

Sploosh
2011-01-14, 12:14 PM
I've run into a similar problem with trying to "hook" players in sandbox zones. After a lot of thought, I decided I had two main options:

1) I could "up the ante" of my hooks, trying to get them to be more enticing and influential. In almost any such hook there is always a point where it becomes unbelievable to refuse. The problem is is that while you may be giving them a lot of choice in which hook they follow, the more enticing you make the hooks, the less free will they have to decide their own actions, which is usually the opposite of what people want in a sandbox.

2) You can instead switch your style to be more reactive. Tell me to describe their goals, and have them try to go obtain them. They'll be forced to make choices and interact with things and you can use those choices to push them along.

The latter of the two seems to be better, but with your current problem of not having character interests, it won't work. Thus, I propose you do neither of your stated choices and work on a third option ie. actual getting them to flesh out characters so it is easy to think like them.

Not only will getting more defined characters help you with hooking them and/or simply having them be proactive, but it should also make the roleplay aspects of the game more enjoyable as well.

Kurald Galain
2011-01-14, 12:15 PM
Have the hooks attack them, then see if they're willing to chase?

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 12:18 PM
Ask your players to revise their in character goals. In addition, ask for backstories from each of them and integrate them into the future. You will have to modify your world a bit (ie: place some towns if players expect them etc) but it may work.

Also, don't be afraid of tropes unless your players are vehimently against them. In my experience players love tropes because they understand what's going on and it's always awesome to hear about something then finally be a part of it.

(edit: Some railroading is necessary at first. You get your players interested in things then give them lots of options to cover sandbox after they've become more involved)
Ha! Me, afraid of Tropes? :smallcool:

Anyhow, it's not that I didn't give them a kick in the ass to get started. I went with the classic "You Have Debt" plot and sent them into the middle of the main continent as part of the Caravan portion of the campaign.

I am tempted to ask for a revised set of backstories now that the Players have experienced the world a bit but I hestitate because I don't know what good it would do. One Player doesn't care about his backstory - he's on his second character after his first died and he didn't want to raise him - and a second Player explicitly wrote an Amnesia backstory (a "baby robot" as he puts it) and doesn't seem to want to develop any sort of broader purpose aside from acquiring a Delver's Light and a Docent (he's a Warforged). Ironically, when he had the chance to buy one from a local Artificer he instead spent the majority of the party's money on a Cloak of the Walking Wounded :smallsigh:

By and large, nobody seems too interested in world-building - and in any case, they're all well away from home. Currently they're adventuring in the heart of the Old Empire that fell to Infernal influences and is mostly overrun by Gnolls, Cambions and actual Devils. Perhaps a trip to a Wretched Hive (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WretchedHive) is in order? I mean, they already were in one and managed to kill everyone they could - and then get driven out of town by the guys they couldn't kill :smallsigh:

EDIT: @Kurald Galain - ah, vengence. Yes, that worked best in the past - but then they just murdered everyone under guise of parley :smallsigh:

And no, they're not Evil, although one Player did say "but you never give us an opportunity to be Good." I then pointed out to him that he had just quit an organization devoted to doing nothing but Good. A good quote to summarize the situation is this:
Warforged: If there was an orphanage on fire, I would totally run in to save the children!

Me: Would you do it to save the children, or just to show off your "cool robot powers?"

Warforged: To show off my cool robot powers, of course.

Me: :smallsigh:

Sipex
2011-01-14, 12:29 PM
It sounds like you have a conflict of interests.

Give them black & white reasons to be good and "Show off their stuff". Also, I like the antagonist idea, give them a rival (party,individual,organisation,whatever) and have the campaign revolve around that.

The PCs get a job only to find, at the end, that the rival party is there and takes the object and their job.

If you can get your pcs going "I hate those guys so much!" you've succeeded.

Balain
2011-01-14, 12:39 PM
I don't know if this will help much. I have a main goal in mind and have adventures I use to get them there, but for the most part they are free to run off and do side quests which I give some hooks here and there for other things. Sometimes they get into trouble all on their own and adventure just follows.

Kyeudo
2011-01-14, 12:44 PM
I've currently got a semi-sandbox running. My players are investigating the plot hooks I've thrown at them, but for personal motivations, and I think they realize that if they just dropped the plot and headed off to explore I'd take it and run with it. A sand-box game requires a lot of effort on the part of the players, because they are the ones driving the action, not the GM, and if they don't realize that, the game won't go anywhere.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 12:45 PM
It sounds like you have a conflict of interests.

Give them black & white reasons to be good and "Show off their stuff". Also, I like the antagonist idea, give them a rival (party,individual,organisation,whatever) and have the campaign revolve around that.

The PCs get a job only to find, at the end, that the rival party is there and takes the object and their job.

If you can get your pcs going "I hate those guys so much!" you've succeeded.
...I just did that.

Set up a rival group of adventurers (with a Main Plot Hook embedded!) which only "got there first" because none of the Players thought to check behind a tapestry (much less "Search the Room") to find a concealed door. The Rivals then got back to town with the loot and spent the time mocking the Order of which the PCs were members.

The PCs then proceeded to walk into the bar and they...
(1) Bad mouth their own organization

(2) Made a blatant lie that their Good & Just Order had accepted a bribe to take a dive to the Rivals

(3) One member loudly quit the Order and gave his insignia over to the allies of the Rivals
...all without actually meeting the Rivals!

And then they skipped town to follow another plot point. At least they're planning on sneaking back into town and stealing the trophy that the Rivals had been parading around :smallsigh:

Anonomuss
2011-01-14, 12:47 PM
One thing that might help, is a house rule I found here (http://gregbilsland.wordpress.com/house-rules/).

Get each player to come up with a list of three things either they want to do in the campaign or things they want their character to do. The examples given on the site are just some of the things that can come up.

For example, I've just begun an Eberron campaign, and two of my characters now have long term goals that they thought of, that I can facilitate and I've plenty of side quests I can now do alongside the main "tracks" of my campaign.

I think the important part to it though, is that it gets the players thinking about what they want to do. Which I think is especially important in a sandbox game.

Sipex
2011-01-14, 12:50 PM
...I just did that.

Set up a rival group of adventurers (with a Main Plot Hook embedded!) which only "got there first" because none of the Players thought to check behind a tapestry (much less "Search the Room") to find a concealed door. The Rivals then got back to town with the loot and spent the time mocking the Order of which the PCs were members.

The PCs then proceeded to walk into the bar and they...
(1) Bad mouth their own organization

(2) Made a blatant lie that their Good & Just Order had accepted a bribe to take a dive to the Rivals

(3) One member loudly quit the Order and gave his insignia over to the allies of the Rivals
...all without actually meeting the Rivals!

And then they skipped town to follow another plot point. At least they're planning on sneaking back into town and stealing the trophy that the Rivals had been parading around :smallsigh:

This would be an issue of "You needed the PCs to do something to advance the plot and they didn't" which I would advise against. It's a cop out but next time they don't get it, put it somewhere else. Or just give it to them somehow.

"You enter the room and find that a secret door you didn't see earlier is left wide open." (this is reasonable as the rivals came through)

That said, can't undo the past. Play off the rivals more, maybe force another conflict. Just keep putting the pressure on so your PCs really hate those guys.

edit: make them stereotypical jerks if need be

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 12:55 PM
This would be an issue of "You needed the PCs to do something to advance the plot and they didn't" which I would advise against. It's a cop out but next time they don't get it, put it somewhere else. Or just give it to them somehow.

"You enter the room and find that a secret door you didn't see earlier is left wide open." (this is reasonable as the rivals came through)

That said, can't undo the past. Play off the rivals more, maybe force another conflict. Just keep putting the pressure on so your PCs really hate those guys.

edit: make them stereotypical jerks if need be
So, two things

(1) The tapestry thing was just that. When they failed to investigate the room, they decided to explore the other tunnels and had an exciting combat with some of the kobolds that lived down there. By the time they got back to check the room, the Rivals had been through, ransacking everything, and revealing the secret door.

So yeah, I did that.

(2) The Rivals are total jerks, but it doesn't matter because the Players never got to meet them - they just walked away when they were loudly mocked by drunks.

...well, at least I'm already doing the "reasonable" stuff :smalltongue:

Sipex
2011-01-14, 12:59 PM
So, two things

(1) The tapestry thing was just that. When they failed to investigate the room, they decided to explore the other tunnels and had an exciting combat with some of the kobolds that lived down there. By the time they got back to check the room, the Rivals had been through, ransacking everything, and revealing the secret door.

So yeah, I did that.

(2) The Rivals are total jerks, but it doesn't matter because the Players never got to meet them - they just walked away when they were loudly mocked by drunks.

...well, at least I'm already doing the "reasonable" stuff :smalltongue:

Perfect time then, make the rivals know who the PCs are and force a confrontation where the PCs meet them. Have the PCs find out 'These are the guys who took our job!' and then show off how jerky they are.

Amphetryon
2011-01-14, 01:02 PM
I've said this before: Sandbox means different things to different people. I've seen players vehemently rebel against any plot hook placed before them in such a game, using the objection "We're supposed to be in a Sandbox campaign, so we're not interested in your prefabricated plot." In some cases, this included plot hooks that were laid out expressly to forward stated character goals.

In your case, I don't think it's to that extreme. Because they've actively requested a bit more structure, you might consider actively 'forcing' one of their stated character goals upon one or more of them, and letting the game progress from their reaction. If one of them wants to be the ruler of the Duchy of Duckington, have the current ruler die, with his immediate heir as a dead ringer for the interested party member. When the folks of the duchy begin reacting to him as if he is the new Duke, plot happens.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 01:04 PM
Perfect time then, make the rivals know who the PCs are and force a confrontation where the PCs meet them. Have the PCs find out 'These are the guys who took our job!' and then show off how jerky they are.
I'm really tempted for the PC's former Order to hire the Rivals to hunt down the PCs and bring them in for questioning.

It'd be too out of character, unfortunately, but that's a plot point that will be resolved when they get to it. At this point I'm thinking they'll settle down after resolving this side-plot but then... I don't know if I should introduce more side plots! They either distract the PCs to immobility or get immediately forgotten.

Hell, they just left an NPC they liked enough to rezz twice in town without even saying goodbye. When I asked them about him later they said "oh, well we figured he knew where we lived and would have shown up on his own." They didn't even mention his name that whole session!

EDIT: @ Amphetryon - just so.
My only concern is how to balance the "we need rails - but not too much rail" sentiment I'm getting out of them. I've gamed with these guys in the past (as a Player) with a DM who is a solid railroader. He's gotten better, but watching these Players in that game they seem to cotton just fine to being railroaded from one plot point to another.

That said, I know that at least one Player wants the chance to do wacky things - he's the one who came up with the "we'll steal the trophy" idea - so I want to leave room for him as well. I dunno - big rails for the Plot, but let them arrange the furniture in the train as they'd like it? :smallconfused:
Also: I don't think they're the rebel types. Whenever I say "what do you want to do?" they don't just say "anything else!" but they usually sit around for 30 min (real time) arguing about what to do next - and usually it's just a matter of picking between plot hooks they happen to remember at the time.

bokodasu
2011-01-14, 01:17 PM
Some people need a good train ride before they're ready to step off onto the platform. Or some metaphorical thing like that. Although it sounds like you gave your characters a good start and they're still kind of floundering; do they really *want* to be in a sandbox game?

If so, I'd recommend zombies. Not literal D&D ones, but some sort of big, impersonal, nigh-unstoppable force. Volcanoes are good, or plagues, or political revolution, or, yes, actual zombies. You can bring whatever it is forward whenever you want, and if the characters do start developing their own goals, you can let it fade into the background. (The volcano is done and life is starting to get back to normal, the plague runs its course, the zombies disolve into sticky goo.) And if they don't, hey, there's always more zombies.

And if not, I still recommend zombies, except this time more literal ones. Really, there are very few things that aren't made better with zombies.

Britter
2011-01-14, 01:19 PM
Have the consequences of the things they don't deal with or choose to walk away from come back to them and hit them hard.

Ideally, hit them hard by having those consequences affect things and/or people the characters care for. Goad them, mock them, threaten them with all sorts of negative ramifications, and hound them to the ends of the earth until they pick a point and take a stand.

Essentially, find out what they believe in. Then force them to fight for it, and see what they are really made off. If they keep running away from chances to defend what they claim to believe in or care about, then destroy it.

Please note that I don't mean that you, as a person, should attack the players as people. But you should make life as difficult for the characters as possible. Let them know that if they keep backing down, things they care about will be lost. Ask them why they are so willing to let that happen. Make those answers have weight and importance in the setting. You are not trying to be adverserial or a killer DM. You are just forcing them to stand for something.

Talk about what they want, like, care about, and would defend in the game. Make the process dynamic.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 01:42 PM
Essentially, find out what they believe in. Then force them to fight for it, and see what they are really made off. If they keep running away from chances to defend what they claim to believe in or care about, then destroy it.
A fair point.

But, as a caveat - for some reason I have a reputation as a Killer DM amongst my Players.
While it is true that two of their PCs have died within 5 levels of play, but to be fair that was the natural consequence of taking on a floor of gnolls and then walking right into the Boss Battle without taking a Short Rest.

"The Gnoll Keep" adventure was kind of rough on them, but as Players they say they enjoyed the challenge and actually don't cite it as a reason for their playstyle.

What I'm saying is that my Players really worry about making "mistakes" in my game. I'll admit that I bring the "natural consequences of their actions" to bear with some frequency but again, they say that's a good thing.
Anyhow, I'm trying to figure out how to tone down my rep which - apparently - I haven't done anything (recently) to earn. This is another reason I worry about being too aggressive with my DMing: if the Players are already prone to spooking, then they may end up depressed and frightened after running from every line-drive that comes their way.

Which, of course, is weird considering how often they have a "kick down the door" approach to life.
For example, the reason they fled town was actually to pursue a "witch" who had been making Warforged using human sacrifice and devils - something I threw in to hook The Warforged and has been preoccupying him ever since. However, they don't know anything about this "witch" expect that she was working with a Warlock who had co-researching this "Hellforged" process and had been trading parts for wealth & magic. Naturally, when they found the Warlock they murdered him dead instead of asking for directions to the "witch's" secret base - somewhere in an enchanted swamp.

Well, the PCs ride 3 days out of their base town to the town nearest to the swamp and then swim out to the edge of the swamp... and then stand there. They never bothered to research Rituals, or even ask one of the numerous NPCs they know who live in the swamp if they can help track her down. Instead, they stand knee-deep in muck until I remind them of a particular amulet they stole from the corpse of the Warlock which can communicate with the Witch.

I don't know about you, but this sort of behavior sends warning bells in my head. What sort of Party says "let's kill the Witch!" and then travels for 3 days to stand at the edge of a swamp without a thought in their head as to how to find her?
I don't think I'm sending bad signals. Perhaps I just need to be a more "active" DM and before my Players go off half-cocked I need to be the one to ask them "how do you plan to do this?" But... that's not normal, is it? Isn't it the job of the Players to figure out how they want to do missions, and what sort of planning they need to do? :smallconfused:

EDIT: @bokodasu - I had thought I had given them a good train-ride with the Caravan from Start Town to Plotsville but once they got to Plotsville they ran out of steam. I'm thinking that if I put them on another train for "gold & glory" by the time they finish it I can pull out my Zombie Volcano - as you put it :smalltongue:

The funny thing is that the "main plot" for this game is a strictly Heroic Level one. My original plan was that after they got around to resolving the Heroic Plot they'd be free of their original Debt (which drove them to adventure) and then could think of what they wanted to do next. It might be worthwhile to layer on a Paragon Plot at the end of the next train, since IMHO Paragon Plots are perfect for Zombie Volcano games :smallamused:

Crow
2011-01-14, 01:48 PM
I feel your pain. My group travelled across half the kingdom to find evidence against the BBEGirl and once they had it, decided it was "nice, but nothing we could really do anything about".

It was evidence that the BBEGirl had murdered a member of the nobility and assumed their identity.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 02:06 PM
I feel your pain. My group travelled across half the kingdom to find evidence against the BBEGirl and once they had it, decided it was "nice, but nothing we could really do anything about".

It was evidence that the BBEGirl had murdered a member of the nobility and assumed their identity.
That can be a legitimate problem.
In a Sabbat oWoD Vampire game I was playing in, the DM gave us evidence of some high-level Sabbat plotting against each other as a plot hook.

Our response? "Well, we each have these terrifying Mentor/Sires you saddled us with, so I guess we tell them? We're neonates - what the crap are we supposed to do?"

She was less than pleased. Apparently we were supposed to go behind the backs of our Sire/Mentors and solve this problem on our own. As Sabbat.

The ST was very new so I sat her down after the game fell apart and told her one of my DMing Secrets: watch out for games where the Players can legitimately say "so what?" to your Big Reveal :smalltongue:

Did your PCs at least try to contact the guy who gave them this mission? That's what my Party in a 8th Century Fantasy Wales D&D4 game is doing: We discovered evidence that one of the three princes is plotting against the king so we passed that information onto our Noble Sponsor and busy ourselves with trying to track down the Prince's Evil Organization.

For the record, our party consists of two Fey (distrusted by mortals), a filthy peasant, a stranded Viking, and me - the daughter of a low-status noble who joined the Church as a Paladin. Not exactly the sort of crew you want mucking around with Affairs of State :smalltongue:

Blue Paladin
2011-01-14, 02:16 PM
In the end the responses I got from everyone were too vague and varied for me to use.No such thing. Throw them up here on the board and you can get a bunch of suggestions from even the vaguest player backstory.

Vague is awesome, because it lets you mess with them even more.

The overarching plot based...Stop. This is a sandbox, right? Then there is no overarching plot. There are instead many plots that the players can get hooked into. But there is no right or wrong story to get involved with. It's up to the players to decide to engage with any particular plot, or ignore it. Or start to get involved and then back out and go do something else. My party did that a lot...

That said, the presence and absence of the PCs should have meaningful impact on how that plot unfolds. If they don't do anything, A happens. If they do do something, well, B might happen, or C, or maybe even A still happens.

[One of the players] explicitly wrote an Amnesia backstory (a "baby robot" as he puts it) and doesn't seem to want to develop any sort of broader purpose aside from acquiring a Delver's Light and a Docent (he's a Warforged).I can work with this. In addition to whatever they might encounter at the time, somewhere around Round 3, bring in a Warforged. It sees the PC and shouts, "[PC Name, possibly with additional title the player has never heard of]! I've finally tracked you down! Now give me back the [Delver's Light/Docent] that you stole from me!" and attack (not necessarily to kill, but rather for a grab/pin/search type thing). Make sure the newly introduced NPC has a teleport ability/more movement speed than the party, so it can run away successfully if bloodied. If fought off, make sure there's lots of fist-shaking with a "I'll get you next time!". If it ends with a search that comes up empty, drop the PC and say, "It's no use. No matter where you've hidden it, I will get it back!" and stomp off.

Now your PC should have a few questions: A) who was that, and how did they know me? B) why does he think I have his [thingy that I want]? C) Why don't I remember ever having his [thingy that I want]? and D) Why don't I have his [thingy that I want] now? Since this applies directly to his goals, he should have ample reason to go digging around his past. And now you have to think of why he would give up his beloved stolen [thingy] and wipe his own memory. Lots of possibilities.

As for your non-backstory-having PC, have you seen the television show Firefly? Jaynestown. Only built around him instead. Let the other PCs grill him as to why he has a town hero-worshipping him. Again, lots of possibilities. It doesn't even have to really be him! Just another dude who looks exactly like him. Long-lost twin? Doppelganger??

[I] can't get my players to bite any hooks even though they are engaging the NPCs more meaningfully than I expected.

Sometimes I feel like I have to force-feed plots to them.If they bite, they bite. If they don't, they don't. If they are letting the world around them pass them by, then let the world pass them by. If they then complain about not having anything to do, they have only themselves to blame.

One of the main tenets that I stuck to when running my own sandbox game (and I know, everyone has a different style; there's no "one way" to do things) was that everything moves forward. I thought of various scenarios, and how they would unfold over time. Multiple storylines that may or may not overlap. Some were entirely separate; others tightly woven together. I made sure there was a beginning set-up, a middle (usually drama of some sort happened here: someone is betrayed, killed, revealed), and an end (usually a Bad End, just cause I'm a fatalist like that).

Now, are you familiar with the show Quantum Leap? The party is Sam Beckett. They can alter events by joining in any of the stories, at any point. If they work from the beginning of a story to the end, it can lead to a totally different ending (hopefully a Good End), often something entirely new that I as a DM did not even think of. If they only meddle in a story for a short amount of time, then most likely that story will lead (eventually) to its originally planned (downer) ending. The time frame might be thrown off by days, weeks, months or even years, depending on how much the party actually does (e.g. the Beggar King succession devolved into war because they didn't do anything with that story at all; the Wind Demon invasion happened pretty much on schedule because they barely did anything in that storyline; the assassination of Count Pridestorm was delayed by months and ended up being carried out by an entirely different group because the party was actively involved in the southern areas for weeks).

But if the party hung around doing nothing for two weeks, then all of the plots advanced by two weeks. The world continues to move forward, even if the party doesn't.

Britter
2011-01-14, 02:18 PM
Gotcha. They are afraid to take chances. The only way to combat that is to make the failures interesting, and make success or failure a process they are fully invested in.

Maybe you could set a ground rule of some sort, something like the Death Flag rule found in the "raising the Stakes" part of E6 (in short, the players can only die if they tell the DM "this matter to me, I am raising the death flag". They get some plot tokens [in 4e this could be represented by a full refresh of all powers and the addition of some APs] and they are vulnerable to dying as per book rules.) This allows the players to know that, even if they fail, they won't die. This frees you as the DM up to creating very interesting situations where the failure condition is not death, but is instead something more interesting.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 02:35 PM
No such thing. Throw them up here on the board and you can get a bunch of suggestions from even the vaguest player backstory.
Well... here's a collection of answers to the question "Name two things your character would like to accomplish, in the short-to-medium term"
Warforged
- An appreciation for what constitutes squishy "humor"
- Greater understanding of what connects one fleshbag to another

Deva
[Deva] has taken, in the years leading up to the campaign, a very cynical view on the world. He has spent most of his time in the equivalent to inner city hospitals helping to heal those in need. Because of this He has only seen the pain and suffering of the outside world. Many of those that he helps return to the hospital within a fortnight due to some self destructive tendency or another. Something that he desperately seeks is to see some permanent good come to the world. A Warlord dethroned or even a town saved for good from some roaming bandits.

The more immature (or undecided) side of [Deva] wants to live a little. Make some gold, enjoy the finery and foods that he was never allowed by his elders in the monastery. he will always jump at the opportunity to live the "high life"

Drow
A strong movement of Drow that will re-establish the colonies above ground.

An elf that will see that the Drow have suffered enough and agree that it is time for them to leave the dark.

Goliath
He definitely needs to kill, or facilitate the killing, of that Stupid Paladin. Beyond that he wants to visit home, and be confident enough in his skills that he would be able to escape. It wouldn't be entirely for the purpose of gloating...then again it mostly would.
...OK, maybe I see my problem. While some of these are vague to the point of uselessness, I haven't done much with the much more specific ones. Then again, I've not seen any of my Players make any independent action towards these goals.

Feh, that's still my problem. Well, looks like it's time to try this thing again. I dunno why I assumed it all was garbage - it certainly looked that way the last time I read it :smallfrown:


Stop. This is a sandbox, right? Then there is no overarching plot. There are instead many plots that the players can get hooked into. But there is no right or wrong story to get involved with. It's up to the players to decide to engage with any particular plot, or ignore it. Or start to get involved and then back out and go do something else. My party did that a lot...
Meh, the overarching plot is merely Plot A - the thing that got their butts out the door and needs to be resolved (one way or another) within a year of game-time. It's hardly the only plot out there; it isn't even a plot that will blow up the world if the PCs never touch it again.

There's no worse way (IMHO) to start off a sandbox than say "here's the world - what do you want to do?"

Britter
2011-01-14, 02:39 PM
Feh, that's still my problem. Well, looks like it's time to try this thing again. I dunno why I assumed it all was garbage - it certainly looked that way the last time I read it :smallfrown:

Don't worry. Sometimes it takes a little discussion and debate to get the ideas flowing. An outside perspective can really shake things loose.


There's no worse way (IMHO) to start off a sandbox than say "here's the world - what do you want to do?"

Oh so very true. Recipe for disaster.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 02:42 PM
Don't worry. Sometimes it takes a little discussion and debate to get the ideas flowing. An outside perspective can really shake things loose.
Well of course! If I didn't want to hear outside perspectives, I wouldn't have placed the problem out here on the Internet :smalltongue:

I'm just a little sad that I've been effectively ignoring all kinds of useful tidbits which I asked my Players to give me before we even started. A good DM asks his Players for input and then listens to that input!

...I do kind of wonder if the Players remember what they sent me. Well, I'll try to weave one of those into the planned Train Ride and see if that leaves my party in any better shape.

Britter
2011-01-14, 02:49 PM
I find it is really worth the effort to take 15-30 minutes post session to ask the players what they want to work towards next time, and take 5-10 minutes pre-session to remind them of what they found important enough to pursue last time, and ask if that has changed. keep those important plot points and character goals in front of them as often as possible, so they don't forget about them.

It is sometimes worth ti to assign some sort of bonus xp/plot token/etc to someone willing to write up a session recap that focuses on what the group did and why, so that there is a reminder between sessions of what they found important.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 02:54 PM
I find it is really worth the effort to take 15-30 minutes post session to ask the players what they want to work towards next time, and take 5-10 minutes pre-session to remind them of what they found important enough to pursue last time, and ask if that has changed. keep those important plot points and character goals in front of them as often as possible, so they don't forget about them.

It is sometimes worth ti to assign some sort of bonus xp/plot token/etc to someone willing to write up a session recap that focuses on what the group did and why, so that there is a reminder between sessions of what they found important.
I don't really use XP anymore - they level at the completion of each Arc (usually 2-3 sessions).

I do have post-game sessions when I have the time, and always encourage the Players to remind themselves what happened last time while I get set up. I usually field questions during the pre-game, but since one of the Players likes to keep a journal they usually have the gist of it.

I... don't like emphasizing plot points because it feels like I'm "ordering" them to pursue one or another. I have been tempted to get a small white board to write "ongoing quests" on it but I still believe it is up to the Players to remember what they're doing and why they're doing it.

Crow
2011-01-14, 02:54 PM
That can be a legitimate problem.
In a Sabbat oWoD Vampire game I was playing in, the DM gave us evidence of some high-level Sabbat plotting against each other as a plot hook.

Our response? "Well, we each have these terrifying Mentor/Sires you saddled us with, so I guess we tell them? We're neonates - what the crap are we supposed to do?"

She was less than pleased. Apparently we were supposed to go behind the backs of our Sire/Mentors and solve this problem on our own. As Sabbat.

The ST was very new so I sat her down after the game fell apart and told her one of my DMing Secrets: watch out for games where the Players can legitimately say "so what?" to your Big Reveal :smalltongue:

Did your PCs at least try to contact the guy who gave them this mission? That's what my Party in a 8th Century Fantasy Wales D&D4 game is doing: We discovered evidence that one of the three princes is plotting against the king so we passed that information onto our Noble Sponsor and busy ourselves with trying to track down the Prince's Evil Organization.

For the record, our party consists of two Fey (distrusted by mortals), a filthy peasant, a stranded Viking, and me - the daughter of a low-status noble who joined the Church as a Paladin. Not exactly the sort of crew you want mucking around with Affairs of State :smalltongue:

They hadn't even been told to go look for the evidence. An NPC gave them a hint and they followed up on it, on their own, at great expense to themselves because they hate this B****, then once they had it, just sort of gave up...

I was floored. So I did the natural thing, and let the bad guy win.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 02:55 PM
They hadn't even been told to go look for the evidence. An NPC gave them a hint and they followed up on it, on their own, at great expense to themselves because they hate this B****, then once they had it, just sort of gave up...

I was floored.
Did you ask them why? And what did they say? :smallconfused:

More importantly - what did they do next?

Britter
2011-01-14, 02:59 PM
I don't really use XP anymore - they level at the completion of each Arc (usually 2-3 sessions).



Works for me. I find xp to be awkward and frustrating usually.




I do have post-game sessions when I have the time, and always encourage the Players to remind themselves what happened last time while I get set up. I usually field questions during the pre-game, but since one of the Players likes to keep a journal they usually have the gist of it.

I... don't like emphasizing plot points because it feels like I'm "ordering" them to pursue one or another. I have been tempted to get a small white board to write "ongoing quests" on it but I still believe it is up to the Players to remember what they're doing and why they're doing it.

I don't mean plot points from on high or anything. I mean what the players felt was important enough for them to do. In other words, if they felt that pursuing a goal was important, then the "plot" takes a backseat to their pursuit of the goal. Challenge their pursuit of the things that interest them. Let the game revolve around that.

Does that distinction make sense?

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 03:03 PM
I don't mean plot points from on high or anything. I mean what the players felt was important enough for them to do. In other words, if they felt that pursuing a goal was important, then the "plot" takes a backseat to their pursuit of the goal. Challenge their pursuit of the things that interest them. Let the game revolve around that.

Does that distinction make sense?
It's not a bad idea, no. Maybe I'll ask the Record Keeper to keep a tally of plot points they want to pursue at the start of each session. At the very least, it might keep things clearer in their heads.

Britter
2011-01-14, 03:05 PM
Yeah, thats exactly the idea. Refresh peoples memory of the things they were doing last time, brush away the cobwebs of the intervening days, and then right back into the game.

bokodasu
2011-01-14, 03:37 PM
Oh yeah, that is important. The sandbox game I was in kind of fell apart because nobody could remember anything. "Oh yeah, we had a prisoner, didn't we? And that guy was the guy... no wait, that was the other guy." Might be a good idea to take 5 minutes at the end of a session to make some notes, or even assign a party scribe. People think they're better at remembering than they really are. (Our party gave a bit of loot bonus to the scribe, which worked nicely.)

Also, the next campaign I run is going to have a zombie volcano, although I haven't decided if it's an undead volcano roaming the countryside and melting people's brains or a volcano that has occasional eruptions of undead. Either way sounds pretty entertaining.

Kyeudo
2011-01-14, 03:40 PM
Also, the next campaign I run is going to have a zombie volcano, although I haven't decided if it's an undead volcano roaming the countryside and melting people's brains or a volcano that has occasional eruptions of undead. Either way sounds pretty entertaining.

I'd go with both. An undead volcano that moves slowly around the country-side, errupting with lava and charred undead corpses.

Tvtyrant
2011-01-14, 03:50 PM
I like the Drow one; you could run a long term campaign based around the normal elves capturing Drow and using them as examples of "evil" in world's fair type deals where they display them to delegates from other nations. When your Drow hears about this he/she should be pretty willing to go deal with it, which is when you begin the "reuniting the elves" plot.

Yakk
2011-01-14, 04:49 PM
While it is true that two of their PCs have died within 5 levels of play, but to be fair that was the natural consequence of taking on a floor of gnolls and then walking right into the Boss Battle without taking a Short Rest.
Issue: "Short Rests" are horrible ideas in the middle of an enemy fortress.

5 minute break? At the door of some big bad? If the big bad wants to fight you, he'll walk right out and beat on you. If the big bad doesn't want to fight you, that gives the big bad 5 minutes to leave.

The natural consequence of taking 5 minute breaks at anything besides a serious "there are no bad guys who are aware of us anywhere nearby" or "we are disengaging" is generally horrible, realistically.

To "fix" this, I'd recommend giving free short rests with every milestone (you can spend 1 healing surge as a free action, and you have 1 round to expend encounter powers that you haven't used yet and get them back). This means when they finish the floor of gnolls, they hit a milestone, and instead of "5 minute break before the boss--anyone for coffee?", you get a "charge" fun event.


Well, the PCs ride 3 days out of their base town to the town nearest to the swamp and then swim out to the edge of the swamp... and then stand there. They never bothered to research Rituals, or even ask one of the numerous NPCs they know who live in the swamp if they can help track her down. Instead, they stand knee-deep in muck until I remind them of a particular amulet they stole from the corpse of the Warlock which can communicate with the Witch.

I don't know about you, but this sort of behavior sends warning bells in my head. What sort of Party says "let's kill the Witch!" and then travels for 3 days to stand at the edge of a swamp without a thought in their head as to how to find her?
At this point, I'd expect them to find creatures, or maybe NPCs, or signs of NPCs, or something.

3 days away is a long distance. It would be like expecting to find clues about where to go to dinner in Argintina before leaving from Toronto (by car).

The natural consequence of looking in the swamp for the Witch doesn't have to be "nothing happens".
Think of it this way: if that is what happens when they bite one of their motivation hooks (they stand around looking dumb and bored), it won't make them want to do it again. :)

One trick is the retroactive smart move. They clearly intend to find the Witch -- what if killing the Warlock and heading towards the Witch was, retroactively, a smart move to do?

When they get there, there could be evidence of people living in the area, warped monsters corrupted by the Witch, etc.

Ie: if they express an interest in doing X, and they happen to do something that you can think up a reason why it doesn't work, can you also think up a reason why it could work? Why go with the "it doesn't work" option?

---

Another trick is the cinematic cut scene. A short scene where you say "meanwhile...". Unless it is interactive, keep it really short. This can remind them of other beings (like their friend).

---

Warforged
- An appreciation for what constitutes squishy "humor"
- Greater understanding of what connects one fleshbag to another
Ask for action items. But in the above case, a plot involving a trickster god or spirit, magic item that involves humor, or the like?

Also, fleshbags who don't connect to one another. A society. Possibly cursed. Maybe just lacking a divine blessing.

Deva
[Deva] has taken, in the years leading up to the campaign, a very cynical view on the world. He has spent most of his time in the equivalent to inner city hospitals helping to heal those in need. Because of this He has only seen the pain and suffering of the outside world. Many of those that he helps return to the hospital within a fortnight due to some self destructive tendency or another. Something that he desperately seeks is to see some permanent good come to the world. A Warlord dethroned or even a town saved for good from some roaming bandits.

The more immature (or undecided) side of [Deva] wants to live a little. Make some gold, enjoy the finery and foods that he was never allowed by his elders in the monastery. he will always jump at the opportunity to live the "high life"
So some healing. A magical artifact of healing? Maybe one that is area-based. A fountain of life? Or a disease that can be defeated.

The high life -- some opportunities to do trading? Connections to the economy.

Do you use a magic item economy? Or is gold a RP-souce thing?

Drow
A strong movement of Drow that will re-establish the colonies above ground.

An elf that will see that the Drow have suffered enough and agree that it is time for them to leave the dark.
Any important NPC elves? Plots involving elves. A drow looking for help. A non-drow looking for help with drow.


Goliath
He definitely needs to kill, or facilitate the killing, of that Stupid Paladin. Beyond that he wants to visit home, and be confident enough in his skills that he would be able to escape. It wouldn't be entirely for the purpose of gloating...then again it mostly would.
Contains references to things I don't understand.

Another idea is to give out levels if you pull off a plot point arc.

Or (tend to) tie boons and the like to these plot points.

Amphetryon
2011-01-14, 05:05 PM
Quoth Yakk:
Issue: "Short Rests" are horrible ideas in the middle of an enemy fortress.

5 minute break? At the door of some big bad? If the big bad wants to fight you, he'll walk right out and beat on you. If the big bad doesn't want to fight you, that gives the big bad 5 minutes to leave.

The natural consequence of taking 5 minute breaks at anything besides a serious "there are no bad guys who are aware of us anywhere nearby" or "we are disengaging" is generally horrible, realistically.

To "fix" this, I'd recommend giving free short rests with every milestone (you can spend 1 healing surge as a free action, and you have 1 round to expend encounter powers that you haven't used yet and get them back). This means when they finish the floor of gnolls, they hit a milestone, and instead of "5 minute break before the boss--anyone for coffee?", you get a "charge" fun event.
Thoughts:
I'm missing a step in the thought process here, I suspect. There is a stated concern about how horrible short breaks are from a realism perspective (a notoriously dangerous citation in a world of Elves and Fireballs and Teleportation magic), then the proposed solution is more healing as a free action? To my sensibilities, that steps just as much on realism's toes as the short break.



Ie: if they express an interest in doing X, and they happen to do something that you can think up a reason why it doesn't work, can you also think up a reason why it could work? Why go with the "it doesn't work" option?If the DM - in this case Oracle Hunter - has set up a dynamic world around the PCs, then forcing solutions that should not work to function as the PCs hope in that environment can have several undesirable consequences, from damaging verisimilitude and immersion, to starting down the slippery slope where the PCs are unable to fail. "No failure, no danger, no fun" is often cited on these and other RPG boards as the attitude of players whose DMs have handled things in such a way as to consistently enable character success in a fashion similar to what you describe.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-14, 05:08 PM
To "fix" this, I'd recommend giving free short rests with every milestone (you can spend 1 healing surge as a free action, and you have 1 round to expend encounter powers that you haven't used yet and get them back). This means when they finish the floor of gnolls, they hit a milestone, and instead of "5 minute break before the boss--anyone for coffee?", you get a "charge" fun event.
That is... actually a pretty good idea. Plus, it'll make Milestones a bit more meaningful.




At this point, I'd expect them to find creatures, or maybe NPCs, or signs of NPCs, or something.

3 days away is a long distance. It would be like expecting to find clues about where to go to dinner in Argintina before leaving from Toronto (by car).

The natural consequence of looking in the swamp for the Witch doesn't have to be "nothing happens".
Think of it this way: if that is what happens when they bite one of their motivation hooks (they stand around looking dumb and bored), it won't make them want to do it again. :)

One trick is the retroactive smart move. They clearly intend to find the Witch -- what if killing the Warlock and heading towards the Witch was, retroactively, a smart move to do?

When they get there, there could be evidence of people living in the area, warped monsters corrupted by the Witch, etc.

Ie: if they express an interest in doing X, and they happen to do something that you can think up a reason why it doesn't work, can you also think up a reason why it could work? Why go with the "it doesn't work" option?
I must have been getting sick of my Players wandering around expecting Adventure to hit them in the face. Particularly for a Sandbox game, Player input is important - you shouldn't just wander into a zone and then have whatever plot hook is around give you a wedgie. Maybe I'll "taught" them to act that way :smallfrown:

Normally, I'm pretty good about "bringing the adventure to the Players." For example, when the PCs were thwarted by a tapestry I quickly whiped together a Skill Challenge and an Encounter involving the kobolds I had mentioned were also in the caves. There the Players had been moving with purpose and just so happened to hit a roadblock. Fine, I'll work with that - it was easy enough for their misstep to result in their Rivals getting the prize first rather than having the planned fight later on.

But here, they literally walked three days to a swamp without any idea as to what to do next. They knew that the Witch was making Hellforged out in the swamp and had a secret hideout. Wouldn't it have been reasonable for the Players to have thought to do something beforehand? Is that unreasonable? :smallconfused:

EDIT: @Amphetryon - the point about Very Short Rests ("VSR") is that it fixes one of the major problems of 4E: dynamic dungeons. It is "normal" to have a bunch of Encounters clump together - guards are called, reinforcements arrive. This is manageable but difficult for some kinds of Adventure design. Specifically, raiding an enemy fortification tends to bring all of the guards down on the heads of the PCs.

Ideally, my Players should have done what they had been told by older-and-wiser heads (in game): lure the gnolls out and pick them off piecemeal. Gnolls are intelligent, but savage; a wide arrange of trickery can be used to thin out their numbers and minimize their pack advantage. Unfortunately, my Players don't like thinking tactically - they just snuck into the main tower (good!) and then tried to kill everyone at once. They didn't even think that escape (or a tactical retreat) was an option!

However... I'm no longer so pleased with the VSR mechanic. I might tweak it to allow Players to opt - once per Milestone - to spend a Healing Surge to refresh a single Encounter power and recover one Surge's worth of HP (2 Surges total) or something similar.

Yakk
2011-01-20, 10:48 AM
You can even go further than implementing VSRests.

Replace Daily powers with "Inspired" powers. These powers no longer refresh each day.

Long Rest: After 6 hours of rest, make an Endurance check with a bonus equal to your maximum healing surges. For every 10 points (round down) you regain one healing surge. Gain the effects of a short rest.

Short Rest: Spend as many healing surges as you like. Encounter powers recharge.

Milestone: You can spend 1 healing surge. Encounter powers recharge. For each Inspired (read Daily) power that is expended, roll 1d6: on a 456 it recharges. Gain an Action Point if you have less than two. Regain 1/2 (rounded down) of your healing surges.

Level up: Requires a Milestone or a Long Rest. All powers recharge. Gain an action point if you have less than two.

Extended Recovery: You spend a week in a safe spot, recovering, living in comfort. Regain one inspired power (daily).

---

Milestones in the above system become like treasure.

I call the above "plot-based pacing".

Instead of placing Milestones at every 2 encounters, place them at plot points (that are roughly 2 encounters apart).

If you travel somewhere, and it is reasonably dangerous, then have encounters on the way, and a milestone at the end.

If you fight your way through the fortress, there will be a milestone before the boss.

If you defeat the boss, there will be a milestone afterward.

You fight two encounters in a row without a break -- that should always be worth a milestone.

Etc. Give them out relatively freely, biased towards "you actually accomplished something meaningful or challenging".

You'll note that the above gives very limited benefits to "we go and take a break". It is intended to. It encourages players to go out and do things. And I think it works in a Sandbox game.

The only real downside on the side of players is that they cannot control when milestones occur. This is a complication, because it forces the DM to meter them out a reasonably fast and reasonably predictable rates.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-20, 11:19 AM
You can even go further than implementing VSRests.

Replace Daily powers with "Inspired" powers. These powers no longer refresh each day.

Long Rest: After 6 hours of rest, make an Endurance check with a bonus equal to your maximum healing surges. For every 10 points (round down) you regain one healing surge. Gain the effects of a short rest.

Short Rest: Spend as many healing surges as you like. Encounter powers recharge.

Milestone: You can spend 1 healing surge. Encounter powers recharge. For each Inspired (read Daily) power that is expended, roll 1d6: on a 456 it recharges. Gain an Action Point if you have less than two. Regain 1/2 (rounded down) of your healing surges.

Level up: Requires a Milestone or a Long Rest. All powers recharge. Gain an action point if you have less than two.

Extended Recovery: You spend a week in a safe spot, recovering, living in comfort. Regain one inspired power (daily).

---

Milestones in the above system become like treasure.

I call the above "plot-based pacing".

Instead of placing Milestones at every 2 encounters, place them at plot points (that are roughly 2 encounters apart).

If you travel somewhere, and it is reasonably dangerous, then have encounters on the way, and a milestone at the end.

If you fight your way through the fortress, there will be a milestone before the boss.

If you defeat the boss, there will be a milestone afterward.

You fight two encounters in a row without a break -- that should always be worth a milestone.

Etc. Give them out relatively freely, biased towards "you actually accomplished something meaningful or challenging".

You'll note that the above gives very limited benefits to "we go and take a break". It is intended to. It encourages players to go out and do things. And I think it works in a Sandbox game.

The only real downside on the side of players is that they cannot control when milestones occur. This is a complication, because it forces the DM to meter them out a reasonably fast and reasonably predictable rates.
My problem with this approach is that I'm layering another level of mechanics onto an already rules-heavy game. For my Players, at least, that won't do.

Y'see, I came upon a revelation to my earlier problem thanks to a random idea I had in another thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=183926): The Player Alignment System:
The key with any Alignment system is to pick axes that are relevant to your interests. As a DM, I am interested in my Players' interest in Roleplaying, and their interest in an external plot.

So we'll go with a Mechanics/Dramatics Axis and a Sandbox/Railroad Axis.

The Roleplaying Axis
Mechanics means that the Player is most interested in the numbers on their character sheet, and how they interact with the rest of the system. They are unlikely to have much interest in the "fluff" behind their numbers and are more willing to do things for mechanical advantage than for any in-character reason.

Dramatics means that the Player is most interested in the "fluff" of their character and have little interest in how it is supposed to work mechanically. They are unlikely to show much interest in the rules of the system and act according to the internal motivations of their character rather than what would bring them the greatest likelihood of success.

Neutral on this axis means that the Player is equally interested in the rules of the game and the fluff of their character - or equally disinterested in both. Neutrals tend to pay enough attention to the rules to make sure their characters function and develop their character just enough to make it more than a collection of numbers. Neutrals usually act according to what seems "reasonable" to them as Players, rather than explicitly weighing mechanic advantage versus in-character motivations.

The Plot Axis
Sandbox Players eschew plot hooks whenever possible and focus more what their character would like to do. If a plot hook happens to be in line with their character's motivations so be it - but they will do it their own way. Sandbox Players tend to be hostile to obvious DM intervention - whether it be in the form of Broken Bridges, Plot Coupons or similar tropes.

Railroad Players prefer to follow the plot as it is presented, rather than try to find adventure on their own. When given a plot hook, Railroad Players will try to find a reason to follow it, even if it has little to do with their characters and has no obvious reward. Railroad Players tend to prefer "bread crumbs" style games in which the DM leaves an obvious path to follow.

Neutral Players on this Axis enjoy having the autonomy to pick and choose plot hooks but prefer to follow one that is presented, rather than invent one on their own. These Players enjoy the occasional "bread crumb" to help them along on their path but will rebel if they feel that the plot can only be resolved in one fashion. Alternatively, Neutral on this axis can indicate an indifference to plot entirely - it happens however it happens.

While very much a work in progress, this conceptualization helped me figure out where the true problem was in my game.
While 4E is a MN system by default, I had been running it as a DS game. Looking over my Players (DN x2, DS, NN, MR) I can see that an DS game can only work if the DS Player is also the "leader" of the party - which he isn't. The actual leader - a NN Player - lacks the motivation to argue for any particular Hook over any other while the DS Player's injection of personal plans just makes the game harder for the NN Leader to manage.

If I shift to a DN game - where plot hooks are explicitly presented as such, rather than as "opportunities" - the Party should have more cohesion. My main concern now is to make sure that I focus on keeping the 3 DX's characters hooked into the storytelling: I threw a quick Railroad dungeon at the party to break up thing and it ended up with two bored and rebelleous DX's :smalleek:
Obviously, a purely mechanical fix won't go over well since over half the party cares little for the mechanics as it is - throwing a patch on the system will just anger and confuse them :smalltongue:

Yakk
2011-01-20, 12:27 PM
What I am trying to do with that is push MN towards DN behavior. Make it less mechanically punitive to do the dramatically appropriate thing (namely, don't sit for 5 minutes outside of the boss-dudes door waiting for your powers to recharge, use powers when they are dramatically appropriate, etc).

However, that PC alignment axis did poke something in my brain. So I'll run off with that.

---

Your two-axis alignment is missing the neurotic axis -- how much planning. Should the players spend a bunch of time planning what to do when they find the witch, or should they find where the witch is and then head towards it?

You seem to want the players to do a bunch of planning to make their plans work, and your job (as DM) is to find holes in the PCs plans and exploit them. Another option is to take what the players intend or want, and find reasons for it to work.

It isn't as if your world is actually fully simulated. You don't have all of the details of the entire swamp the witch is in planned out. You improvise.

When the players do something unexpected to you (ie, they head towards the witch to find the witch, instead of looking where they are for more clues about the witch), do you present them with improvised material that is blank (you arrive at the swamp. You are knee deep in water. Now what?), or do you present them with improvised material that contains content (as you approach the swamp, you encounter some warped creature while on a track through the swap. There is a track leading to a village, and a strange creature you spotted through the fog. What do you do?)

You may have prepared for the players to ask around the city, but the players do not know that. Asking around the city might have resulted in a bunch of time where they run into blank content, because they don't know that you placed all of the hints about the witch near where she lives. (Picture: "why would they spend time half a week travel away searching for more information. I just told them where she lives! And while they are wasting time, the witch was watching her friend, and now knows that they are coming for them, and will have done Y and Z during that time.")

The high-planning vs impulse axis. The players seem to be low-planning, ie impulsive. This doesn't mean they don't want dramatic sandbox games.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-20, 02:25 PM
The high-planning vs impulse axis. The players seem to be low-planning, ie impulsive. This doesn't mean they don't want dramatic sandbox games.
Interesting.

I would have placed that Axis within the Plot axis. A Sandbox game requires a lot of pre-planning - or at least implies pre-planning. While a NS Player might just say "we go to X" he will always pick something to do while there. No Sandbox Player would go somewhere completely random and not plan to work with what was there. Even though there may not be pre-planning involved, any Sandbox Player will seek adventure.

In the Swamp scenario, when asked "now what?" a Sandbox Player will have some course of action to find adventure. A Railroad or Neutral Player will more likely scratch their heads - a Railroad Player will expect "bread crumbs" to guide him to adventure while a Neutral Player would merely appreciate them.

In my mind, the Planning v. Impulse Axis is less important than the Plot Axis - Sandbox Players are inherently more "investigative" than Railroad Players since their course of action is always going to poke holes into the World. Railroad Players may be equally plan-heavy but their plans are always around plot coupons - "I know the Wizard lives in the tower. What else can I learn about that?" Basically, trying to Align people along a Planning/Impulse Axis is going to be less helpful to the DM (and the game) as the current Plot Axis. After all, this is merely a question of preparation - can you answer all the questions the Players ask - rather than structure - how do I structure the campaign so that people have adventures.

I don't think anyone really can defend the "I go to the Swamp - where's the Witch?" approach. Even after polling my Players, several (Dramatic types) questioned what that was supposed to accomplish. It is clear that a more Railroad game will require less innovation from the Players - it's all Broken Bridges and Plot Coupons.

I'm glad to hear the PAS has poked a hole in your brain - it did so in mine :smallbiggrin:

Beleriphon
2011-01-20, 02:58 PM
But here, they literally walked three days to a swamp without any idea as to what to do next. They knew that the Witch was making Hellforged out in the swamp and had a secret hideout. Wouldn't it have been reasonable for the Players to have thought to do something beforehand? Is that unreasonable? :smallconfused:

It very well could be unreasonable to assume they have a plan. If they show up at the edge of the swamp, and they want more direction maybe, just maybe they were expecting that you would have "something" for them to work with or at least some direct. At best the idea was they wander around until the find something to fight that looks like a good prospect for a lead. At worst the players are basically saying: "we want to do Xthing, we'll get there you fill in the rest as an adventure."

Essentially, I think they want to be presented with plenty of adventure options, but then have you fill in the remainder of the adventure for them rather than having to drive the game forward with you just playing the monsters.

RagnaroksChosen
2011-01-20, 03:10 PM
I'm a huge fan of sandbox games and i run them constantly.



I must have been getting sick of my Players wandering around expecting Adventure to hit them in the face. Particularly for a Sandbox game, Player input is important - you shouldn't just wander into a zone and then have whatever plot hook is around give you a wedgie. Maybe I'll "taught" them to act that way :smallfrown:

Normally, I'm pretty good about "bringing the adventure to the Players." For example, when the PCs were thwarted by a tapestry I quickly whiped together a Skill Challenge and an Encounter involving the kobolds I had mentioned were also in the caves. There the Players had been moving with purpose and just so happened to hit a roadblock. Fine, I'll work with that - it was easy enough for their misstep to result in their Rivals getting the prize first rather than having the planned fight later on.

But here, they literally walked three days to a swamp without any idea as to what to do next. They knew that the Witch was making Hellforged out in the swamp and had a secret hideout. Wouldn't it have been reasonable for the Players to have thought to do something beforehand? Is that unreasonable? :smallconfused:

Agreed player input is very usefull. And required, however there is a certain amount of "easy" adventuring. Which hopefully you have made them aware of. For example in most of my major cities there are bulletin posts or boards that have odd jobs on them.(aka quick 1-2 session jobs). My players generally don't go neer them, they used to when i first started. Generally (even back in ye old days) there was always something to do.

No players should have done something before hand. And im sure they sat there with thumbs up there asses.
Personally it sounds like your players don't want a sandbox. To me it just sounds like they want a normal non rail-roaded game. Aka the illusion that they are not railroaded.




EDIT: @Amphetryon - the point about Very Short Rests ("VSR") is that it fixes one of the major problems of 4E: dynamic dungeons. It is "normal" to have a bunch of Encounters clump together - guards are called, reinforcements arrive. This is manageable but difficult for some kinds of Adventure design. Specifically, raiding an enemy fortification tends to bring all of the guards down on the heads of the PCs.

What??? That's why raid's are so much harder is you have to hit something hard and then get out before the enemy brings down the gaurd.
I've done raids in both 4e and 3.5... The 4e raid I pc'ed in was 1 big encounter and it was more of a jail break then any thing. Just because we cleared a room the "encounter" didn't end. we kept going. More "gaurds" kept coming the more rooms we pushed through. Granted we had spent a session scouting the camp and knowing the guard rotations and when to hit them.

I know when i gmed a "raid" my players did not prep correctly and failed. Mainly because they broke apart into chaos and weren't working as a team. But it goes to show you when people don't know what role they are playing in a raid it can cause problems.




Ideally, my Players should have done what they had been told by older-and-wiser heads (in game): lure the gnolls out and pick them off piecemeal. Gnolls are intelligent, but savage; a wide arrange of trickery can be used to thin out their numbers and minimize their pack advantage. Unfortunately, my Players don't like thinking tactically - they just snuck into the main tower (good!) and then tried to kill everyone at once. They didn't even think that escape (or a tactical retreat) was an option!

Oracle hunter, I meen this in no disrespect but it sounds like you wanted to rail road them into taking out the gnolls in a certain way. Now I don't know/can't remember if you mentioned it but did they put any prep into this?

I know in the past me and my groups have found creative ways to say F-U elders and done things our way(both with tact and a sledge hammer).

I would be carful of expecting your players to do one thing and then them do another.

The reason i love sandbox games is to me it allows me as the GM to play reactionary. PC's do X then I do Y. IF the x is something that could effect a large scale operation(like a town, mining facility, race, etc) then i ususaly pause a few minutes to figure out what the pc's actions will do to effect every thing.

I know in one of my games a specifc pc had a large bounty on his head. A good portion of the campain was spent hiding him and dodging from fights they couldn't win.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-20, 03:25 PM
Oracle hunter, I meen this in no disrespect but it sounds like you wanted to rail road them into taking out the gnolls in a certain way. Now I don't know/can't remember if you mentioned it but did they put any prep into this?

I know in the past me and my groups have found creative ways to say F-U elders and done things our way(both with tact and a sledge hammer).

I would be carful of expecting your players to do one thing and then them do another.

The reason i love sandbox games is to me it allows me as the GM to play reactionary. PC's do X then I do Y. IF the x is something that could effect a large scale operation(like a town, mining facility, race, etc) then i ususaly pause a few minutes to figure out what the pc's actions will do to effect every thing.

I know in one of my games a specifc pc had a large bounty on his head. A good portion of the campain was spent hiding him and dodging from fights they couldn't win.
Hell, don't worry 'bout disrespect - I'm a veteran of the Edition Warz! If you have a point, I want to hear it :smallbiggrin:

In this particular place, I presented them with a problem (clear out the Gnolls from the semi-ruined keep) and wanted to see how they responded. The older-and-wiser heads suggested that they do a skirmisher strategy because Gnolls are nasty en masse and they were trying to take out 50-some Gnolls with a party if 8. Gnolls are notable for being intelligent but savage: they like to pile on wounded animals and thrill in slaughter. So their known strength (numbers) could be countered by using their known weakness (animal-like behavior). Since the Order had fought a lot of them, this was known to be the optimal strategy.

Now, if the PCs had chosen to somehow bargain with the Gnolls (unlikely, 'cause they had a good seat and were arrogant) or arranged some sort of fancy diversion that would have been great. Instead, they snuck into the Keep (good!) and then tried to take out the Boss and his bodyguard by themselves. Not a particularly original strategy and one that made no attempt to deal with the rest of the camp. Hell, they didn't even gauge the strength of the Boss before trying this.

I don't feel like I was railroading them; it's just that no alternative strategies ever were discussed.

RagnaroksChosen
2011-01-20, 03:42 PM
Hell, don't worry 'bout disrespect - I'm a veteran of the Edition Warz! If you have a point, I want to hear it :smallbiggrin:

In this particular place, I presented them with a problem (clear out the Gnolls from the semi-ruined keep) and wanted to see how they responded. The older-and-wiser heads suggested that they do a skirmisher strategy because Gnolls are nasty en masse and they were trying to take out 50-some Gnolls with a party if 8. Gnolls are notable for being intelligent but savage: they like to pile on wounded animals and thrill in slaughter. So their known strength (numbers) could be countered by using their known weakness (animal-like behavior). Since the Order had fought a lot of them, this was known to be the optimal strategy.

Now, if the PCs had chosen to somehow bargain with the Gnolls (unlikely, 'cause they had a good seat and were arrogant) or arranged some sort of fancy diversion that would have been great. Instead, they snuck into the Keep (good!) and then tried to take out the Boss and his bodyguard by themselves. Not a particularly original strategy and one that made no attempt to deal with the rest of the camp. Hell, they didn't even gauge the strength of the Boss before trying this.

I don't feel like I was railroading them; it's just that no alternative strategies ever were discussed.


Fair enough and i see your point that they didn't discuss when they where doing. Not that taking out the boss isn't a good idea. I was just taken aback by the comments on raiding thats all.

This particular situation it honestly sounds like your players don't want a sandbox they just want to be able to pick there goals.


Edit: Mabye the next game you run before even planing any thing ask them what type of game they want, aka what type of goals, do they want to take over a dutchy or remove a king from power, save a princeses etc etc.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-20, 03:51 PM
Fair enough and i see your point that they didn't discuss when they where doing. Not that taking out the boss isn't a good idea. I was just taken aback by the comments on raiding thats all.

This particular situation it honestly sounds like your players don't want a sandbox they just want to be able to pick there goals.


Edit: Mabye the next game you run before even planing any thing ask them what type of game they want, aka what type of goals, do they want to take over a dutchy or remove a king from power, save a princeses etc etc.
As I mentioned, I've figured out a solution (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=184204) to my particular problem here. It turns out that my party is mostly Dramatic and almost entirely Neutral on the Plot Axis. So, as long as I engage the characters of my Dramatic Players and leave room in the plot for hijinks my Players should be happy :smallbiggrin:

Yakk
2011-01-20, 06:21 PM
I would have placed that Axis within the Plot axis. A Sandbox game requires a lot of pre-planning - or at least implies pre-planning. While a NS Player might just say "we go to X" he will always pick something to do while there. No Sandbox Player would go somewhere completely random and not plan to work with what was there. Even though there may not be pre-planning involved, any Sandbox Player will seek adventure.
You can be a Sandbox player who wants to pick where they go, and what they want to do, but doesn't want to have to do careful planning.

Ie, there are 15 evil power sources nearby. A railroad-leaning option would be telling you what order to do them in -- a sandbox-leaning would leave it up to the players.

In the Swamp scenario, when asked "now what?" a Sandbox Player will have some course of action to find adventure. A Railroad or Neutral Player will more likely scratch their heads - a Railroad Player will expect "bread crumbs" to guide him to adventure while a Neutral Player would merely appreciate them.
It wasn't the Swamp scenario -- it was "hunt down the witch".

In a Railroad game, the next step is "hunt down the witch".
In a Sandbox game, there is no next step. The players may be aware of the witch, and may or may not choose to go after her.

In a high-plan game, players will be expected to build a complex strategy to track down and find the witch. Failure to plan will be punished.

In a low-plan game, once you find where the witch is, and you decide to go after it, you head towards the witch. Your intention (I want to go after the witch) isn't railroaded.

In my mind, the Planning v. Impulse Axis is less important than the Plot Axis - Sandbox Players are inherently more "investigative" than Railroad Players since their course of action is always going to poke holes into the World. Railroad Players may be equally plan-heavy but their plans are always around plot coupons - "I know the Wizard lives in the tower. What else can I learn about that?" Basically, trying to Align people along a Planning/Impulse Axis is going to be less helpful to the DM (and the game) as the current Plot Axis. After all, this is merely a question of preparation - can you answer all the questions the Players ask - rather than structure - how do I structure the campaign so that people have adventures.

I don't think anyone really can defend the "I go to the Swamp - where's the Witch?" approach. Even after polling my Players, several (Dramatic types) questioned what that was supposed to accomplish. It is clear that a more Railroad game will require less innovation from the Players - it's all Broken Bridges and Plot Coupons.
No Broken Bridges. No Plot Coupons. But low requirements for intensive planning.

Ie:

they just want to be able to pick there goals.
You are connecting "must be extremely careful about what you do, and plan massively" with "want to pick their goals".

Maybe they want to be able to pick their goals, but don't want to worry about heavy planning.

This is not railroad -- there aren't any broken bridges -- but by your definition it isn't sandbox either. So what is it?

Evidence of a false dichotomy!

And if you say "it is a tricotomy, with pure-railroad, pure-sandbox, and 'everything else'," that isn't a predictive model, but rather a descriptive one. A game in which you expect a huge amount of complex planning based off of the information provided, and leaving the hints results in the world pushing you back on the tracks -- the bad guys are to be fought in a particular order, and if you don't figure out how to defeat the next set of bad guys you either die or walk in circles gaining XP -- is a very different style of game than one where the world is open, the heroes have choices, and they can head off and do whatever they want, but you don't have to plan around every detail.

Yet both are "neutral", "neutral" in your alignments-of-gaming.


"I go to the Swamp - where's the Witch?"
I can defend that.

They defeated the Witch's last minion, and discovered that the Witch is in the swamp, producing creatures.

The swamp is half-a-weeks travel away, and they want to stop the Witch quickly. So they mount up and head towards the Swamp.

The Witch is creating warped creatures, so other creatures near the swamp will have noticed these creatures.

So ... head towards the Witch!

Now, given that the result of "head towards the Witch" is "you stand in a puddle", of course the players will say "that didn't work well, and I can see your argument why it didn't work well". It was un-fun to sit around with no clue what to do.

At the same time, burning time on "lets ask about the Witch around town" could easily be un-fun to many players -- especially if it turns out that while they where looking around town, the Witch learned of her lieutenant being defeated, and also found out that the players are looking for her via spies in town, and set up an ambush for the players while changing her venue -- I mean, isn't it obvious? And similarly, they could have arrived and found looking for the Witch to be trivial.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-01-21, 05:23 PM
@Yakk - while most of the campaign-specific points are off-base (unsurprising, since you're not in my campaign AFAIK :smalltongue:) I have to respect your Planning/Impulse Axis.

In part, this is because I've had another session with this crew and it became extremely clear to me that I have an Impulsive group - and I can't understand why they think that way. Also, they are beginning to see my DMing style as "overly punitive" - which is to say, they are getting punished for things they could have known if they had asked.

ANECDOTE
As an example, one of my Players was upset that there was fallout for him turning over his Badge to a third party and saying "I don't want it anymore." When he did this, I was shocked because:
(1) This Badge was given to him to symbolize his membership in the Alabaster Order - a government-sponsored "adventurer militia" that they had to complete a difficult quest to join.

(2) The third party was a bouncer in an inn whose owner sponsored a rival adventuring company which had just beat the PCs to looting a dungeon. Since the PCs were dispatched under orders from the Alabaster Order, the inn-owner has been roundly mocking the Alabaster Order for its ineffectiveness.

(3) The PC had joined the Alabaster Order to aid another party member who was pushed into joining as part of a political stratagem by the Protectorate of Light to make the city government more amenable to partnership. As the PC in question is a Warforged and the Protectorate Embassy had the best Artificers around, the PC also wanted to get in good with them so that he could be upgraded.
None of this occurred to the PC. He did know about all of these - as I had told him and the party at various times beforehand - but he still didn't see why giving his Badge over was a big deal. When I explained this to him, he said "that doesn't make any sense to me" which would have been fair if at least one of the other Players hadn't told me at the time that he saw what was about to happen.
Under the PAS (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=184204), the above Player ranks in as a DN. He's very smart, so it isn't just "dumb Player syndrome" - this had to be something else I didn't see. I think it was your Planning/Impulse Axis. I had hesitated to turn the PAS into a three-axis model but... it's too important to ignore for campaign-planning purposes.

...I think it's still workable, but I'll be damned if that doesn't make things more complicated :smallfrown: