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InQbait
2013-12-24, 03:50 PM
The purpose of this thread is to come up with and share any interesting, unusual, bizarre, crazy, and hopefully fun ideas used for tabletop roleplaying games. The point of this thread is to think outside the box. I'll start with a few:

1. Using the White Elephant Method for determining which player gets which character.
2. Each time a combat begins, some kind of battle music must be played.
3. Instead of using dice, each player is given a certain number of "Influence Points" per session. Whenever an important event occurs in-game, each player involved "bets" or wagers as much Influence Points as they want, but they do it secretly. And all at once the players reveal how much Influence Points that they each bet. Whoever bets the most "wins" and gets to determine the outcome. However, you lose all Influence Points you bet, regardless if you won or lost. A GM or referee will be needed here of course so things don't get out of hand.
4. At the beginning of each session, each player's character is introduced, and each player has to select a theme song for their character, and during each introduction, the theme song must be played.
5. Each session, each player is given a card. It is to remain face down and the player is not allowed to know what the card is. Should a player's character dies, the card is immediately flipped over and depending on which card it is, an effect will occur in-game.

Airk
2013-12-24, 08:03 PM
The purpose of this thread is to come up with and share any interesting, unusual, bizarre, crazy, and hopefully fun ideas used for tabletop roleplaying games. The point of this thread is to think outside the box. I'll start with a few:

1. Using the White Elephant Method for determining which player gets which character.

Haha. I've always wanted to run a game where I had players create characters and then told them "pass your character sheet to the player on your left, that'll be their character for the game." because some of my friends are notorious minmaxers and one of the others has an uncanny ability to create a mechanically crippled character in almost any system.



3. Instead of using dice, each player is given a certain number of "Influence Points" per session. Whenever an important event occurs in-game, each player involved "bets" or wagers as much Influence Points as they want, but they do it secretly. And all at once the players reveal how much Influence Points that they each bet. Whoever bets the most "wins" and gets to determine the outcome. However, you lose all Influence Points you bet, regardless if you won or lost. A GM or referee will be needed here of course so things don't get out of hand.

Houses of the Blooded has a system that's not entirely dissimilar from this, except that your 'wagers' are dice off your roll.

Toofey
2013-12-24, 10:15 PM
IIrc: that's also similar to how the marvel universe RPG worked


What's the "white elephant" method?

erikun
2013-12-24, 11:12 PM
What's the "white elephant" method?
Not sure. This (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_elephant_gift_exchange) comes up immediately, although I'm not sure how that would work. Unless one player is intentionally "trolling" and making a character they have no intention of playing, it seems that everyone would make a character they want to play and then pick/take that one, giving an identical party setup.

The Oni
2013-12-24, 11:27 PM
What you'd have to do to make that work is talk to another GM that's running a game with the same number of players as yours, swap your party's sheets with his/her party's sheets, and then play it white-elephant style.

originalginger
2013-12-24, 11:32 PM
I always have music going when we play.

I have playlist set up for for:

- Exploration of wilderness; mostly light classical and orchestrated film soundtracks
- Castles, keeps, and Labyrinths; mostly made of atmospheric music (think or the MYST 4 soundtrack or instrumental New-Age)
-Caves and Ruins; much the same as above, but darker and more moody, often times with ominous Latin chanting.
- Towns, cities and other settlements; 'happy' classical, celtic music, and movie scores, think the Shire theme from LotR/the Hobbit or the Wind Waker theme.
- Combat; mostly from video game soundtracks, such as the Total War soundtracks, boss music form various games, etc.

In addition, many locations and main NPCs have certain themes that I play each time they appear. For example, I play the Game of Thrones theme when they enter Rivenreach, a city that was invaded and partially destroyed shortly after the game began that has become a sort of hub for the campaign. For the main enemy (so far) I use an orchestrated version of the 'Wrecked Ship' theme of Super Metroid.

It adds a whole lot to the atmosphere, and helps me ensure that each 'scene' has the right mood and feeling.

Ideas -
1) If a player fails to attend a gaming session without prior notice or a reasonable excuse, his or her character is run by the other players. The player must deal with the consequences. <-- I don't actually do this; Usually I just hand wave it, saying the character is busy doing something else and move on. I have seriously thought about it though.

2) Conspire in secret with one player - His or her character is actually an agent for the enemy, and is covertly working to sabotage the other characters; Leading them into traps and ambushes, purposely throwing them off the trail of their objective, etc. <-- I HAVE done this, it was great fun.

3) SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT'S Fantastical Emporium of Marvels, Wonders, and Glorious Blunders.

A shop run by SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT. It never appears in the same place, but can appear anywhere including inside of dungeons. SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT never talks, but he has a talking owl named Willhem the Utterly Trustworthy. When Wilhem talks, half the time he lies, and half the time he tells the truth. If you attempt to attack or steal from SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT, you will regret it, for SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT is a powerful wizard. You might appear 300 miles away in the town square of a city under enemy control, entirely naked and the opposite gender. Or you might suddenly gain 400 hundred pounds and break out in a terrible itchy rash.

SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT also gets angry if you don't say his full name loudly and triumphantly. SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT sells literally everything that can be found in any legal book, but it is grossly overpriced. <-- Exists in all of my campaigns. SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT has become legend in my gaming group.

inexorabletruth
2013-12-26, 12:26 AM
Include a 6 second timer for each turn.
I've tried this before. It really adds intensity to battle. If you don't declare at least a move or action within your six seconds, you delay initiative to the end of the round. If you don't manage to fit your turn at the end of the round, you either lose your turn or only manage to get halfway through it (more relevant when casting spells or doing multiple attacks per round) that round.

Incorporate terrain and surroundings to a more elaborate level.
In the enchanted woods? Why not make it enchanted?! Water has healing/enlarging/reducing properties. Moss works like Faerie Fire. Special colored rocks found within mushroom groves work like Thunderstones. The mushrooms… don't get me started. Everything within the forest can be harvested and combined with other items to make an Alchemical or weak Magical item (similar to a potion, but with maybe half the effect).

Low tier classes have secret academies that teach esoteric techniques.
I ran a monk only campaign out of a temple known as The Flame Hand. Within its basement chambers was hidden scrolls that would give them increasingly advanced (touch, burst, cone) Fire Attacks each time they expended a Stunning Fist attempt.

Tell about NPCs that the PCs recognize.
I do this all the time now. It only really works in PbP though, but this is especially powerful in battle. If a PC hears an NPCs name or the NPC does something that would spark memory about that person (speak loud enough for the PC to clearly hear the NPCs voice, for instance) give a 1 paragraph bio about that farmer, tavern server, stableboy, whatever. Talk about their families, their hopes and dreams, who they were in love with, whatever you think the PC would know about them based on the amount of time they've spent there. You want to see a player really get into character? Give something a moral/emotional conundrum to deal with when poor old farmer Brown (widowed father of 3), who's daughter Kate is to be wed a fortnight from now to the strapping young son of the family's closest friends, takes a javelin to the hamstring as an orc charges up with a proper throat-slitting knife to finish the deal, and moving from their current location to stop the impending death of a sweet-hearted old man means they might have to risk a few AoOs.

Offer bonus XP to anyone who dresses in character for the session. (Even more if they speak in character the whole time.)
No explanation needed. This is freaking awesome.

Give low level characters cursed or at least complicated magical weapons.
Make them functional… and definitely better than mundane or masterwork weapons, but give them a strange quirk… like the absolute unwillingness to attack giant types. Or the tendency to tell awful one-liner jokes when it gets bored. Or the tendency to periodically blast sparks of multi-collored lights into the air (like miniature fireworks) at random-rolled times. Or better yet… equip them with a Feeder (Bestiary of Krynn, pg 33) and don't let them know about it. Good weapons with complicated personalities or bizarre quirks can make a game fun without trollin' the players.

Jack of Spades
2013-12-26, 02:09 AM
3. Instead of using dice, each player is given a certain number of "Influence Points" per session. Whenever an important event occurs in-game, each player involved "bets" or wagers as much Influence Points as they want, but they do it secretly. And all at once the players reveal how much Influence Points that they each bet. Whoever bets the most "wins" and gets to determine the outcome. However, you lose all Influence Points you bet, regardless if you won or lost. A GM or referee will be needed here of course so things don't get out of hand.
This sounds a lot like the Willpower system in Everyone is John (http://wso.williams.edu/~msulliva/campaigns/john/), which happens to be GM-less.

Low tier classes have secret academies that teach esoteric techniques.
I ran a monk only campaign out of a temple known as The Flame Hand. Within its basement chambers was hidden scrolls that would give them increasingly advanced (touch, burst, cone) Fire Attacks each time they expended a Stunning Fist attempt.
If one is going to make character classes an in-game construct, one should absolutely do this, and probably for every class. It's an awesome idea. Works as a way of putting a band-aid on balance issues, but works really well as a way of explaining why classes are in-game constructs in the first place.

Tell about NPCs that the PCs recognize.
I do this all the time now. It only really works in PbP though, but this is especially powerful in battle. If a PC hears an NPCs name or the NPC does something that would spark memory about that person (speak loud enough for the PC to clearly hear the NPCs voice, for instance) give a 1 paragraph bio about that farmer, tavern server, stableboy, whatever. Talk about their families, their hopes and dreams, who they were in love with, whatever you think the PC would know about them based on the amount of time they've spent there. You want to see a player really get into character? Give something a moral/emotional conundrum to deal with when poor old farmer Brown (widowed father of 3), who's daughter Kate is to be wed a fortnight from now to the strapping young son of the family's closest friends, takes a javelin to the hamstring as an orc charges up with a proper throat-slitting knife to finish the deal, and moving from their current location to stop the impending death of a sweet-hearted old man means they might have to risk a few AoOs.
YES. Every day, yes. Shoves your player characters right into the world. I love it.

Offer bonus XP to anyone who dresses in character for the session. (Even more if they speak in character the whole time.)
No explanation needed. This is freaking awesome.
I get doing voices, but most people I play with are consistently using characters with whom they don't share a body type or gender. Also, there's no need to feed into the already-existing stereotypes about people who play RPG's.

Give low level characters cursed or at least complicated magical weapons.
Make them functional… and definitely better than mundane or masterwork weapons, but give them a strange quirk… like the absolute unwillingness to attack giant types. Or the tendency to tell awful one-liner jokes when it gets bored. Or the tendency to periodically blast sparks of multi-collored lights into the air (like miniature fireworks) at random-rolled times. Or better yet… equip them with a Feeder (Bestiary of Krynn, pg 33) and don't let them know about it. Good weapons with complicated personalities or bizarre quirks can make a game fun without trollin' the players.
I'd change this to "always use cursed/complicated magical weapons," but that's because I'm not a huge fan of the whole 'magic weapons as power progression' thing that DnD leans on. I've always thought that magic weapons work a lot better when they're rare, mysterious, and weird.

inexorabletruth
2013-12-26, 05:54 AM
I get doing voices, but most people I play with are consistently using characters with whom they don't share a body type or gender. Also, there's no need to feed into the already-existing stereotypes about people who play RPG's.

And what's the harm in that? Some of my male friends make a darn sexy elven princess… and I've seen a handful of female friends rock a pretty terrifying male dwarf or half-orc costume for cosplay events. It's fantasy. If you can't even be allowed to think outside of the gender/body type box for fantasy… when can you?

Jlerpy
2013-12-26, 06:04 AM
The purpose of this thread is to come up with and share any interesting, unusual, bizarre, crazy, and hopefully fun ideas used for tabletop roleplaying games. The point of this thread is to think outside the box. I'll start with a few:

1. Using the White Elephant Method for determining which player gets which character.

I'd try it for a one-shot. Then again, given how often there's "I don't mind, after you" at the start of con sessions...


2. Each time a combat begins, some kind of battle music must be played.

I have music all the time.


3. Instead of using dice, each player is given a certain number of "Influence Points" per session. Whenever an important event occurs in-game, each player involved "bets" or wagers as much Influence Points as they want, but they do it secretly. And all at once the players reveal how much Influence Points that they each bet. Whoever bets the most "wins" and gets to determine the outcome. However, you lose all Influence Points you bet, regardless if you won or lost. A GM or referee will be needed here of course so things don't get out of hand.

Sounds a bit like the Marvel Universe Roleplaying Game.


4. At the beginning of each session, each player's character is introduced, and each player has to select a theme song for their character, and during each introduction, the theme song must be played.

I don't have music for each character, but I have an opening credits sequence.


5. Each session, each player is given a card. It is to remain face down and the player is not allowed to know what the card is. Should a player's character dies, the card is immediately flipped over and depending on which card it is, an effect will occur in-game.

Unless there's some way to peek at the card, that's the same as just drawing as card if the character dies.
Which is not a bad idea, I'm just saying.

Jlerpy
2013-12-26, 06:14 AM
1) If a player fails to attend a gaming session without prior notice or a reasonable excuse, his or her character is run by the other players. The player must deal with the consequences. <-- I don't actually do this; Usually I just hand wave it, saying the character is busy doing something else and move on. I have seriously thought about it though.

That sounds very likely to lead to silliness.


2) Conspire in secret with one player - His or her character is actually an agent for the enemy, and is covertly working to sabotage the other characters; Leading them into traps and ambushes, purposely throwing them off the trail of their objective, etc. <-- I HAVE done this, it was great fun.

This can be good fun.
I've also had good fun with doing it retroactively. One of the PCs had just found out that his manservant had betrayed them (a while ago, when he'd only just come to work for him, before they'd really developed any trust; since then, he'd felt bad about it, but hadn't figured out as way to bring it up without ruining everything). After a bit of gnashing and paranoia, I turned to one of the other PCs and asked him why he'd arranged it. He was surprised, but boy, did he run with it.


3) SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT'S Fantastical Emporium of Marvels, Wonders, and Glorious Blunders.

A shop run by SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT. It never appears in the same place, but can appear anywhere including inside of dungeons. SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT never talks, but he has a talking owl named Willhem the Utterly Trustworthy. When Wilhem talks, half the time he lies, and half the time he tells the truth. If you attempt to attack or steal from SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT, you will regret it, for SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT is a powerful wizard. You might appear 300 miles away in the town square of a city under enemy control, entirely naked and the opposite gender. Or you might suddenly gain 400 hundred pounds and break out in a terrible itchy rash.

SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT also gets angry if you don't say his full name loudly and triumphantly. SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT sells literally everything that can be found in any legal book, but it is grossly overpriced. <-- Exists in all of my campaigns. SHAMTAKKU THE MAGNIFICENT has become legend in my gaming group.

There is almost nothing in that which isd not ridiculous.

Jack of Spades
2013-12-26, 02:58 PM
And what's the harm in that? Some of my male friends make a darn sexy elven princess… and I've seen a handful of female friends rock a pretty terrifying male dwarf or half-orc costume for cosplay events. It's fantasy. If you can't even be allowed to think outside of the gender/body type box for fantasy… when can you?
Well, there's a bit of a difference between a cosplay event, like a convention or a LARP, and 'our normal Saturday meetup at Steve's house where we eventually get around to gaming.'

Honestly, the body type slash gender thing is less of an issue to me than the "Really, we're going to be those gamers?" factor.

So, for a special occasion? Sure, go nuts. I just don't care to see it every session, y'know?

Dimers
2013-12-26, 03:11 PM
DMing by Mad Libs: At the end of each session or arc, have the players briefly answer questions like

What will the characters smell during the next session?
What symbol will they see?
What kind of man or woman will they meet?
What emotion will highlight their experiences?
What place will become important?
What will acquire new significance?
What animal or monster will appear?
What number will influence the party?
What institution will come to the fore?
Which character will one of these things happen to? (including NPCs)
What magic effect will be witnessed?
What weird sensation will come over a character? (including NPCs)
What will happen to a character's body unexpectedly? (including NPCs)


Then you try to work those things into the next session or arc. It's an unusual form of player empowerment that keeps the DM as the primary influence on the setting.

Jlerpy
2013-12-26, 03:57 PM
DMing by Mad Libs: At the end of each session or arc, have the players briefly answer questions like

What will the characters smell during the next session?
What symbol will they see?
What kind of man or woman will they meet?
What emotion will highlight their experiences?
What place will become important?
What will acquire new significance?
What animal or monster will appear?
What number will influence the party?
What institution will come to the fore?
Which character will one of these things happen to? (including NPCs)
What magic effect will be witnessed?
What weird sensation will come over a character? (including NPCs)
What will happen to a character's body unexpectedly? (including NPCs)


Then you try to work those things into the next session or arc. It's an unusual form of player empowerment that keeps the DM as the primary influence on the setting.

I do something similar, but in the moment, rather than between sessions.

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-12-27, 05:35 PM
I wouldn't use White Elephant for character selection; I'd find a way to use it as a core mechanic of the game! Maybe it would be a story where characters could have one of several outcomes, and all the outcomes are hidden (or randomly rolled). You pick one and "unwrap" it at the end of a scene centered on you. Then, the next player who gets a spotlight scene could either steal your ending for themselves or grab one from the center.

And I bet there'd be other ways to use it.

Creativity! That's the spirit!

Jlerpy
2013-12-27, 05:42 PM
I wouldn't use White Elephant for character selection; I'd find a way to use it as a core mechanic of the game! Maybe it would be a story where characters could have one of several outcomes, and all the outcomes are hidden (or randomly rolled). You pick one and "unwrap" it at the end of a scene centered on you. Then, the next player who gets a spotlight scene could either steal your ending for themselves or grab one from the center.

And I bet there'd be other ways to use it.

Creativity! That's the spirit!

I'm reminded of a game that used an "I cut, you choose" dynamic: one player (in a 2-player conflict) describes two personal outcomes, the other player chooses who gets which one.

Calen
2013-12-27, 06:33 PM
Somehow randomly assigning characters sounds great, might be worth a try sometime. Since I primarily play online games that would make it harder for me though.

Playing around with items is something that I do a lot of. My current party has 12 unidentified potions that no one has tried yet.

Jormengand
2013-12-28, 03:21 PM
I'm reminded of a game that used an "I cut, you choose" dynamic: one player (in a 2-player conflict) describes two personal outcomes, the other player chooses who gets which one.

I don't know about RPGs, but Magic: The Gathering has A set of cards that do that kind of thing. (http://wiki.mtgsalvation.com/article/Divvy)

Would be interesting mechanic for a game, actually.