Giant Detailed Settings And Story-Gaming!

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  • Posted By: LaughingJackWiltonThat's mostly about games that have a lot of material that's essential knowledge, rather than extra grist to the GM's mill.
    All games with a GM have every piece of setting information in the second category and none in the first, by virtue of the role of the GM as arbiter and creator of the setting for play. If there is more or less essential knowledge in a campaign, that is by virtue of a GM decision, not a design decision. This is one important reason having a GM is great.

    Naturally this only applies to games with GMs where one person is responsible for deciding what is essential setting knowledge and what isn't. In games where that power is shared, the responsibility is shared too.

    If I stacked up everything ever written for the Forgotten Realms, it would be taller than I am. I could design a game where virtually every page needed to be understood by the players, and I could design a game with two paragraphs out of one book in the middle of the list. But it's my decision as a GM, it has nothing to do with what the designer may have thought was a good campaign. Indeed, I can pretty much guarantee every game I play is played in such a way as would make the designer scream and start crying and fall down on the floor sniveling - or worse, grit their teeth and mumble something like 'that sounds really interesting' all the while wanted to kill me, then themselves.

    Should have another post up soon!
  • edited February 2010
    Posted By: JDCorleyAll games with a GM have every piece of setting information in the second category and none in the first, by virtue of the role of the GM as arbiter and creator of the setting for play.
    Except that I can't think of any role-playing game that's written that way. It's certainly an interpretation you can apply, but all the setting-heavy books I can think of make the assumption that the GM will conform to the printed material as much as possible. If they are intended to be the latter, then they are simply badly written because they conceal the important story germs within irrelevant detail.

    To take them as extensions to the basic information, as a resource to make the GM's job easier, supplemental books and sections are fine. If the material is just a weak suggestion, then you run the risk of a player assuming details that the GM has changed (and often this doesn't break the player knowledge/character knowledge barrier).

    Some games even make important information with regards to character motivation and knowledge part of a massive, indigestible construct that has to be swallowed before play can begin (White Wolf, I'm looking in your direction). As such, it's an obstacle to play- where this happens I'd comfortably class it as a design flaw. Fortunately, it seems to be an unheard-of phenomenon in Indie RPGs, and a good thing too.
  • Posted By: QueexIf they are intended to be the latter, then they are simply badly written because they conceal the important story germs within irrelevant detail.
    What I suspect our host would say to that is that it doesn't matter what the person who wrote the book intended, it only matters what you want in your game.

    So if I pick up a 300-page Spelljammer setting book, but I ignore every single piece of information that the game writers clearly meant to be important in favor of one paragraph about bariaur society that gets me jazzed, then THAT become the "important" information for my game.

    Mmm ... bariaurs....
  • Posted By: QueexOddly, I blogged recently about games with lots of setting. I'll link it rather than repost it in its entirety-http://queex.livejournal.com/163480.html.

    The executive summary is that big setting == bad design, unless you take special measures to minimise the amount of material new players need to absorb in order to bootstrap themselves into the game.

    That's mostly about games that have a lot of material that's essential knowledge, rather than extra grist to the GM's mill. The gazetteer approach, where the fluff provides a decent enough list of background material the GM can mine for story hooks is better, but I've always thought that it would be far more efficient if it was pared down to just the bullet points that could drive a story, no matter how interesting the detail actually is.
    I think this really strongly depends on a set of assumptions that tend not to be true for my big setting games. Obviously, if you think of setting detail as useless dross, then you can improve "efficiency" by paring it down as far as it will go. However, for many games I value that detail.

    So, for example, I don't think that my Korea game would have been improved if I set it up so that we could start playing without players knowing what Buddhism and Confucianism were - or even what the Taiping Rebellion was. The backdrop and traditions were a part of the game, and while there was a lot of stuff that was detailed in play, there was still a certain amount detailed up front - more than a few bullet points. Now, I could have started with almost no background knowledge, but I don't think it would have improved the game.

    If you don't want any of the detail at the start - only wanting to select out a paragraph or two or some bullet points, say - then I'd question whether you want to be getting into a giant detailed setting in the first place. There's nothing wrong with simple setting games - that might be a better choice for that campaign.
  • There is one little thing that "buggers" me here. You might know the french saying : "you can't get the butter, the money for the butter, the ass of the milkmaid and the smile of the milkman".

    As I see it, you can't have a functional 300 pages that would cover all the needs for everyone (herein what is described in the above).
    I see this management of fluff exactly as for crunch : it would be very specific. This fluff would be good at addressing *something* (put what you are asking for).

    But we need to state it beforehand and stop doing like "adding" pages is solving the problem.
    The nerve of the war is selling out the right content to the right person. In a quick, accessible, intuitive way.

    Another question, by the way : let's say I'm playing an historical period for the sake of discovering (exploring) the true meaning of Confucianism (or economy breakdown), is a rpg book really the best resource ? Or shouldn't this book give something to play and show me toward some good place for historical references ?
  • Posted By: pellsBut we need to state it beforehand and stop doing like "adding" pages is solving the problem.
    The nerve of the war isselling out the right content to the right person. In a quick, accessible, intuitive way.

    Another question, by the way : let's say I'm playing an historical period for the sake of discovering (exploring) the true meaning of Confucianism (or economy breakdown), is a rpg book really the best resource ? Or shouldn't this book give something toplayand show me toward some good place for historical references ?
    Thses two things go together, though, don't they?

    I mean, a historical setting game should, hopefully, have the historical info in a quick, accessible, intuitive way and one geared towards being used in the game.

    Pointing to great non-game books is always appreciated, but doesn't do much directly for the game or for players unwilling to take the time to read those sources initially.
  • Okay, let me rephrase and give you an example (not an happy thought, but in link with the Korea example).

    I like the Korean/Japanese/Chinese history, pacific war in particular. One "major" event, you might know, is the attack of Nanjing (also called the rape of Nanjing). I've read something like 2000 pages on this, some comic books (yes, they exist on the subject and they are strange), I saw movies too. Now, can *someone* produce a rpg, providing enough *fluff* to play a campaign like this (with, by the way, some heavy moral dilemma) ? I guess so (now, would it be happy ? not quite sure. That said, you can take human condition as another example, more happier, which requires a lot of background). Is the rpg a substitute of all those books ? I guess, no. I'm even hoping not !!!

    Now, I think rpg (in their fluff version of the product) are a good way to introduce people in a "fun" (read "ludique" in french here) way to those issues.
    And is this a great asset of our hobby ? I say "hell yes" !!!
  • I think I follow you, pells.

    No, I'd imagine that a game couldn't begin to match all of those other sources taken collectively. My interest is more on how to start with somehing like those resources, then boil it down to some form of presentation that is more geared towards a game, if that makes sense.

    For example, how compressed could one make the necessary info, almost as a sort of cheat-sheet, to hand around to players? How could one use imagery to convey concepts? Also, even prior to getting into game mechanics, how does one convey the essence of the setting and the type of play either the GM or designer wants to encourage?
  • Now I'm going to show you why gigantic setting books are good for more than just Oracles, randomly turning to a page and getting a situation from it.

    The next thing you do once you have a basic concept and an idea of the conceptual layout of the game is you go trolling for ways to expand your concept. This has several purposes:

    1 - prophylactic. You may get four sessions in and everyone stops the game to announce it is the worst game and nobody wants to play it anymore. No problem. You can then take the characters to do something else.

    2 - verisimilitude. Sometimes it's good in stories to see a bit of slice-of-life not connected to the conflict. It's important that it be a bit "off to the side", only visible in the wide view.

    3 - complications. Sometimes your players will solve a problem so fast that it throws off the pacing of the game and makes everything easy and boring. Bringing in something from left field is a good way to re-ignite stories that have fallen into a rut.

    4 - elements for the story. A character that's neat, a plot that's ongoing, stuff like that. Really you are so great you probably don't need this stuff but it never hurts, Moliere.

    So let's go!

    The first thing I do is I actually read the rest of the entry on P'Bapar, instead of just page 87.

    It says that it's a leader among the Young Kingdoms, that's interesting. Maybe the players' decisions are emulated in other places and we can see how their strategies work out in other places.

    The Archduke prefers a small government, with lots of responsibilities loaded on very few people. Interesting, what if one of these guys goes off the rails, or takes a disliking to the player characters? That could mean that if they, for example, piss off one of the religious leaders, they might find their favorite inn is off limits to them, even though the two may not be otherwise connected. Xkewl.

    There's a couple of interesting dudes in the Mages & Sages and Underworld section. Of course I always love crime stories and put crime in everything, even if it doesn't belong. I file these away under possible complications and move on.

    A mile north of the city is Crag Keep, right on the border with someone or other. Apparently they claim all the land around there but when trouble comes, they turn to P'Bapar. That's a pretty good "someone is running into town carrying a torch screaming for any moron with a sword to come running" type of hook.

    The next thing I do is go "up a level" to read about what the Young Kingdoms (of which P'Bapar is a leader) are. This is back at the beginning of the chapter. Not much to say there except they are newly independent and the faraway Emperor (whoever that is) is not thrilled about it. Maybe some kind of Imperial spy comes in and fucks everything up. Meh, all right, it's not knocking my socks off.

    Next thing to do is actually look up what the dwarves and humans are like. Way back in Chapter 1. Hm, looks like it's Brandobians? I guess. There's a pretty interesting ethnic diversity of humans there. But it looks like dwarves are just dwarves. Okay, fine.

    Next thing is to check out what the Temples I was talking about earlier actually mean. This is chapter 10. And right away I am loving this list of gods, because even just in the header I'm seeing something cool about the gods of Kalamar. They're classified virtually all by what they do. In other words, clerics on Kalamar are less worshipping because wow, they think the god is just so great, but instead because hey, people need to fight evil, counsel others, study the world, and so on, and this god is going to help everyone do that. That is a cool and very practical thing.

    Oh hey wait, the players are going to have to know something about this setting before we even get to character creation. OH NO JDCORLAY WHAT WILL YOU DO NOW

    Find out in the next post.
  • There's been a lot of discussion in the thread about how to get information across to the players. And whether you have to. Blah blah blah. Actually it's a good discussion and a good thread that deserves more than 'blah blah blah', I'll do something about that later.

    Your job as GM is to sort the facts in the fiction into several categories:

    1 - Stuff the players absolutely must know, one hundred percent have to know, before beginning play.
    2 - Stuff you can tell the players as you go along, and which they should remember because it is impractical or lame to tell them more than once.
    3 - Stuff you can tell the players as you go along, several times if need be, it's not an issue.
    4 - Stuff you can tell the players as you go along if it comes up.
    5 - Stuff you never need to tell the players unless they specifically charge after that fact with an axe.

    How do you decide this? Well, it's not an exact science and it's going to take some practice. You are going to misfile some facts at various times. But here are some good guidelines.

    Know what your players consider "fair". If you play Houses of the Blooded and say "You've cornered the killer. He says 'did it work? Do they think you're chasing me?'" and they go "Haha, fuck yeah, I'm working with the killer!" then you can hide the ball a lot more than if they go "What, no, fuck you, that goes against the entire motivation of my character!"

    In the example I gave above, with a bunch of hippies who are used to story games, they are pretty used to games where sudden new facts are "revealed". That's good, it means you can put more facts into 3 and 4.

    Sometimes you have a player who really wants a lot of details before they make decisions about where they want to go in the setting. That's good too, you can put facts in 1 and 3.

    Sometimes you have a player who is going to make the same type of character no matter what game you're playing. That's good, you can put more in 4.

    Everything in 1 goes on handouts and is addressed in your opening briefing about the campaign and the characters. Everything in 2 goes on handouts and you don't worry about it until you have to hand it out. You are the controller of everything in 3-5.

    You must be up front with the players about what you expect from them. If I want people in my Kalamar game to be able to pronounce "P'Bapar" (try it!), I not only need to tell them how to pronounce it, I need to tell them I expect them to pronounce it properly.

    Sometimes you will get players who don't even want to read a one-sheet - your "1" facts, above. These players are telling you they don't want to play in your game! Listen to them! Don't make them play in your game!

    Now you have some additional responsibility here as well. Sometimes the reason players don't want to read or pay attention to a one-sheet of material is because they've played in so many games where that material is boring or lame or just so badly categorized that the GM made the material they were expected to learn completely irrelevant - like if I started pronouncing "P'Bapar" wrong after hammering everyone to pronounce it right.

    This is why you have to practice this sorting task until you master it, so they can trust that what you're doing is actually going to matter to them.

    Next....the Player Who Loves Kalamar joins my game! WHAT NOW!!
  • Posted By: JDCorleyNext....the Player Who Loves Kalamar joins my game! WHAT NOW!!
    OH NO JDCORLAY WHAT WILL YOU DO NOW????!!!
  • HAY JAYDEECORLAY, isn't all that stuff in #110 rather similar to how the 4E Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide is organized?

    And didn't that book get a lot of god reviews and praise for being a good setting book to use? So hey, shouldn't other setting books be organized that way, because at the very least, GMs/players would get the experience of doing it once, and then they might gravitate towards doing this naturally?
  • Posted By: JDCorleyIf I want people in my Kalamar game to be able to pronounce "P'Bapar" (try it!)
    I just tried it and I think maybe I'm putting too much spit into it. So, uh, how do you pronounce it?

    And can I get a towel over here?
  • Posted By: pellsAs I see it, you can't have a functional 300 pages that would cover all the needs for everyone (herein what is described in the above). I see this management of fluff exactly as for crunch : it would be very specific. This fluff would be good at addressing *something* (put what you are asking for).

    But we need to state it beforehand and stop doing like "adding" pages is solving the problem. The nerve of the war is selling out the right content to the right person. In a quick, accessible, intuitive way.
    Well, this determines how you would break up your setting books, I would say. If, say, there is one set of users who only use detailed gazeteer information, and another set who only use detailed history information -- then I think you might do well to have a supplement only about history and keep the history in the core setting book short. If there are some things that only a few users would want (or only a few users don't want) - then you should play to the majority. You can't please everyone all the time.

    In my experience of Harn and other settings, though, players didn't vary so much on the type of detail they wanted - but more on how much detail they wanted. Thus, the approach was to have a detailed but not super-detailed core book, and then a lot of add-on modules.
    Posted By: pellsAnother question, by the way : let's say I'm playing an historical period for the sake of discovering (exploring) the true meaning of Confucianism (or economy breakdown), is a rpg book really the best resource ? Or shouldn't this book give something toplayand show me toward some good place for historical references ?
    In my experience, adult history books tend to suck at providing information needed for an RPG. They tend to be macro-histories that discuss the chains of events with kings and armies, and give little idea about what life was like. Children's history books are often better at illustrating what daily life was like - but daily life is different than the lives of player characters. So yes, in principle, I think that an RPG book can in principle be a very good resource - though there are many examples of poorly done historical RPG books (as well as some good ones).

    However, I don't think my point about the Korea campaign was limited to real-world history. The point is that extra details can change the tone of a campaign considerably.

    i.e. I could indeed run a 19th century Korea game with little to no background knowledge. The players could just play off of familiar Asian tropes from different martial arts films, and we could create characters quickly and get on with playing the campaign. However, I assert that this creates a very different experience than if the players learn some about Confucianism and mudangs and the Taiping Rebellion first.

    In the same way, one can start up a campaign set in Harn with no particular background knowledge. However, it is very different from playing in a game where you know the background. So, my first Harn PC was a priest of Agrik, and it made considerable difference when I knew about the Morgathian theocracy that had been thrown down decades earlier. My conception of my character was very different than if I just went with a quickie summary of Agrik as "evil fire god." His whole view of life was shaped to a degree by the evils that he felt he was fighting against.
  • I think the idea that most adult history books are "macro-histories" is probably true of popular historical works, but diplomatic/social histories of this sort have not been the primary sorts of works produced by most historians for some time. Economic and social histories are definitely available, and will give you a better picture of daily life than the kings-and-armies sorts of books that you find on end-of-aisle displays in Border's. It does require going into the specialist historical literature, however, which is not always hugely accessible, whether physically or attentionally (they can be very, very dry).

    Of course, for certain time periods (very late Antiquity in Europe through till the Carolingian/Macedonian revival, or Anglo-Saxon England) primary sources are rare and almost entirely chronicle-style, so there is slightly less scope for economic and social history, but some very valiant attempts have been made, usually drawing heavily on the archaeological record.

    YMMV, since not everyone can get through this sort of thing (I personally find it very hard to maintain interest in hardcore archaeological discussion) but the information is definitely there, and in a great more detail, in adult history books.
  • edited February 2010
    Before I get on with the Player Who Loves Kalamar, let me go back and address some stuff from earlier in this (really great) thread.

    In reverse!!
    Posted By: JARI think the idea that most adult history books are "macro-histories" is probably true of popular historical works, but diplomatic/social histories of this sort have not been the primary sorts of works produced by most historians for some time. Economic and social histories are definitely available, and will give you a better picture of daily life than the kings-and-armies sorts of books that you find on end-of-aisle displays in Border's. It does require going into the specialist historical literature, however, which is not always hugely accessible, whether physically or attentionally (they can be very, very dry).
    I love reading boring books. I bet some of your players will too! I would love to play in a game sometime where the explicit expectation was "read and learn this 300 page history book about the era we are playing in", with a group of people who have done just that. Naturally if someone hates doing that, they will never like studying up on a setting presented in that way.

    Most of the "birds eye view" histories of kings and whatnot are still pretty decent for coming up with conflicts the player characters can get dealt into, though. In fact, the vast majority of fictional settings are presented in this way in RPGs. Oddly, one of the most vivid exceptions was the Netherworld of Feng Shui, an action movie inspired game - the source material's setting information is at MOST a single title card at the beginning of a film!
    Posted By: JohnstoneHAY JAYDEECORLAY, isn't all that stuff in #110 rather similar to how the 4E Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide is organized?
    I'm going to have to take a look at it again when I get home. I don't remember that being true, but maybe it is!
    Posted By: komradebobFor example, how compressed could one make the necessary info, almost as a sort of cheat-sheet, to hand around to players? How could one use imagery to convey concepts? Also, even prior to getting into game mechanics, how does one convey the essence of the setting and the type of play either the GM or designer wants to encourage?
    There are lots of ways to teach the players things - probably enough for another thread, because you have to teach mechanics and stuff too, as a GM or even just as a game organizer and advocate in your group. I try to combine text, verbal discussion and the occasional illustration or tactile exercise ("Now, hand the fan mail chip to Ryan.") Writing a one-sheet isn't easy, because you have to be concise and conciseness is very hard. Also, as I noted, it's not easy to figure out what goes on a one-sheet, it takes practice and knowledge about your group and the game you intend to run. It's very rare that, for example, you do a cheat sheet for a convention game that hits one hundred percent of the things that people need to know to play, because the players are going to be strangers to you.
    Posted By: QueexPosted By: JDCorleyAll games with a GM have every piece of setting information in the second category and none in the first, by virtue of the role of the GM as arbiter and creator of the setting for play.
    Except that I can't think of any role-playing game that's written that way. It's certainly an interpretation you can apply, but all the setting-heavy books I can think of make the assumption that the GM will conform to the printed material as much as possible. If they are intended to be the latter, then they are simply badly written because they conceal the important story germs within irrelevant detail.

    I disagree - unless the setting book somehow changes the role of the GM in the game, the GM's responsibility in the rules as the person who adjudicates, introduces, and controls setting remains. And indeed, as I said in the first post of this thread, it is absolutely impossible to use every fact in a big setting book, or even a relatively modest one, in a game. It's trivial to recognize that impossibility and a GM is empowered by the rules of the game to act accordingly.

    Interestingly, there is viirtually no help in most big thick setting books, or even modest ones, on how to use the book. Not "stick as close to you can to the printed material!" or "change the printed material a lot, it will be great!", typically you will get absolutely nothing. In Kingdoms of Kalamar, there is literally zero, not one word, not one paragraph, nothing that says "Hey, GM, welcome, glad you're reading our book, here's what you should be looking for in order to make a great game." This is terrible, and it's terrible that our dumb industry hasn't figured out that "how to use this book in a campaign" is the most important text you can put in a book even if it's a setting book, perhaps especially if it's a setting book.

    I'll talk about the Player Who Loves Kalamar, which you also brought up, in my next post. You're right, it can be problematic sometimes, but rarely as much as people think. I used to rant and rail about how bad metaplots were, myself. What if a player joined my group who wanted things to be some other way, what then?! Stay tuned.

    Hexabolic posted about "splats". I'll talk about supplemental setting material later too, but Hex more or less has the right of it. There's typically just plain no difference between supplemental setting material and big thick book setting material except where the game company decided to insert covers and time in between it. You have to find what is relevant to what you want to do, just as you would in the main setting book, or in the real world.
  • JD:
    How do you feel about going a different rout and using a very controlled, very focussed one-shot as an intro instead of other methods of imparting initial info?
  • The question wasn't addressed to me, but I'll throw in anyway: I love tightly controlled, highly focused one-shots as ways of imparting important information, although I haven't tried it as an intro (as either a GM or a player).

    But it's been used in our games as a way to "make in-game history fun" -- making the one-shot a window into some historical event that relates to the current plot, so that instead of the players getting a handout or a lecture from the GM to tell them about the Rock Creek Massacre, they actually got to be part of that Massacre. This worked out spectacularly in a horror game -- when the ancient evil was on the verge of waking, we went back and played through the fateful night back in Colonial times when it last awoke, and when we came back to the "real" game, no one needed to be lectured on how terrible it was or forgot the names of the families whose vicious blood feud released it.

    I don't see why it couldn't work as an intro just as well. For example, if you were going to play Cheech & Gimli in Kingdoms of Kalamar, you could probably reinforce some of the most important type-1 and type-2 temple facts and important dwarf information via play, and get better name- and fact-recognition than from just a pre-game lecture and a handout. By the time you hit the actual campaign, the story of the temple's founding or how the dwarf army successfully held off a monster invasion would be something that everyone "just knows" and might actually have some feelings about (bitterness towards the rival temple, reverence for their fallen heroes, whatever).
  • Wow !!! So much stuff here !!! Where to begin ?

    General note
    Am I getting this right ? There is not single product that can solve all *needs*, but there is a product for anyone *need* (otherwise, let's just throw the towel and not even think of producing such products).
    I do sense that at some point, in this thread, the solution is add modules !!! I don't think it is a viable solution. A major mistake in fact. Why ?
    Well, I do believe that fluff is like crunch : it is meant for one purpose, not all. If I would come here to propose you to add a module to d20 to play all type of narrative games, what would say ?
    If I was reading/writing a tragedy-like novel, and someone would come to me for some James bond adventures in it, is oh yeah sure, just add this part of text a good answer to you ? That would be a hell of a dysfunctional product for sure !!!

    Also, we're talking about a functional, intuitive product ; so how does having two products, not integrated (one providing details, the other being general), is going to be helpful ?

    JD
    I'm just wandering, and maybe, you'll come to this later, but what about stakes ? I mean, okay, you convinced me to play in your campaign, to play about that specific race, with that particular culture and you provide me with the stuff I need to be introduced, but what about the stories ? How is the world around the group going to evolve ? How to you provide the information ? Manage it ?
    You see the difference between "in this world we're playing, those two nations are at war" and "in the course of the campaign, those two nations will come to war" ?
    It is not only about which information to provide, but also when to provide it.

    Accounting for taste
    I like your idea of "teaser" ; this could do a good job. Throwing out the players just into it !!! And I think it should be part of the product.

    Introduction to the world - the setting only, not plots

    Yeah, I know this is bad, very, very bad : I'm going to show you exactly how I do it for my product and which tools I provide. All things I'm showing here are already given away (by me) and can be found else where on the web.
    Except, for the layout of the characters and locations, which I'm showing here as a preview (we just finished it yesterday) for the purpose of this thread. And yeah, I think it kicks ass !!!
    Okay, assemble your players for an evening, pick up a system (BW, TSOY, or whatever), bring up some good wine and food and present this :
    Map of the world
    A relationship map
    And those that you would move around to discuss :
    Races
    Characters
    Locations

    You might like or not the level of details of the text, but I'd like to point out the format of the description : very easy to manipulate, almost like the "cards" they provide for boardgames (fantasy flight games, in particular).
    And this is how we designed the product to look alike : not a BIG product, but A LOT of single ones.
  • I'd like to highlight the point jhkim's making, because it's one I'm interested in hearing addressed and I think it's getting lost.

    Paring down a large setting to a few facts that fit on a one-sheet is fine, but what do you do when that cuts out much of what makes the setting interesting? This comes up when the setting is based on a different culture from any that are familiar to the players. We all kind of know how medieval fantasy people think, and samurai culture is fairly widely known. But other cultures, such as 19th century Korea, or citizens of the Tsolyani empire on Tekumel, are different. If players don't understand what this culture is all about, and make sure it's part of the game and their characters, they'll be missing out on a lot of the fun.

    How do you get players on board with this kind of game?
  • Posted By: NeilHow do you get players on board with this kind of game?
    I think it's a pretty easy question - if a 1-sheet won't get across what you want everyone to absolutely know about the setting, use a 2-sheet, a 10-sheet packet and a movie night, or have a required reading list, but the most important thing is to make sure the players are as invested in the same things you are and understand what you want to do with the setting. Most of the time, the actual number of setting elements you can get across in a campaign of average length is very limited (if you have 30 sessions, you're probably introducing less than 200 things of any sort to the fiction, including things that wouldn't be classified as setting), and many of them can be introduced and explained by you in the moment without losing any of their impact, so you don't need to teach the setting to them completely before the first act of play. But if you don't feel that way about a game there's absolutely nothing wrong with saying "gang, this game is in part about existing in this highly detailed setting and I want you to read 300 pages before we start playing". Just make sure they know you're not joking and it's not optional. They can walk if they don't want to participate, and should.
  • So basically, it all boils down to "have the right group and lots of time".
  • ...then again, "have the right group and lots of time" tends to be a winning formula for a lot of games, doesn't it?
  • Yes, it is. And if we could find something (a product) that would help cut on lots of time, that would greatly help me.
  • Which is exactly where low-detail, make-it-up-as-you-go settings come in. You can't have everything.
  • Posted By: droogWhich is exactly where low-detail, make-it-up-as-you-go settings come in. You can't have everything.
    Right, if you want all your players to buy into and absorb all the details of a highly detailed setting, there are no shortcuts, there never will be one.
  • Posted By: droogWhich is exactly where low-detail, make-it-up-as-you-go settings come in. You can't have everything.
    I disagree that make-it-up-as-you-go settings are necessarily low-detail but that might be the subject for another thread entirely.
  • I'd summarize my view as:

    1) Don't view it as the setting you want that you are trying to persuade or trick your recalcitrant players into trying. Talk together as a group, throw out some ideas and see what people like. Be prepared to try a setting that might not be your first choice if deciding alone. If you have a bunch of history buffs, then consider a historical game. If you have fans of Tolkien or Zelazny or some media series, then consider that. If everyone considers detail dull and can't stand the idea of reading about any setting - then maybe a giant detailed setting isn't the right choice for this group.

    2) Agree as a group how you want to approach the setting. i.e. What supplements would you use, and how prepared should people be before starting the campaign. This doesn't have to be a GM decision that the players either accept or walk away from. Almost all settings can be done in higher or lower detail.

    3) Your group doesn't need a ton of free time - just be prepared for start-up to take multiple sessions. Consider taking more than one session for everyone to get together, brainstorm, and talk about the setting along with campaign and character ideas. This isn't a "failed" or "wasted" session - it's a time to make some snacks, have fun, and hang out with friends. I had a movie night where we watched the movie "Blood Rain" with my group before the Korea campaign, and talked about it afterwards. After that, we had a campaign and character creation session.

    4) Running a one-shot with pre-generated characters in the setting can be a good idea. If you're trying to introduce the setting, then a focus on places in the adventure is a good idea. I'm doing this with Castle Falkenstein.

    5) Make sure everyone has copies of the books. A lot of people have free time to read even if you have time scheduling game sessions.
    Posted By: NeilI'd like to highlight the point jhkim's making, because it's one I'm interested in hearing addressed and I think it's getting lost.

    Paring down a large setting to a few facts that fit on a one-sheet is fine, but what do you do when that cuts out much of what makes the setting interesting? This comes up when the setting is based on a different culture from any that are familiar to the players. We all kind of know how medieval fantasy people think, and samurai culture is fairly widely known. But other cultures, such as 19th century Korea, or citizens of the Tsolyani empire on Tekumel, are different. If players don't understand what this culture is all about, and make sure it's part of the game and their characters, they'll be missing out on a lot of the fun.

    How do you get players on board with this kind of game?
    I partly disagree here, because I think it's more about how the setting is done than familiarity. Most kinds of settings could be done as high detail, or could be done as low detail. For example, Harn is definitely medieval fantasy - and you could potentially approach it as just another fantasy world (i.e. "we all kind of know how medieval fantasy people think"). But there is a kind of fun that you miss out on if you ignore the detail. I think this is also true of historical - i.e. Victorian London is a mildly familiar culture, but you can do it as a sketchy, low-detail setting where you just play off a few stereotypes - or you can read up on fine points of detail regarding what people were really like then.
  • Okay, so my game has been such a success that I've attracted a new player who is SO PSYCHED ABOUT KALAMAR. He's read every Kalamar book and knows every page. He knows Kalamar far better than I do. And he wants to play in the game!

    It is very easy to snigger at this guy, or to somehow blame him. But it is not his fault he loves Kalamar. Love doesn't come to us and we take it or turn it away, it comes on us like a sickness, a surge of passion and we are caught forever. It's this way with me and Sherlock Holmes, it's this way with this guy and Kalamar.

    The real issue is that of authority. Whether there's GM-led or shared narration authority, someone who knows more about a subject can rightly get upset when the authority directs that things go opposite to what their knowledge indicates things should go. And authority can get exasperated when it's being corrected all the time by someone who thinks they know more.

    It gets worse when the person who has the knowledge doesn't have the authority. In a GM-led game, for example, something someone says can be a lie or the truth or in some grey zone. The whole conversation can be a dream or a hallucination. To have someone nitpick a conversational or descriptive detail can bring the whole game to a halt.

    So here's what you do.

    First, recognize the person with the greater knowledge. Talk to them separately from the rest of the group. "How do you see Kalamar? How do you see this area of Kalamar? What do you think of my game pitch? Is there something else you think would be cool to work in?" Listen closely to the answers. You are likely to learn something that you missed - after all, it's a big detailed setting, you're going to miss something. Shoot down an idea, there'll be at least one you don't want to do. See how they respond. Make a firm stand on what you see your game as. And if they start to nitpick that idea, listen to that too - they are telling you they don't want to play in your game. It doesn't fit their idea of the subject they love.

    Secondly, assuming that goes well, recruit them into explaining things to other participants. During character creation, have them help one person while you help another. Suggest that they play a widely-travelled character who can explain situations to the other characters, reducing your explanatory narration and "what do I know about this?" rolls.

    Finally and most importantly, have clear in your own mind what you see as your role and their role. The main problem comes when you say "The walls are 60 feet high" and the guy who loves Kalamar says "No, they're only 45 feet high" and neither you nor he are willing to give. This is a role-at-the-table issue, NOT an issue of big detailed settings.
  • Posted By: JDCorleyOkay, so my game has been such a success that I've attracted a new player who is SO PSYCHED ABOUT KALAMAR. He's read every Kalamar book and knows every page. He knows Kalamar far better than I do. And he wants to play in the game!
    Good advice!

    I did exactly this when running my Godlike campaign. One of the players was as big a WW2 buff as me and I utilized his knowledge in much the way you described. Since we had that understanding of roles and he realized I was making an effort to "get it right" he didn't nitpick and I frequently called on him to explain something to the other members of the group when the situation warranted. He got the opportunity to display his knowledge and love of the material and we all got added color.

    Worked out great!
  • Well, I hope the thread has been useful. In conclusion, here are all the great things about big setting books for story games:

    1 - Verisimilitude. What John Kim has elsewhere called a "non-fiction" style of story play. Extremely thorough guidance on what details in the setting are like.

    2 - Extremely Broad Application. A large number of groups looking for a lot of different things are well-served by a product that gives a lot of different ideas for different ways to use the material.

    3 - Setting Mastery. Fans of big brick fantasy novels know what I'm talking about here - the pleasure of recognizing something in a setting you already knew when you see it for the first time. Actually this is kinda like #1, but incorporates the expertise of the players as well.

    Remember that initial principle: you can't possibly use every part of a big setting book and it's inadvisable to try.

    And remember that if you want to write a giant setting book, give ideas and instructions on how to use the material.

    I think I got all the questions...but if I missed yours, it's been a big thread, please post 'em again and I'll answer all of them 100 percent perfectly.
  • I think another great thing about Big Setting Books is this:

    You allow people at the table with different levels of investment. That is, you tell the folks "We're playing Kalamar" (or Dark Sun, Blue Planet, Continuum, etc) and if you utilize the information above, you can bring people into the setting who only need to read 1-2 pages of pre-play information to "get it". Meanwhile, if one or more of your members has the free time and interest in reading more (read: "all of it, everywhere"), then they too have an equal seat at the table: Their level of investment can also be rewarded, and you can even draw on them (as Mike M indicates above) to help with explanations.

    -Andy
  • For me, the key strength of a giant detailed setting is that it allows richer communication of meaning.

    If I say "You see a Buddhist monk on the road." in the 19th century Korea game, or "You see an Peonian priest on the road." in a Harn game -- then I have communicated much more about the situation than I would have if I was running a low-detail setting saying "You see the priest of a peaceful religion on the road." This richness of meaning translates to all levels, so you've always got a lot of layers of meaning that are built up in situations.

    When done well, that detailed meaning isn't just dross that makes the game more believable - it adds depth to the events of the story. When my Agrikan character argues with the Peonian priest, there are all sorts of thematic allusions and ties that wouldn't be there if we didn't know anything about the religions of the world. That detail can prevent you from telling some simple iconic stories - but conversely it can lets you tell stories about detailed issues that you couldn't otherwise.
  • edited February 2010
    Thanks, Jason. I rate this thread both "Useful" and "Entertaining".

    EDIT: I am getting my big ol' Planescape setting out of the back of the closet this weekend.
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