[UA] 5 minutes til glory

[Royal Minister of Stuff]

I don't think there's anything WRONG with spending a
long time on a Scenario, but I usually spend a long
time on a Campaign instead.

The problem, for me, in spending a long time on a
Scenario is the very fact that players have free will
and I'm told people can read me pretty easily.

The very idea that I might be hemming people in or
setting up a situation -unless I set that situation up
in response to a player choice- sends everyone I've
ever played with on a sort of rampage.  Only the most
timid players -the ones who've had their individuality
and desire to tamper with plotlines whipped out of
them by GMs who call players stupid when they don't do
what looks obvious from the GM side of the table.

In the end, I know that there are usually only two or
three things in any game that I, as a GM, really want
to see happen.  I don't care how the players get to
those things, so long as they do interesting stuff
along the way.  Players never do interesting stuff if
they don't have any real choice.

I was in a game once where the players decided to take
a roadtrip for no very good reason.  They all had
"instantaneous travel" powers like teleportation and
dimension gates and what-not, but someone got a wild
hair and so they stole a car, bought a cooler, filled
it with beer and sandwich fixin's and drove across the
SouthWest.  I'd spent three weeks hammering out a
complex tale of intrigue using the inhabitants of the
players' appartment building.  I spent the first
session floundering until I realized that I could just
grab a few key elements that I'd wanted to see the
players interact with and toss them in at roadside
diners and truck stops along the highway.

Then again, in another "unplanned" roadtrip game, we
ended up selling Dracula Pie after finding a cardboard
box with that written on the outside in felt-tip
marker.  It was filled with ashes and sitting on a
porch in the Ozarks.  People bought the pie as if
hypnotized, but we made enough cash to visit a really
great strip bar right across the border in Texas.
 
--- Robin Pfeifer <robinpfeifer at web.de> wrote:
> I seem to be the only meticulous preparer left in
> the RPG business.... ;-)
> 
> I tried to keep my current scenario short, and it
> still fills 10 pages just
> for preparation. I usually prepare a storyline as it
> would unfold without
> the PCs intervening. Then I need to jot down a lot
> of information about GMCs
> and possible avenues of investigation the PCs might
> take. The actual writing
> helps me focus because I can tell a story to myself
> only so far, then I keep
> going in circles. If I write it down I can proceed.
> 
> The actual amount of those notes I then put to use
> in-game is rather small.
> And I never manage to guess the avenues the players
> take anyway.
> 
> All attempts to use any other style have been futile
> so far.
> 
> Robin
> 
> 
> 
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=====
-- Rp Bowman, Royal Minister of Stuff
The Electronic Nation of Yokeltania:
http://www.geocities.com/yokeltania/

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