I. Dear Reader,
I’ve been thinking about scenarios and railroading and ease of GMing.
Let me take a step back. GMing is hard. It’s not so hard that people don’t constantly just learn how to do it on their own but it’s hard enough that many people don’t do it. It’s also hard to talk about how hard GMing is because GMing isn’t the same thing. Different playstyles demand different skills. Different prospective GMs have different expectations for what they want to achieve.
But to me, the fundamental problem is the strength of RPGs: anything can happen. Tactical infinity, if you will. So how do you ever get comfortable with that? How do you prepare for everything?
The solution to the fundamental problem is pretty fundamental as well: you have to limit the possibilities. The typical way to do this is through your scenario. In fact, that’s the main thing a scenario does for you. The logic is simple: if the whole adventure happens in this 5×5 square, then you don’t need to improvise what the weather is like in Klatch.
The next thing a scenario does is help you envision an ending. In a location-based adventure, what’s at the end? In a monster hunt, there’s the monster. In a mystery, there’s the answer. The less obvious the ending, the harder the scenario is to run. Or to put it another way, the easier it is to hold the shape of the whole scenario in your head, the better.
If you’re interested in adventure or challenge or problem-solving, a dungeon with a clear goal (get the treasure) is great because the possibility space is literally bounded by the walls. Players aren’t going to ask to speak to their childhood friend, Zorp, or try to start a flying carpet business. They’re going to only engage with the ingredients listed in the recipe. Expanding this a little: What’s the difference between a dungeon and a long winding road through the desert? Or a creepy forest with a monster in it? The physical constraints are a little less obvious and the scenario becomes incrementally harder to the same text.
But what about the GMs who imagine their games in terms of genre and narrative and not challenge? Here, the solutions are less well-theorized. All my favourite story games are all big lifts but not because the rules are more complicated necessarily. But because they don’t offer an easy way to limit possibilities into something manageable. They might come with scenario starters but they don’t tend to be starter scenarios. They don’t tend to be bounded enough so it’s easy to hold the possibility space in your head.
When I discussed my Blades in ’68 game, I explained my scenario: Suicide Squad-style team of criminals gets charged with killing 5 villains before they destroy the city in 5 days. I did this to make the game easier for myself. This scenario has organic limits: space, time, people. You can politely explain to players that no, there isn’t time to invent a whole new type of bomb. If they don’t stick to task, their handlers will chase ’em down with prejudice. (They can choose to abandon the mission of course but that’s a sign the whole game isn’t working. Time to talk.)
That’s what’s been on my mind.
Yours scenariobly,
Thomas
II. Media of the Week
- Nothing this week!
- You too can support the newsletter on patreon!
- If you’ve released a new game on itch.io this month, let me know through this form so I can potentially include it in the end of the month round-up.
III. Links of the Week
- The Indie Game Reading Club reviews Mothership and comes to a number of good conclusions. I agree with Paul mostly but also agree with Markus of the Personable blog that the system is only half of the game. Maybe even less than that. The modules drive play, the system facilitates them.
- I generally felt that the Quinns Quest review was a bit too uncritical of the system and this review reflects my own experience more accurately. But Quinns specifically lavishes praise on the modules for good reason!
- The Dice Pool has a nice report on running Cosmic Dark, the new weird horror game from Graham Walsmley. (Which I will be contributing a scenario!)
- Skeleton Code Machine discusses a duplicitous minigame from the solo RPG, Mechs to Plowshares. The minigame essentially lies to you about what it does but the fun is in figuring out that it’s lying: “The Chaplain’s Game could be played over and over until the player (i.e. soldier) realizes the war is over.”
- Adrian Hon writes about Singapore-based KMS Games making jubensha in English.
From the archive:
- On Githyanki Diaspora, a good blog about how in Trophy Gold one roll acts as both perception check and encounter roll. (Issue 93, May 2022)
IV. Small Ads
All links in the newsletter are completely based on my own interest. But to help support my work, this section contains sponsored links and advertisements. If you’d like your products to appear here, read the submission form.
- Calling all nerd parents! Don’t miss Game Master Mom’s debut children’s fantasy book that introduces families to playing TTRPGs together. Tales of Aetheria: An Unexpected Quest launches May 1 on Kickstarter!
This newsletter is sponsored by the the wonderful Bundle of Holding. Check out the latest bundles below:
- Coyote and Crow, the world and game of indigenous futurism, bundled with all existing modules
- Also, a short-run deal for the Hellboy-inspired Apocalypse Keys along with its expansion, Domesday Delights
Hello, dear readers. This newsletter is written by me, Thomas Manuel. If you’d like to support this newsletter, share it with a friend or buy one of my games from my itch store. If you’d like to say something to me, you can reply to this email or click below!
Indie RPG Newsletter 
Leave a comment