Changing relationship maps

In previous discussions about relationship maps, the map has been a static map over how things are in the world at a given moment. This time, however, I'm going to talk a little about the idea of relationship maps that develop over time.

The main idea is that one of the goals of a session can be to change how the map looks. Sworn allies can be made into enemies, or leaders whole cities can be toppled and replaced.

Most of these things can of course be roleplayed out without any particular rules. However, sometimes it's nice to have a nice foundation to start from as a GM. So, let's expand on the idea of relationship maps once more. Each important relation and link can have

• A value representing the strength of the relationship. A low value means a relationship that is weak or unimportant. A stronger value means a relationship that is strong and important. The higher this number, the harder it is to change it (at least to the worse)
• A weakness. Many relationships can have a weak point. Two warriors and allies in love with the same woman, a peace agreement that holds as long as no one enters an area important to both parties etc. If the characters manage to discover and use this weakness, it makes it easier for them to destroy and change the relationship.
• Dependencies. In some cases, a relationship is depending on another relationship. Prince Afur has the power over the city, but that's only because he currently has the backing of the ancient Orthus-family. If that backing is lost, he will soon lose his grip over the city.

The idea is not to write long essays about each of these, but rather use them as a very quick framework for how to structure your adventure and environment to make it easier to run games that feel open ended and dynamic.

Relationship Maps

Relationship maps expanded

A while ago I wrote a little about how to build an adventure using relationship maps.

Mapping out your adventure pt1
Mapping out your adventure pt2
Mapping out your adventure pt3
Mapping out your adventure pt4

In many cases, these maps describe a number of secrets for the characters to uncover. However, the map in itself doesn't say anything about HOW these relationships are discovered.

You can naturally wing it, and just give out clues whenever you feel it's appropriate, but if you prefer a little more planning I suggest the following:

For each relationship, write down a number of signs of the relationship. These could be obvious and visual (Mr Darris is a member of the Order of the Black Triangle, and has a ring on his right index finger with a black triangle on it), to more hidden clues (Underneath Mr Darris beds can be found a number of letters concerning threats against the Order). Maybe two persons who are secret lovers can't help but look at each other and smile from time to time, and if given some money or bought a drink, one of the locals can tell that he's seen someone enter the mansion from the servants entrance.

To make the mystery a bit easier, I'd suggest give out at least 3 clues or signs to each relationship (that isn't already known), so that if the players miss one of these clues, there are other ways to find out.

If you want to expand even more, one could add a quick note on which skills are usable to detect the relationship, and how hard it is.

Push the players with triggers and phases

This is, to some extent, a development of my previous post where I talked about how to add "combat rounds" to other things, and in other time scales, than just combat.

In this post, I want to add two more ideas/ concepts. The first one is Phases, and the second one is Triggers.

Phases

A phase is a part of a module, adventure or story. When you go from one Phase to another, something in the world or the story must change. In order to motivate a phase-change, it should be something significant. For instance, in a game with a vampire as the antagonist, the first Phase might be about investigating strange deaths. After a couple of hours, the vampire learns that the players are on it's tail, and acts indirectly against them. This would be the second Phase. In this Phase, perhaps, the vampire has gotten some control over the local police, the keeper of the vast library that otherwise could be useful etc. In the third Phase, the confrontation is more direct. This is where the players (or the vampire) seeks out the enemy.

One could add in meta-rules as well, rules that dictate not only changes in the story, but also if something is allowed to happen or not. For instance, in our vampire-example, you could say that no major character in the game can die in the first two Phases. It's only when the story proceeds to Phase 3 anyone can die (both the players and the vampire).

Triggers

Instead of having the Phases occur at set, predetermined times, you could let the players actions decide when to go from one Phase to another. Some actions doesn't advance the Phases and, unless the GM says otherwise, could be done an infinite number of times without advancing the plot (mind you, this has the slight disadvantage of not.. you know... advancing the plot). However, certain actions advance the plot to the next Phase. Let's say that you can do an infinite number of library research, but you can only talk to three people before rumors spread and the vampire hears of you (thus advancing the adventure to Phase 2). So, the players can basically decide when they want to further the plot, but they do so by raising the stakes.

More structure for more creativity

I've stated before that I think that the most important game balance is time/spotlight balance from player to player. Ironically, this is in a way most enforced in combat, for one simple reason: Each player at least has his go. Every turn, each player get to do something. Of course, this "something" might vary quite a lot, and not all game system are particulare good at this, but all players still have their turn to do something.

Now, what would happen if we kept the round-system, but increased the scale. Let's say that we are playing an investigative game. I know that in 8 hours the next murder will happen, unless the players do something. So, instead of just asking the players "What do you do?", I make them roll for initiative (perhaps using a more fitting stat then usual), and ask, in turn, what each character do this hour. I also make sure to tell them that other things happen that hour as well.

Why do I think this could be an interesting idea?

The main reason is, it gives all characters and players a better chance to tell the the group what they are doing. Of course, they have that chance anyway. My experience, however, is that the louder members of the group often dominates the talk.

And NO, I won't just be satisfied with "then the shy guy has to speak up". Nope, gaming should cater to all personality types, and this gives all types a better chance to tell the group what he wants to do.

Also, if the GM starts to count the hours, it can give a sense of urgency to the group.

When using this solution, I believe that the GM should be fairly generous with clues about what happens. Just as in combat, the goal and (at least some of) the premises should be clear. Tell the players what the basic structure is. If needed, give them some ideas of what they can do each time-slot.

Whatever the players say they do, make it matter! It may not be as effective as they would like (compare, once again with combat... an attack might miss or do less damage), but for each time slot, each and every player should have a chance to contribute to the development of the situation.

Mystery adventures - a few tips

One of my major weak spots is that I'm less than stellar at writing and running mystery adventures. This isn't that surprising, considering that these kinds of adventures can be quite tricky. I have written a few other posts that touches upon the subject, but today I thought I'd just point you towards a couple of links that gives helpful advice.

First is a thread from rpg.net, where a player asks about help to run an murder-mystery-adventure.

My favorite from that thread was the "three methods (quoted from the thread):

The Agatha Christie method: The victim was a snot - Murder is murder, but the Victim was a genuinely nasty person who had it coming. Maybe Victim wasn't a criminal, but he/she made the lives of people around him/her absolute misery. Every NPC within Victim's circle (family, business, social) had an excellent reason to hate him/her and is a potential suspect. Solving the mystery involves unraveling the NPCs' relationships with Victim and each other to determine who hated Victim most and had the opportunity to do him/her in. Some of the NPCs will be openly bitter. Others may be sympathetic sufferers. Christie usually gave the culprit at least one kindly trait to throw readers off.

The Doc Savage method: The culprit comes after the PCs - The victim was probably a nice person, since he/she was a friend/associate/acquaintance of the PCs. The culprit is so sure that the adventurers will give him (or her) grief over the murder that he starts trying to off them as soon as the crime is committed. The PCs' friend was somehow tangled up in a much larger conspiracy; as they attempt to defend themselves against their assailants and investigate their friend's death, they'll uncover a web of clues that will inevitably lead to the villain.

The Sam Spade/Philip Marlow method: Never trust a client - No client or assignment is what he/it seems to be. The PCs are hired to watch or find somebody who doesn't want the attention. The more they pursue their quarry the more goons and corrupt officials come out of the woodwork, and the bodies start stacking up as not-nice parties with conflicting agendas "remove" people who have given/might give info to the PCs. They typically have to fend off/avoid the police while they hunt down the culprit(s). It's not unusual to have different victims slain by different villains, all of whom are trying to conceal the Big Secret that the heroes are threatening to uncover.

Another good place is an essay written by Justin Alexander where he (among other things) talks about the three-clue-rule, where he says that the GM should have at least three clues for piece of information he wants the players to find. Well worth a read!

Mapping out you adventure pt 4

In the previous posts, I've been looking at a way how to design an adventure using a relational diagram. This is a snapshot of the situation so far, but it's still not a playable adventure. We are almost there, but I'd like to add some more seasoning and presentation.

First of all, the main conflict here is of course if the wizard manages to perform his ritual or not, but there are other conflicts. For instance, will the dwarves let the player characters investigate the theft of the crown?

Before trying to run this, I'd note down a few things more. One of these things are key scenes. What can you do to kick-start the module? Look for a situation that seems filled with drama and excitement, and have that as your adventure starter.

Then try to find other situations as well to use as exciting scenes. These scenes are key-points in the characters discover of the situation as a whole.

That leads us to the next point: Add clues!

Using the word "clues" implies that this is a mystery, but in this context, it's all things that shows more of the situation as such. There is a tendency among GM's (at least from my experience) to be rather sparse with clues that reveal the inner workings of his plans.

Believe me, that is a mistake! My advice would be to include 2-3 clues for each relation that isn't completely obvious (but add some there as well just for the sake of it). Looking at the diagram, we see a number of different relations that can be discovered. We can include an old bard that sings about how the wizard was defeated the last time by the guardsman, we can give the guardsman a scar over his face from the last battle and we can say that he patrols the area where the wizard had his tower last time a lot.

More clues doesn't equal a more boring or predictable world, it means a more rich and living world.

So, finally, with the diagram, a bucketful of clues, some exciting scenes (including a few combats), we are ready to go.

And, one last thing: Don't forget to use player input. Sometimes they come up with ideas that are a lot better than your original idea was.. in that case, go with that idea and toss your own out the window.

Mapping out your adventure pt3

The next (and almost final) step is to fill in the blanks. The map from last post is decent as a starting point, but to build a more complex module we need to fill it in a bit more.

For each entity, I tried to add so there's at least 3 arrows to or from each entity (if possible), and to make sure that there are no "unconnected" groups in the map. In this step, I also try to add some more drama and interesting connections. In this case, I decided that Joanna (someone I added without knowing her purpose when I put her name down) was in love with the guardsman, and that gave her a weakness that the wizard might exploit. Another question to answer was WHY the wizard wants to cast the ritual. Revenge is always a nice motivator, so let's add that. Let's say that the guardsman stopped the wizard before.

So, I for each entity I added some more relations, adding more depth and drama to the story.

Looking at the diagram when I feel ready, I see the following situation.

Many years ago, Helvith the Tall thwarted the plans of the wizard Thuluman the Red. Thuluman went away, but didn't forget. Years later, he slowly returned, armed with the knowledge of a powerful ritual. He needed a very rare metall, secretium, for the ritual. This metal can be found in the crown of the dwarven clan. Therefore he exploited the weakness of a dwarf of the clan, Naug Grim, and put him into a gambling debt. Naug Grim then stole the crown, intending to hand it over to Thuluman.

The ritual also needed a sacrifice of someone who is emotionally attached to the victim. Joanna is a young woman who is in love with Helvith the Tall, and Thuluman used that to lure her into believing that the ritual will make Helvith fall in love with her.

There's still some things to fill in, but we now have a fairly solid framework with greed, revenge and romance from which to improvise an adventure together with the players.

Mapping out your adventure pt2

So, with the basic story written down, and the different participants and entities written down in cmaptools (or on our sheet of paper).

The next step is to draw lines between the enteties. Each line represent a relation or an attribute. Naug Grim, for instance, is a member of the dwarven clan. The wizards wants to cast the ritual etc.

We do this by either drawing a line between the enteties and write down what the relation is, or in cmaptools, click on the arrows above each entity and drag it to another entity.

If you look at the example above, moste enteties now have at least 1, but sometimes 2 relation-arrows going to or from it. We can already see a few things of interest (the crown is lost, the wizard is trying to make the ritual etc), but the map is still a bit lacking. The next step will be to fill out the diagram to make it more dynamic.

Mapping out your adventure pt1

My latest find is a tool I wanna share with you all, together with a way to use that tool to design modules and adventures for RPG's.

Now, mind you, the tool in itself isn't necessary for the method, but it's handy and it's free. Can't get better than that, now can it?

The tools is called cmaptools, and it's a tool for drawing relational diagrams. In short, create a map of "enteties" and their relations.

The image attached to this post is an example of how it can look after you have added a number of enteties.

In this particular case, I as a GM brainstormed a couple of things. I have Naug the dwarf, who is a member of a dwarven clan. It is run by a chieftain. Not far from the hills where the clan lives is a human-populated village called Outskirts. In the village we have the Rangers, a group of able bodied men protecting the surrounding area from harm. In a tower not far from the hills, a mighty wizard lives. He is currently researching a powerful ritual.

This short story resulted in a list of things that I added to the work area in cmaptools. Now, mind you, all of these things could be done manually.

Excel at relations.

Sometimes it's fairly important to keep track of relations between different persons and factions within an adventure or a module. This can be done in different ways, and one of these ways are a relational matrix.

A relational matrix is a grid with columns and rows (as matrices tend to be). In both the leftmost column and the top row you enter the participants of the adventure or story.

The way I usually do it is to have the column as the "active" part. That is, in the cell where a column meets a row, it's what the person in the column thinks about the person in the row.

So, in the example picture, you can see that Andy is afraid of John, for instance. In the cells where the person "meets himself" I just write down what he thinks about himself or his state of mind right now.

One of the uses is if course as a reference, I can have it in front of me when running the module. However, it's just as helpful when planning the module. I can start with the known relations, and then fill in a sufficient number of empty cells. It makes my work a bit more structured.

When I'm done, I can also try to see if any interesting scenes grow out of it naturally.

The example below was done in just a couple of minutes, but it didn't take me long before a semi-comples relational structure started to show up on the screen.

You can use basically any tool that has tables or grids on it for this. Many word processors have tables or you can use a spreadsheet like Excel to use it. In my example I used the spreadsheet function in Google Docs.

Dungeon Delves - the perfect format?

One of the problems often mentioned with RPG's in general is the time investment. First you have to spend one or several (often the latter) evenings, and on top of that, the GM have to prepare the adventures, something that shouldn't be taken for granted.

Dear Wizards have tried to solve that with what they call the Dungeon Delves. They are short adventures for DnD 4th of three encounters each, and each encounter is designed to take about an hour. There's also a book with a collection of Delves, meant to take you from lvl1 to lvl 30.

That means that if you have an hour to spare, you can play a short session. We are a couple of gamers that is trying this out on the lunch hour of the university we are all attending.

The impression so far is that it works. The modules are nice enough, and so far the encounters do stay within the time slot. So, what are our impressions so far?

• As said, the timing works quite nice. The GM has to setup the place a couple of minutes before, but other than that one encounter is roughly one hour (and sometimes less)
• The delves are VERY combat oriented. If you prefer other types of roleplaying, they may not be for you.
• The encounters are nicely balanced so that they provide a challenge, without being to lethal. You have to be careful with your resources (like Daily Powers) so that you have some oomph left for the final encounter. There are also guidelines for how to balance the encounters if you have to many or to few characters.
• The encounters use the environment quite nicely. For instance, in one of the encounters, some kobolds pushed over a large statue on one of the characters (who got stuck under it for 3 or 4 rounds).
  

Of course, while playing through the encounters, I've been toying with the idea of spreading the idea to other games and settings. Even to other types of encounters within DnD 4th, like an interesting skill challenge.

I think that "bite-sized" roleplaying has a place and is possible. Maybe we just have to think a little different and modulize our adventures a little more.

How I wrote 30 adventures in a couple of days.

Ok, I admit, the headline is a bit of an exaggeration. But it's cathy, right!

However, it's not that far of. But perhaps a better wording would be "how I wrote the outline for a 30-adventure campaign in a couple of days".

Anyway, I had an idea the other day, based on the Dawn of Defiance-campaign for Star Wars Saga, and also on the Scales of War-adventure-series for DnD 4th ed. The idea was to write a campaign that took you from lvl1 to lvl30 in DnD 4th. The pace would be 1 lvl/ adventure, so that would make 30 adventures. That felt a bit intimidating, but then I started to divide things up, and after a while I hade a rough outline for each module, stretching from the first one up to the very last one. Here is basically what I did. Hopefully it can serve as an inspiration to one or two of you out there.

I had some vague ideas that I wanted the characters to go from young, "just-graduated" heroes that could do some work for the local villages and towns, up to world-shakers. Thankfully, 4th ed provides some natural spans (level-wise) so that I basically had three parts of the campaign (Heroic, Paragon and Epic).

So, the first step was to write down the theme of each tier, what dangers there where, and to write down a line or two about the archvillain of each tier. For the first tier, it's on a fairly local scale, the villain is a local player etc. It has also the theme of "night", to keep with the Points of Light-setting. Basically, the villages are scattered, the wilderness is wild and everyone is threatened by the unknown. In the second tier, the PCs have some reputation, and all of a sudden they become involved in the politics of the area. At the same time, they have to face bigger dangers. The theme of the paragon-tier is dawn. Both the PC's and the evil around them is waking up, preparing for bigger things to come. The new archvillain is a bigger player (and a supernatural one, at that), who was the driving force behind the villain in the lower tier.
Finally, the last tier is Day, where the players are rulers of kingdoms, and now have to face opposing armies and epic enemies.

With the three tiers nailed, I made three empty lists, with 10 posts in each list. Then I brainstormed and tried to find a number of "one-sentence" plots/ scenes/ ideas. I wasn't satisfied until I had 10 ideas for each tier. Since I already had the basic framework and theme, it was fairly easy to find around 10 ideas for each. One aim I had was to vary myself, and also to use different settings and try to use as much of the rules as possible. For instance, I was keen to try out how 4th ed handles sea battles, so there is a module where the players have to stop a pirate invasion.

With the 3x10 ideas written down, I tried to sort them in some kind of order, so that they start out small for each tier, and then grow to something bigger, preparing for the next tier as the end of the tier approaches.

Finally, for each module-idea, I wrote down 3 additional points. This could be a bit of background, a twist, how it connects to the overall arch etc. The point of the points (no pun intended) was to give each idea a bit more depth and story. When I did this, I tried to look at the modules before and after the current module, to see if there was anything I could tie into it.

Not all ideas where smooth and easy to come up with 3 "sub-ideas" for, but after a little while I had 30 modules, with a coherent story, ideas, twists etc. While they still need to be fleshed out, doing so with the help of for instance the DnD-Insider tools (which I can recommend) will be a fairly quick and straighforward task. (And also, keeping it fairly loose will make it easier adapt it to what the players do and wish).

I'm so far quite satisfied with the results, and will do try this out on other games and settings as well.

So, to sum up: The secret is in

• Divide and conquer - Split the campaign into manageable parts. And then split them into smaller parts
• Use the rule of three - While a bit cliché and corny, in most cases you can always come up with three "sub-ideas" or lines for something. This process can be iterative, so if you want to detail it further, you can always add three points to each of your previous three points.