This post includes spoilers for a game I'm running. So, if you're currently playing in a game that is run (and set) on E 5th in NYC, and if it began with a crazy woman's suicide in a bookstore called "The White Rabbit," and if it ended with a bunch of blue-eyed cops taking you in for questioning... Surprise! You're one of my players! And you should probably stop reading.

Also, I thought I should confess to posting this in a few forums across the web, so if you've seen it already, I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me.

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Ok. My players're good people, so they should be gone now.

First I want to thank in advance anyone who braves this lengthy post, and is able to help me out. I'm a relatively new Storyteller, and I have some truly great players for whom I'm genuinely honored to be running a game. So I really want to make it something special. Specifically, I'm hoping for some tips on preparing/running what has become a truly EPIC chronicle inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos, with heavy survival horror and conspiracy themes. I am having two main issues, but first I must give a brief synopsis of the "big picture". I've tried to keep it short, and I dare say I think it's pretty interesting, so hopefully I'll keep your interest long enough to earn your help with my troubles

Synopsis

(Seriously, if you even suspect you're one of my players, you know to stop reading.)

The players find an artifact. The artifact is quite obviously evil (it drove its last owner insane; players failed their surprise checks and she shot herself in front of them; I had sound effects and it was great). But it speaks to them, and it offers to help them if only they'll agree to return the favor. None of my players have taken it up on its offer thus far, but they've yet to leave their bookstore. I intend to place them in situations where refusing the Eye's offer becomes a lot more ... interesting.

My players, now bound to the artifact, will find themselves at the heart of a conflict that spans millions of years and involves our whole solar system (yikes!): The eight planets, all of them sentient deities, have been squabbling like children on Earth since intelligence first dawned there. Each one, in pursuing its selfish agendas, has guided much of history, myth and religion via the influence they've cultivated on Earth over the eons ("influence" includes conspiracies, human conduits, hive-mind control, direct manifestation, sanity-wrenching time-loops, fate-bending... each planet's methods are different).

To illustrate (feel free to skip to the next paragraph once you get the idea): "Earth" can pull its followers into a hive mind, and has them in almost every branch of government and public service, including the police. "Venus" is everything Vice, but especially human trafficking/slavery: its conduit on Earth--the Morning Star himself--can annihilate a person's soul, leaving behind only those parts, however small, that love him unconditionally (it's "the devil steals souls" meets "the planet of love"). "Mars" and its two moons, Phobos (Fear) and Deimos (Dread), are at the heart of terrorism and geopolitical unrest; their agents on Earth are the Four Horsemen. "Neptune" traps its followers in an endless, year-long time loop (giving them perfect knowledge of a future they've lived a million times over, and driving them insane in the process). "Jupiter" walks the Earth as a corporate tycoon with a finger in every pie, a Machiavellian master of capitalism who I intend to be the 'Big Bad' for some part of the chronicle (Earth and Jupiter have been duking it out on Wall Street since 2007, as any news network will happily tell you). "Saturn", ever the resplendent narcissist, runs much of the media and can manipulate the global Zeitgeist (the concept, not the silly movie). And so on.

What each planet wants, more than anything else, is the artifact the players now hold. But the artifact represents an even greater threat, even as the players face more and more pressure to rely on its double-edged offers of protection and power. The artifact calls itself the Eye of God, because that's exactly what it is. But religion got God all wrong. God isn't the Alpha and the Omega, the Creator and Destroyer, the Beginning and the End: He was the Alpha, the Creator, the Beginning... and then He became the Omega, the Destroyer, the End. So, while dodging the planets, their conspiracies, and the inhuman horrors they command, the Eye of God will be revealed as the herald of its looming namesake, at which point I hope my players will realize that uniting the planets is the best chance of surviving the End that approaches. If they do, it will mark the turning of the tide towards the grand finale: An epic battle against God Himself, fought with Lucifer, the Horsemen, the hive-minded armies of Earth, and/or any others the players manage to win over.  (If they don't, the worlds end in ash, and the chronicle continues into bleak, post-apocalyptic horror a-la "The Road." Ouch.)

Oh yeah: I'm running it with the nWoD rules, modified with a few things pulled from Unknown Armies (I love them Madness Meters).

My First Problem: I Can't See the Trees for the Forest!

I have what I think is an awesome big picture for a chronicle. It's not a linear plot that'll require railroading, it's not a pre-written story for which the players are merely along for the ride, and it should be able to handle whatever the players throw at it. (I just have to figure out how the planets and the Eye react.) That being said, it's a BIG forest (I'm so glad Pluto's no longer a planet...). So:

- How can I take what I have, and turn it into weekly game sessions? (And I am not deaf to the collective sound of a whole forum facepalming; for this, I am sorry.)
- If you were tasked with running a chronicle based off of the above synopsis, what would you consider necessary prep for the first session after the players leave their bookstore and enter the sandbox of the chronicle-at-large?
- How can I design robust conspiracies that are resistant to unraveling right off the bat, especially when the players come up with some angle I never considered (they're clever bastards), but that still allow my players to make steady, interesting progress?
- Can you think of any publications that might be helpful to me? I'll happily purchase pdfs if they contain good Storyteller/GM material on running conspiracies or "big" games like this, with epic set pieces and lots of moving parts. And they don't need to be White Wolf, since I'm not really looking for rules here, just advice. (I'm less inclined to switch rules systems entirely, though, unless there's a really great one out there that strikes you as tailor-made for a game like this.)

My Second Problem: Making the Story About the Players

I have three great, committed players who, as I said, I am very honored to be running a game for. They've all put a lot of work into their characters, but they're all very different. I don't mean that there are insurmountable conflicts (I would have prevented that), but that they have very little overlap. I have a social character (who, in addition to being an evangelical Christian tailor-made for this setting, will also shine during the possible recruitment stage), a mental character (hence all the back story for her to research), and a physical character (a brawler, he insisted, even after I told him he'd almost certainly die should he attempt to grapple anything Lovecraftian).

- Any tips on how to involve all of them, without having to alternate between scenes built for one character's strength at a time?
- How can I keep things fun for the physical character without sacrificing the horror and without killing him outright? He's a great roleplayer, and not at all a combat twink: He modeled the character after himself, and he's extremely skilled at the martial arts in real life.

I would also really appreciate any general advice from veteran Storytellers/GMs out there, based on what you've read.

And thanks again for making it this far, I hope I was right about it being somewhat interesting!

My main advice is: don't think in terms of "story." Think in terms of what the NPCs, factions, groups want instead. Think in terms of LEGO, if you will. Don't try to create a "story" with a narrative to it. It'll be created spontaneously by whatever happens with the game as it unfolds, as the players make choices, and you react to them.

Set up the base situation, and just react to the players from there with the tools available to you.

That's my first, most important point.

Quote from: Eunomiac;415072- How can I take what I have, and turn it into weekly game sessions? (And I am not deaf to the collective sound of a whole forum facepalming; for this, I am sorry.)
- If you were tasked with running a chronicle based off of the above synopsis, what would you consider necessary prep for the first session after the players leave their bookstore and enter the sandbox of the chronicle-at-large?

Well if your players are taken in by the cops for questioning, they could come in contact with some agents of one planet or another trying to get the Eye of God from them. They could be the cops themselves, or the "lawyers" they did not ask for showing up to "protect their rights" and then "take them to their employer," (i.e. abducting them, if they haven't figured it out in the meantime). It could go any number of ways from there. Just let it unfold. Either they are abducted, or somehow manage to escape their lawyers before arriving to the great warehouse where all the lawyers buddies are waiting to shoot them, or what not.

Also, when the PCs end up in a very tough spot, have the Eye propose to help them. They could for instance be sucked in the world of the Eye of God, and you could go nuts on this parallel dimension, with the PCs trying to figure out how to get out of there back to the real world without giving in to the Eye's niceties. Imagine the PCs talking with an embodied Eye of God inside its own psyche!

That could be a wild card to keep in mind.

Your necessary prep is to know who your NPC are, what means they control, what the henchmen's MO is, what goals they have and how different their ways to go about them are. Create an actual sandbox and visualize it like its a real world. That's the prep you need.

Quote from: Eunomiac;415072- How can I design robust conspiracies that are resistant to unraveling right off the bat, especially when the players come up with some angle I never considered (they're clever bastards), but that still allow my players to make steady, interesting progress?

Roll with the blows. Don't make a "story" with a "narrative". Set up a base situation, as explained above, and then just follow your players' lead, shaking things up once in a while with a new NPC, a new situation, a new encounter with the henchmen. From there they'll want to know what the fuck is going on. And you just let them lead the show. You're their interface with the world. You are *not* the director of the movie. You just hold the camera for them.

Quote from: Eunomiac;415072- Can you think of any publications that might be helpful to me? I'll happily purchase pdfs if they contain good Storyteller/GM material on running conspiracies or "big" games like this, with epic set pieces and lots of moving parts. And they don't need to be White Wolf, since I'm not really looking for rules here, just advice. (I'm less inclined to switch rules systems entirely, though, unless there's a really great one out there that strikes you as tailor-made for a game like this.)

Try to get some by Nights books and look how they function, how they're built, with a special eye for the way the NPCs are fleshed out, the groups and factions, their motivations, where they hang out in the city, the relationships flowcharts, and so on. A good example is Chicago by Night (the 2nd edition is actually better than the first in this regard). Dark Colony. Montreal by Night. Constantinople by Night.

Quote from: Eunomiac;415072I have three great, committed players who, as I said, I am very honored to be running a game for. They've all put a lot of work into their characters, but they're all very different. I don't mean that there are insurmountable conflicts (I would have prevented that), but that they have very little overlap. I have a social character (who, in addition to being an evangelical Christian tailor-made for this setting, will also shine during the possible recruitment stage), a mental character (hence all the back story for her to research), and a physical character (a brawler, he insisted, even after I told him he'd almost certainly die should he attempt to grapple anything Lovecraftian).

- Any tips on how to involve all of them, without having to alternate between scenes built for one character's strength at a time?
- How can I keep things fun for the physical character without sacrificing the horror and without killing him outright? He's a great roleplayer, and not at all a combat twink: He modeled the character after himself, and he's extremely skilled at the martial arts in real life.

I would also really appreciate any general advice from veteran Storytellers/GMs out there, based on what you've read.

And thanks again for making it this far, I hope I was right about it being somewhat interesting!

Let them build relationships between themselves and each other. Let them react via role playing to what's going on with the game. That is how you make the game about them: by having the game actually be about them. Trust them on this, and also make it clear to them that you want them to be proactive, and not just wait for the story to come to them. Then they will do the work for you.

Really the biggie is: think in terms of sandbox, with a starting situation, and let the players do the legwork while you react to them with the world at your disposition. Do *not* think in terms of pre-planned "storylines" and "narratives".

That's my take on it.

Your background is very cool, by the way.

Quote from: Benoist;415084Think in terms of what the NPCs, factions, groups want instead.

And, especially or in addition, what they want from the PCs.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;415087And, especially or in addition, what they want from the PCs.

This is a good point. It helps the NPCs and NPC factions be active without being 'agents of plot.'

I don't have a lot of specifics to contribute, or really anything in the way of experience running Storyteller games, but the general points that I'd make are:

- Superfluity of options : You need at least two or three times as many "clues" and paths from place to place and person to person in your game world than characters get in a book or movie. Things will work a lot better if they don't have to find a certain thing.

- Be careful of making the "mystery" too hard. It's hard even as a veteran referee to really grasp just how little of the world you've created is really conveyed to the player interacting with it. "This man is tall, has grey hair, with a stern expression, wearing a conservative suit." Which veteran movie actor have I just described? It's kind of like that.

- Avoid having things happen at "dramatic" moments - I.E. "As soon as the PCs translate the scroll, the possessed detective drives his truck through the front wall" sounds exciting but it tends to turn the game into an exercise in figuring out how to "trigger" the next chapter. Better to say "the possessed detective drives his truck through the front wall at 7 pm unless othewise delayed," or "15 minutes after he sees the living room light turn on..." That kind of thing. PCs will create drama.

- On conspiracies : I think be best way to make them "unravel" organically is to have the 'chain' of conspiracy be pretty disconnected - each person in the conspiracy probably only knows who he's interacting with. For example, the possessed cop really only knows that he's obsessed with this nightclub singer, maybe not even understanding he has become not quite human - the nightclub singer only knows her old russian uncle who's taught her something 'special' from the old country, and the assistant DA who has an eye for talent and claims that there's more to the world than most people know. They might know people themselves - they probably don't look far enough down the chain of command to be familiar with one weird detective, etc.

As far as book recommendations, if you can find Delta Green for Call of Cthulhu, that's a handy one. Trail of Cthulhu by Pelgrane Press has some interesting ideas, also, and a neat "you WILL find at least one clue" approach to skills.