IME, it's like teaching a kid to ride a bike.  You start out with a little handholding and the training wheels, then eventually, as they get more comfortable, they'll be wanting to go out on their own.  

So you start with a basic setup, and a starting adventure seed, but drop hints about other stuff in the area.  As they go out on those first adventures, they'll start getting the good loot and things, and before long, they'll be setting their own goals.

If you just dump them into a big world and go "OK, now what do you do?", well, they're liable to ask you the same question.  

Get the ball rolling to start, and once it is, it'll go all over the place.

I usually try to get some time in before play starts to talk about campaign and characters.  Then I to for my ace in the hole, their character sheets.  I've yet to find a player that doesn't spend a lot of energy on at least completing their character.  No half filled character sheets here.  A player may not always know what their character is about but their character sheet gives away a lot of what they're expecting to happen.  IMO, players make their characters imagining what the world is going to throw at them.  So I throw it at them.  They're engaged because they have the tools right there in front of them to react to a situation.  

Maxed out climbing skill, must be expecting some climbing encounters.

Maxed out fighting abilities, must be expecting some skirmishes.

Throw them into action right from the get go.  Make them react.  Don't make the players search out conflict.  Making them reactive will lead to them being proactive.  Think Knights of the Old Republic or Halo.  You can always figure out the details later.  I've been as guilty as anyone trying to wow the players with my spectacular worlds or campaign hooks when all I really needed to do is say you're hanging off a cliff with blaster fire showering all around you or the Senate has agreed the players are guilty of treason, seize them!

Quote from: Ian Absentia...no reason for cohesion among the player characters at all.  

I agree with most of what you say above, but I have a bone to pick with this item.

Coming up with a reason for PC group cohesion is not the GM's job.  

The PC's should stay together because that is what the game is about - a group of people who are together doing stuff.

You can either just ignore the reason why they stay together as a conceit of the medium/genre or if the players must be method-actor type role-players, then they should come up with the reason themselves.  The GM has enough work to do without trying to give the PC's "character motivations" like some half-ass director.

Personally, espouse the use of option #1.  Most ensemble fiction, and particularly fantasy ensemble fiction, has the flimsiest excuses ever why people stay together as a group (see Star Wars for example) - with the only real exceptions being fiction where everyone is part of the same military unit/ship's crew/spy branch.

Quote from: jgantsI agree with most of what you say above, but I have a bone to pick with this item.

Coming up with a reason for PC group cohesion is not the GM's job.

I'll quibble only a little with this.  Yes, the players need to develop a rationale of their own.  That's their job.  However, the GM needs to provide the context for that rationale.  What I complained about in my earlier post was the lack of context, a backdrop for the characters to make sense of themselves.

!i!

I know this problem jeff.  I just ask.  What kind of adventures or playstyle do you like or want and then throw a half dozen examples at them.  If they are indecisive I pick one I have ready and say how about something like this.

If you feel they are still not sure, pick something short and with no real need to complete it so if they don't like it they can just back out.

For me, I was told high adventure is what they are after.  After chatting about what that means to each of us I was ready.  At the end of each session I ask what they are thinking of doing next.  I'm not going to prep or think much about an ara they are sure to bypass.  They know I will not hold them to this, its just so I can better prepare.  I also always try to let them know they can do anything it won't bug me if they leave the dungeon I spent a week creating.  

I got a whole world ready baby, there is no off the edge of the map, until you can hire a ship to sail you to the ends of the world...and I'll be ready for that.

Quote from: Gunslinger....  A player may not always know what their character is about but their character sheet gives away a lot of what they're expecting to happen.  IMO, players make their characters imagining what the world is going to throw at them.  So I throw it at them.  They're engaged because they have the tools right there in front of them to react to a situation.  

Maxed out climbing skill, must be expecting some climbing encounters.

Maxed out fighting abilities, must be expecting some skirmishes.

Throw them into action right from the get go.  ...

Here, here.  I agree everybit with this unless they max out underwater basket weaving.  But again there could be a community of mermen that would receive as a god a land dweller that could meet their carrying capacity needs.

I do work really hard in character creation to let people know the non-combat side is just not given lip service.  The PC with multiple languages and social skills could be THE key to success in many an adventure.  I guess I'm saying, people often build their characters to the last game they were in, to the stereo-tpye game or to a I need this to survive combat mentality.

Quote from: GunslingerMaxed out climbing skill, must be expecting some climbing encounters.

Maxed out fighting abilities, must be expecting some skirmishes.

As far as I can tell, I grab skills for 3 reasons:
1: I don't want to encounter the skill, but I REALLY don't want to fail the skill if encountered.
2: I'm expected, by class or agreement, to cover a skill.
3: I want to encounter the skill in play.

Hence I could max my swimming skill just because I don't want to drown or have to drop my loot in water.  If anything, it'd be great to not ever be in the situation where I'd be using swimming.  In this case, you'd be tossing me into an adventure you think I want (hey, he has a high swimming skill!), but I actually want to avoid.

Quote from: jeff37923The problem is, when players have their PCs dropped into a game world, only a handful seem able to cope with the sudden huge number of opportunities that have become available to them. Most just give me the deer-in-the-headlights look while glancing through the game world notes handout, wondering where the entrance to the dungeon is.

So, is giving this much latitude too much for the average gamer?

Probably, yeah.

In real life, people deal with the problems and opportunities before them. You may have a lot of things going on in your world notes, but is any single would-be-adventurer really going to be exposed and interested in all of them?

I'd suggest two things:
1) Try to suss out what sorts of things the players are interested in doing, and put those opportunities before them.
2) Reveal things to them layer by layer. You can still give them choices and opportunities, but narrow the field a bit so they can make sense of it. Chances are, your players probably don't understand your world as well as you do; introduce it to them a bit at a time.

Quote from: WeeklySaying 'OK guys, now do whatever you want' will most often result with a series of dull sessions where the group struggle to find its marks. This is usually the point where I bring up the notion of constraint in improvisational theatre, but I'd rather not be tar-and-feathered out of the site ;-) (and my English skills wouldn't be up to the task anyway).

You don't have anything to worry about from me. I did summer stock with the local theatre to get more into role-playing when I was in High School. One of the most rewarding things I ever did for myself.

Quote from: jrientsAsk each player to write down one, two, or three cool things they've always wanted to do but could never get it done in other campaigns.  Tell them to make it short, one-sentence answers like "Slay an ancient red dragon"  "Become king by my own hand" or "Take a sea-voyage to a land of Harryhausen cyclops and hot amazons".  Come back next session and tell them that all their wishes have been added to the campaign, not as scenarios, but as opportunities.  They just need to be smart enough to find them and bold enough to seize them.

I've used this approach and it has been the most useful to me so far. Although, I still have had some players who don't know how to respond to this.

Quote from: Ian AbsentiaThere's a lot to be said for starting in media res.

This something that I've done as well (It worked great in Star Wars games), but I have to admit to a certain wariness about it that has come from RPGA play that I've done.

I used to do a lot of RPGA play with AD&D2. The problem was the In Media Res modules that were inflicted on the players. You'd have adventure modules start out with, in box text (which means the players have absolutely no control over what their characters do), pithy statements like , "Your character, for no apparent reason, strips naked and abandons all their equipment so that you may walk into a jail cell to await the executioners axe." So, your PC started out the game fucked over and behind the 8-ball, and all your PC could do was try to get out of the situation that the PC would never have voluntarily gotten themselves into.

So, handled in a way that doesn't automatically screw the PCs, I'm all for some adventures that start In Media Res.

Quote from: GunslingerI usually try to get some time in before play starts to talk about campaign and characters.  Then I to for my ace in the hole, their character sheets.  I've yet to find a player that doesn't spend a lot of energy on at least completing their character.  No half filled character sheets here.  A player may not always know what their character is about but their character sheet gives away a lot of what they're expecting to happen.  IMO, players make their characters imagining what the world is going to throw at them.  So I throw it at them.  They're engaged because they have the tools right there in front of them to react to a situation.  

Maxed out climbing skill, must be expecting some climbing encounters.

Maxed out fighting abilities, must be expecting some skirmishes.

I hadn't thought of this. You can bet that I'll be using this tactic in the future.

So here's the followup questions to this:

Why aren't more players proactive with their characters? Is this a result of CRPGs where a character can only proceed through a few well-dfined scenarios with limited interaction influencing tabletop play? Is it a lack of understanding what the characters are capable of in game? Could it be just a lack of experience of the players?

It's just a human thing. Too many choices are overwhelming. You've got to give them something to work with.

If you go into a second-hand music store with 200 CDs there, you look for half an hour and then buy something. If you go into a megastore with 20,000 CDs, you could be there for hours and come out with nothing.

If someone says, "what do you want for dinner?" your mind will sometimes go blank, and if you think of anything it'll be something bland that you've had a thousand times before. But if they say, "do you want Chinese or Italian?" then you come up with an answer quick. If you have cable and 100 channels you could surf the channels for hours without watching any single show from start to finish; if you've just got free to air with 5 channels, you're more likely to watch one show.

When you give choices in a narrow range, people are more inspired than when the choices are entirely open. You've got to give them something to work with. It's nothing to do with computer games, it's just human.

Edit: What I've found works best in campaigns of more than a few sessions is to begin with a narrow range of choices, but to have those choices open up many more, so that while the players didn't actually come up with those new choices, their characters' actions created the options. For example, you might begin a campaign with a PC about to execute someone, someone guilty of murder but with a family who'll be destitute without his support. Either the PC kills him, and then the family is destitute and perhaps seeks revenge, or they don't kill him, and then perhaps he comitts more crimes, or perhaps is grateful and reformed, and in any case what does the local sheriff say? and so on. One choice creates many more choices, branching out like a tree. It's easier to begin at the roots and move along the branches out to one of thousands of leaves than it is to begin at one of the thousands of leaves.

Quote from: KingSpoomHence I could max my swimming skill just because I don't want to drown or have to drop my loot in water.  If anything, it'd be great to not ever be in the situation where I'd be using swimming.  In this case, you'd be tossing me into an adventure you think I want (hey, he has a high swimming skill!), but I actually want to avoid.

Your example kind of proves my point.  You may not want something to happen but you've spent resources to prepare yourself for something happening to your character.  So you're envisioning something happening to your character.  I understand your reasoning behind it as a player.  I'm thinking of jumping points for GMs to start campaigns.  Your high swimming wouldn't equate to Water World the RPG but it would result in a swimming encounter possibly.  

I wasn't just thinking skills though, it could be powers, feats, quirks, BITs, abilities, class, equipment, etc...  The mechanics for character creation definitely play a part.  Hell, if it's random character generation you may not want anything your character is capable of happening to them but you do have the tools to deal with it.  I'm trying to create situations that the players are able to react to, so they can hit the world running.  Trying to start the game off with some action.  I've been in and ran too many campaigns that've fizzled due to a lack of interest because nothing is happening.