TheRPGSite

I'm a lazy GM. I prefer to have the players be self-starters and define their own goals to achieve in a game. This allows me to be lazy and instead of coming up with a campaign and all the attending work that goes along with it (which, honestly, the players may or may not be interested in), I just create a few short scenes and NPCs to drop in on the PCs as appropriate while they are working towards their goal. The campaign follows the players' wishes in what style of game they wish to play, I just provide the obstacles which they must overcome to reach that goal.

The 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? Should I be having generic adventures at first, to get the ball rolling, until the players decide upon their group goals? Should I be avoiding giving players this much freedom of choice in game and keep their options limited?

I struggled with this issue in my previous campaign. Some players are so used to handholding that they consider going off on their own tangents inappropriate. Pretty hard to break this habit, and the GM has a share of the responsibility. Instead of "you can do anything", start with a few adventure opportunities, and let them flow into new adventures which come logically from the occurences of the previous one. I discovered that offering three to five concrete threads works pretty well... although, alas, not in that particular case.

I eventually got new players. :o

Maybe they've had the experience of being 'punished' for 'not doing it properly' by other DMs.

Unless you have exceptionnally motivated and dynamic players, they will need a bit of time to integrate the situation you have set up for them. They're facing a new world, a new character and new adventure companions, so asking them to be ready to rock in the first session is a bit much.  Saying '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).
My technique is to provide very obvious adventure hooks (or better, start in media res) and mercilessly railroad the game into picking momentum. Once the game has reached cruising speed (usually around the 3rd or 4th session) I start to widen the players's options until I end up writing the campaing as a consequence of their actions.
I also discovered that encouraging players' initiative required a lot of effort on my side. I often find myself following up on very doubtful idea of theirs, just to avoid discouraging them.

Ask 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 had this exact same problem.  I've tried for two years to get them to make decisions on their own.  It didn't work.

I finally gave up.  Despite what the Forge tries to say, not all players like to be proactive.  In fact, a lot of them get genuinely confused/frustrated by it and actively dislike proactive play.

So, I've been moving things back to more mission-style play, where there is an obvious path to go down/mission to accomplish.  Not railroading mind you - they still get to decide how they go about handling the mission - but trying not to burden them with deciding what to do.

jgants is right, a lot of players want you to put a scenario in their lap.  But you only really need one proactive player willing to drag the rest of the party along.

Yep, I've come to accept passive-style players and adjust my GM'ing accordingly. I actually was finding it hard to believe that they even wanted to play, they were so passive. But when I took a break, they kept hounding me to start up again.  It made me rethink my entire approach.  I think as GMs that we are so pro-active by nature, it's hard for us to recognize that some players really enjoy playing the game where their next steps are clear.  

It's also a function of busy lives and minds.  People who have lots of time on their hands have time to think about options and choices.  Others may just want the excitement and adventure without having to think too hard about it after a busy day at work or whatever.

I like Weekly's suggestion, of starting with limited options and then opening them up more and more.  I give my players a few specific and clear options but also keep vague openings as much as possible for any crazy idea they may one day come up with.

I've had problems with the proactive shift as well.  Half of us have been gaming together for many years in the traditional style with me as the DM and the other half are pretty new to roleplaying altogether but have played in the latest campaign we had.  I love jrients idea of writing down a few goals that they've always wanted to do, and the game I'm interested in now actually requires that by default.  Problem is, we couldn't even do that successfully.  We just had a floundered character gen meeting that bogged down into frustration.  I'm not even sure what that indicates at this point.

I really want to get some proactive play going though, to see if we enjoy it.  We're on a long break mostly due to my burnout and I've sort of been imagining Proactive players=minimized GM prep.  Traditionally, having a reactive play style has equated to at least 5 hours of prep per gameplay week and I think I'm at the point that I just don't want that anymore.  I'd like to resume playing at some point, but not like that.

Quote from: WeeklyI 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).

A link probably wouldn't get you in too much trouble, how about it?

I wrote a fair amount about proactivity in my LJ; here are links as background, though I don't expect anybody to just read it and say "problem solved". Especially since I don't have the problem licked myself.

Ramblings on [mumble mumble] Proactivity (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/2449.html)
Situations and Stories (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/14366.html)
Setting and Proactive/Reactive Players (http://ewilen.livejournal.com/35186.html)

Apologies in advance for any undefined neologisms in the above.

Anyway, one thing I've been focusing on as a result of the B/X game I'm involved in is the importance of having the world be scaled to the character, and having the players be aware of it. By this I mean, simply, that the players should have a reasonable expectation that anything they think of to have their characters do should be, if not "safe", then "tryable" without excessive risk.

For some this leads in the direction of "tailored" games where encounters are scaled to the current power level of the PCs. I'm not a huge fan of this, though I think it's more necessary in D&D due to the steep power curve found in the game. The alternative is basically to make the PCs pretty powerful from the start, and to include mechanisms and practices which "buffer" them somewhat from bad luck and (at least until they learn the world) misjudgment. 1st level Basic characters are extremely brittle; even fighting a single orc or zombie one on one can be very dicey. (This arises IMO from a combination of the variance in the TO HIT die roll and the high variance in typical damage rolls relative to typical HPs. The latter in particular goes away rapidly as characters get a few levels under their belts. Other games simply start characters off with the equivalent of more HP and a smaller expected loss of HP per round with tighter variance. At least I'll bet that's what you'd find for armored characters in GURPS.) One "buffering" mechanic is "fate" or "hero" points, though depending on exact usage they might as well be seen simply as reserve hit points. Key here is what you can do with them, and how you earn them. Finally, a buffering practice means simply that the GM seeks ways to avoid punishing players for doing stuff with their characters. This can be dangerous as it may lead to a loss of a sense of danger entirely. However e.g. particularly when facing human foes in combat, the GM could make clear that surrender and retreat are both viable options with less than disastrous consequences.

Another idea for encouraging proactivity is to not oppose initial player actions, at least not very strongly. If you want to make them work for it a bit, okay, but I'd suggest that those first things players try to do may actually be an expression of how they want their characters to fit into the gameworld. Ergo, by letting them accomplish those things, you're both giving them a stake that encourages additional building, and getting yourself a "hook" that you can use to devise future gameworld events which will grab the characters' interests.

Finally, I like the idea of using various means to expand the range of viable actions by characters, without adding to GM prep. Mechanically, this is stuff like Resources & Circles in Burning wheel: essentially, you have some abstract number that represents your capacity to contact and/or exploit social and economic resources that haven't been explicitly defined by the GM or linked to the PC. Nonmechanically, it basically amounts to the GM being willing to improvise things into existence in response to reasonable player initiatives. Thus if your character is a merchant, the GM doesn't need to stat out your contacts in every town, instead you just say you're looking for such-and-such a person who can help in such-and-such a way, and the GM either gives you some dice to roll or decides--fairly liberally--whether the person can be found. The same idea can be expanded to things like business/adventure opportunities, though depending on the game system and the detail you want, player initiatives along those lines could require the GM to break the session and go off to prepare. But essentially this approach could be used to frame adventures/scenarios/sessions based on player interest.

EDIT: I'm also a fan of the idea of beginning with limited options and then expanding from there.

Quote from: Elliot WilenA link probably wouldn't get you in too much trouble, how about it?

If I had one, I would gladly provide it. Unfortunately was mainly talking about personal experience and how, during the 3 years I'd been doing improv', the less specific the initial constraints were, the harder it seemed to come up with something. Nothing seemed to stimulate our creativity more than a convoluted set of constraints.

I think that generating characters as part of an organization, be it cult, rock band, LAPD unit, imperial loyalists, etc. might go a decent ways toward keeping things moving. Organizations tend to have clear goals, and if the PCs are part of it, they will hopefully take on those goals as well. It also lets you ask, "What's more important to you guys right now, getting a contract or doing live shows?" rather than, "So, um, what do you want to do?"

It's no help to already existing campaigns, though, just my thought on the situation.

There's a lot to be said for starting in media res.

I've GM'd and played in campaigns that started with scenes such as, "You've been rotting as a captive in an enemy dungeon for a month now, execution promised every day, and one of your cellmates has just surprised one of your lazy guards with a chokehold.  The keys to the cell have fallen to the floor.  What do you do?" or "The pirate/slaver ship that you've been captive on has sunk in a storm and you've just washed up on an unfamiliar shore.  Some of the pirates/slavers may have survived -- you just don't know.  What do you do?"  These two example scenarios do wonders for setting players on their feet with a clear-cut, immediate goal.  In depth characterisation isn't necessary, and the challenges can start small and simple until the players really get their bearings.

I know the pain of the wide-open adventure all too well.  I once had a GM say, "Well, here you all are.  Tell what you're going to do."  No guidance what so ever, no reason for cohesion among the player characters at all.  It seemed as if he wanted us to entertain him, and he seemed to think himself a particularly accomplished GM.  The game lasted for one truncated session and the group of players disbanded.  So, yes, I strongly suggest some guidance, some sense of a delineated scope that can potentially blow wide open once the players are ready to take the reins.

!i!

I am very much a 'clockwork world, huge sandbox' style GM, in other words I don't like forcing players into action.  I feel your pain.

However, I have learned that if you give them some time to get to grips with the world you present them, and their characters places in it, you get better results than you would just plonking them down and saying 'what do ya do?'.

Very few players are capable of reacting to a good plonking.  I can do it, sure, but I ususally start planning on my character's goals long before the game starts... often to my detriment if I don't grok the GM's world as well as I'd hoped.  Even then, there are times when I just wonk up a character at the start of the game and blink stupidly at him for a few sessions wondering why he is.

The cure is to have a definite, if open ended, adventure planned out for the first few games to get things warmed up.  Just avoid a few standard cliches that put players into dungeon crawl mindsets and you are good to go.

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

I've GM'd and played in campaigns that started with scenes such as, "You've been rotting as a captive in an enemy dungeon for a month now, execution promised every day, and one of your cellmates has just surprised one of your lazy guards with a chokehold.  The keys to the cell have fallen to the floor.  What do you do?" or "The pirate/slaver ship that you've been captive on has sunk in a storm and you've just washed up on an unfamiliar shore.  Some of the pirates/slavers may have survived -- you just don't know.  What do you do?"  These two example scenarios do wonders for setting players on their feet with a clear-cut, immediate goal.  In depth characterisation isn't necessary, and the challenges can start small and simple until the players really get their bearings.

.

!i!

This is my method as well. I just started one on Wednesday with, "You are woken from a strange and unsettling dream; some one is pounding at your door, and shouting, "The beacon at Ux Keep is a light!"

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.

Quote from: jeff37923So 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?

Everything is because of CRPGs! Get off my lawn! :D

Seriously though, the level of proactivity we're talking about, where players create a story from whole cloth, is very difficult to do. It's especialy difficult if they don't have control over the setting. The GM should either give them some editorial control or get off his kiester and write some conflict into the script. A bucket o' city names does not an adventure make.

I used to have the same problem.  I think in my group's case they just didn't want to give a lot of thought to the game either and wanted me to entertain them.  In that case I just stuck them in the City State of the Invincible Overlord and let them hear some vague rumors and gossip that got their interest.

They became proactive at that point.  Of course most of them ended up in jail, but they did it proactively.

Maybe just provide them with some plot hooks to get them rolling?  

• "You see an old begger in the street being kicked by some thugs"
• "There is a contest being announced by the town herald to win the hand of Princess Luna."
• "A giant frog is ravaging a nearby village."

etc.  

Just stuff to get them going...?  Just create a stack of those and drop them in when the Players start getting that deer-in-the-headlights look?

- Mark

Quote from: VBWyrdeMaybe just provide them with some plot hooks to get them rolling?

Just stuff to get them going...?  Just create a stack of those and drop them in when the Players start getting that deer-in-the-headlights look?

- Mark

How about rolling for initiative?  Great plot hook.  The GM and players can make sense of how the players tie into the conflict later.

Quote from: Malleus ArianorumEverything is because of CRPGs! Get off my lawn! :D

Seriously though, the level of proactivity we're talking about, where players create a story from whole cloth, is very difficult to do. It's especialy difficult if they don't have control over the setting. The GM should either give them some editorial control or get off his kiester and write some conflict into the script. A bucket o' city names does not an adventure make.

You're misunderstanding my point. The players do have input on the setting and the adventures, they just tend not to take advantage of that.

I don't want to dump the story creation entirely on the players. I want the players to come up with their own goals they want their characters to strive for in game so that I can create the adventuring environment for them that would be the most entertaining for the group.

The problem I face is that while players come up with good backstory and good characters, they tend to not know where to go from there. I can provide them with adventures and campaigns of my own devising, but that may or may not address what kind of adventures they want their characters to go through. I'm trying to maximize fun by getting the players involved with the game on a meta level by telling me what they'd like to see happen, so I can concentrate the campaign focus on those inputs.

If it's metagame, then take a poll as others have said. I thought you were trying to make them write it from within the story. Something like this...

GM: So! What sounds cool?
Player: I wanna hunt down Osama bin Ladin and KICK HIS ASS!
GM: Ok, so you guys are standing outside of the Circle K in Butte Montana. It's about 5pm and clear sky looms above you. This is "big sky country" after all.
Player: I uh, look around for terrorists.
GM: You don't see any terrorists here.
Player: ...go inside and buy some smokes?
GM: The clerk in a turban says "Here are your smokes! Thank you! Please come again!"
Player: Is it a Sikh turban?
GM: Yes.
Player: Dang. Well I look for terrorists anyway.
GM: You don't THINK you see any terrorists here.
Player: ...I look again?
GM: You don't SEE any terrorists here.
Player: ...I feel around for them?
GM: You can't find any terrorists HERE.
Player: Fine I go outside and look, and listen and feel around for terrorists outside the circle K.
GM: YOU don't find any terrorits.
Player: What are you hinting at?
GM: What are YOU hinting at?
Player: What do you want me to do?
GM: What do you want ME to do?
Player: What does it take to make you happy?
GM: What does it take to make YOU happy?
Player: I want to find Osama and kick his ass!
GM: So like I said, you're standing in Butte Montana under a clear sky....

Quote from: Malleus ArianorumIf it's metagame, then take a poll as others have said. I thought you were trying to make them write it from within the story. Something like this...

GM: So! What sounds cool?
Player: I wanna hunt down Osama bin Ladin and KICK HIS ASS!
GM: Ok, so you guys are standing outside of the Circle K in Butte Montana. It's about 5pm and clear sky looms above you. This is "big sky country" after all.
Player: I uh, look around for terrorists.
GM: You don't see any terrorists here.
Player: ...go inside and buy some smokes?
GM: The clerk in a turban says "Here are your smokes! Thank you! Please come again!"
Player: Is it a Sikh turban?
GM: Yes.
Player: Dang. Well I look for terrorists anyway.
GM: You don't THINK you see any terrorists here.
Player: ...I look again?
GM: You don't SEE any terrorists here.
Player: ...I feel around for them?
GM: You can't find any terrorists HERE.
Player: Fine I go outside and look, and listen and feel around for terrorists outside the circle K.
GM: YOU don't find any terrorits.
Player: What are you hinting at?
GM: What are YOU hinting at?
Player: What do you want me to do?
GM: What do you want ME to do?
Player: What does it take to make you happy?
GM: What does it take to make YOU happy?
Player: I want to find Osama and kick his ass!
GM: So like I said, you're standing in Butte Montana under a clear sky....

I can see this as being played by Dante and Randall in CLERKS, the RPG.

But yeah, you got it.

I'm not even supposed to BE here today!

Quote from: jeff37923I can see this as being played by Dante and Randall in CLERKS, the RPG.

But yeah, you got it.

Seriously? Well fuck me, you've got to get your shit together in a sock and wire it tight, GM-boy, before those players rise up and overthrow you in what you can only hope is a bloodless coup.

As I said: Too many choices are overwhelming. You've got to give them something to work with. If they have to come up with everything themselves, what do they need the GM for? You could at least go fetch them pizza or something.

Between "you're either on the train or you're under it, bitch" GMing style, and the "you wake up naked and with no memory in a dark room with no doors and windows, what do you do?" - between railroading and plotless, there's a sensible middle ground, where you give them a choice of several options; from the choices they make others naturally arise, and then you have a campaign.

I had to laugh at the Finding Osama vignette. :)


But yeah, here's my thing: I just tell them where the entrance to the dungeon is.

See, campaigns are different at the beginning and in the middle and at the end, and the people who aren't prone to give you all the goals at the beginning of the campaign might not even know what they want their character to be, until perhaps they have tried him out a bit. And in that case, they're just looking for a place to try him out. In fantasy, you just provide a town and a dungeon full of encounters and let them whomp stuff for a while. They want to try out their powers and rack up some points before they emotionally commit to their characters inner life.

Then after session 4 (or 6 or 10) try asking again? Maybe you get a bit more. I had a situation like that in one of my fantasy campaigns that took like.. a couple of months before one of the players wanted to pursue subplots that I had dangled about his character-race and class (he had chosed an Elan Psion, so I threw out some plot points with other Elan and other psions.. and at first he didn't really want to pursue them.) After a while he got more comfortable and that became a major part of the campaign.

Ok, but if it's not in fantasy, what then? In my case I am working on this Mutants and Masterminds campaign and I plan on just doing the exactly wrong totally counterintuitive thing: I am going to provide a dungeon-type area.. an outbreak zone full of mutants and kill-bots and whatever, and let players start out by whomping them.

After a few sessions of whomping, they can get into personalities and plotlines and whatnot.

Quote from: Abyssal MawI had to laugh at the Finding Osama vignette. :)


But yeah, here's my thing: I just tell them where the entrance to the dungeon is.

See, campaigns are different at the beginning and in the middle and at the end, and the people who aren't prone to give you all the goals at the beginning of the campaign might not even know what they want their character to be, until perhaps they have tried him out a bit. And in that case, they're just looking for a place to try him out. In fantasy, you just provide a town and a dungeon full of encounters and let them whomp stuff for a while. They want to try out their powers and rack up some points before they emotionally commit to their characters inner life.

Then after session 4 (or 6 or 10) try asking again? Maybe you get a bit more. I had a situation like that in one of my fantasy campaigns that took like.. a couple of months before one of the players wanted to pursue subplots that I had dangled about his character-race and class (he had chosed an Elan Psion, so I threw out some plot points with other Elan and other psions.. and at first he didn't really want to pursue them.) After a while he got more comfortable and that became a major part of the campaign.

Ok, but if it's not in fantasy, what then? In my case I am working on this Mutants and Masterminds campaign and I plan on just doing the exactly wrong totally counterintuitive thing: I am going to provide a dungeon-type area.. an outbreak zone full of mutants and kill-bots and whatever, and let players start out by whomping them.

After a few sessions of whomping, they can get into personalities and plotlines and whatnot.

I think this works great, especially if you provide some interesting tid-bits of information during the womping.

Quote from: VBWyrdeI think this works great, especially if you provide some interesting tid-bits of information during the womping.

Yeah, you slip it in. Then 4 sessions later when they encounter the guy manufacturing kill bots or mutagens they go "oh thats the guy who caused that thing way back then!"