I ad lib a lot, in fact that is bout all I do. However, I cheat all the time as well. the easiest way to cheat is to lift a plot and drop it into the game. There are some plots that just work and you can tweak and cycle a thousand times. Hollywood has been doing this for years, Warm Bodies is Romeo and Juliet with zombies, Apocalypse Now whilst it claims its Conrad's Heart of Darkness is really The Wizard of Oz...

Anyway the most common ones I tend to use are

Yojimbo (aka Fist full of dollars, aka Last man Standing) - stranger(s) come to a town and find two waring gangs wrecking the place. How do they rid the town of the scourge and make some money?

Seven Samurai (aka Battle Beyond the Stars, Magnificent Seven, etc) - village is being threatened by a tribe/gang can the party save the village?

Wizard of Oz (too many to mention but I quite like Thelma and Louise and of course the Wizard of Oz is really just The Odyessy and so is the Lord of the Rings I mean its even got munchkins) - a mismatched group of travelers need to reach a distant location but the route is plagued by monsters and trapped and their enemy watches sending their creatures against them.

So what are your favourite recycled architropes?

Sorry play in a sandbox only, no idea what this plot-line thing is you mention...

Sommerjon:
Oy.

You know, even in a sandbox, plots are still useful as 'shit other people are doing.'

It's still interesting to consider, say, 'there are two rival gangs in this town who are concerned about Bla and an all-out war will ensue in a month or so unless someone does something,' even if the players go 'whatevs' and goes to find some bugbears to slice up.

NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (hell, a lot of John Carpenter flicks) use a siege situation: 2 opposing factions who must work together to keep the fort from being overrun.

There are only two plots: "we go somewhere" and "a stranger comes to town". Sandbox players get to choose between them.

I think I tend only to use plot fragments and then add complications in the form of other plot fragments on top of them. I can't point to any movie or book as the singular source for anything I've run; it's always bits and pieces of a lot of them, and I try not to repeat the pieces. (The repeated pieces are the standard things, like dungeons in D&D and so on. Justifications may vary but don't generally matter.)

Quote from: Will;811797Sommerjon:
Oy.

You know, even in a sandbox, plots are still useful as 'shit other people are doing.'

It's still interesting to consider, say, 'there are two rival gangs in this town who are concerned about Bla and an all-out war will ensue in a month or so unless someone does something,' even if the players go 'whatevs' and goes to find some bugbears to slice up.

Yeah, I think Jibba pretty much just meant plot like "stuff that happens".

Quote from: jibbajibba;811791I ad lib a lot, in fact that is bout all I do. However, I cheat all the time as well. the easiest way to cheat is to lift a plot and drop it into the game. There are some plots that just work and you can tweak and cycle a thousand times. Hollywood has been doing this for years, Warm Bodies is Romeo and Juliet with zombies, Apocalypse Now whilst it claims its Conrad's Heart of Darkness is really The Wizard of Oz...

Anyway the most common ones I tend to use are

Yojimbo (aka Fist full of dollars, aka Last man Standing) - stranger(s) come to a town and find two waring gangs wrecking the place. How do they rid the town of the scourge and make some money?

Seven Samurai (aka Battle Beyond the Stars, Magnificent Seven, etc) - village is being threatened by a tribe/gang can the party save the village?

Wizard of Oz (too many to mention but I quite like Thelma and Louise and of course the Wizard of Oz is really just The Odyessy and so is the Lord of the Rings I mean its even got munchkins) - a mismatched group of travelers need to reach a distant location but the route is plagued by monsters and trapped and their enemy watches sending their creatures against them.

So what are your favourite recycled architropes?

I use a variation on Yojimbo where it is just one gang who comes in to strong arm a town (put them to work in the mines, that sort of thing). It is pretty much the same except all the factional stuff exists inside the one group that is running the town.

Flesh Golems. Pretty much every campaign I run, at some point, features an enemy who recycles old foes and allies to turn them against the party.

Fetch and Carry the Macguffin. Sometimes the Macguffin is a person.

Righteous Rebels against the Evil Empire.

Guns of Navarrone (small crack team of misfits -- i.e the adventurers -- go on a vital mission to fuck something important up)

I've also used OZ recently.Whole party was teleported to an unknown island and they spent some weeks getting back home. Pirates, sea zombies, wild apes, a dungeon, all figured.

EDIT: The game I am playing in, is a definite Righteous Rebels set up, and as part of that, I predict we'll be in a Navaronne-style scenario soon.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;811847Yeah, I think Jibba pretty much just meant plot like "stuff that happens".

Yup there is always stuff going on the PCs are free to ignore it and fuck off and do something else. To me plots are stuff my NPCs and PCs hatch to further their ambitions.

I dont know if I have a go to plot line per say. But if I ever get stuck. I find this a good reference.

That is a feat link. Thanks n

Quote from: Ronin;812076I dont know if I have a go to plot line per say. But if I ever get stuck. I find this a good reference.

Great link. Story seeds like this are done a lot in the WoD fora. There are a lot of neat ideas in them.

I usually go for a "shit might hit the fan" type of approach. There is a conflict (war or political) going on. Will the players mix in this confict? If so, then which party will they support or will they be freelancers?

I don't know. I get ideas from all over the place.  Most notably, from my player's character's own interests and agendas.

A bit of necromancy:

Like I said before the WoD crowd loves story seeds. The books are filled with them, some books like Glimpses of the Unknown are completely made up with story seeds. And they have forum topics like this with 1001 story hooks. Personally I always like these ideas, but I don't know what to do with it. I have to admit I like random mission generators better, because they are broader in options and more about what to players will be doing and not so much about the stuff that happens to the players.