I've recently had the first session of the new campaign set in late Republican era Rome, and was talking online with a prospective player for it. His comment was that he'd never before seen a game group prepare so much together. That is, he'd not seen them write up backgrounds, send them back and forth, have the GM tie them into the plot with NPCs and have the player try to tie their characters to each-other. Basically he'd not seen players and GM communicate so much before even the first session.

This surprised me. Obviously most groups don't do webpages, not even simple things like our wiki. But it seemed to me normal that GM and players communicate with each-other a lot before the first session of real play. That's to get everyone on-board and make sure that the campaign has things each person will enjoy, that everyone gets to play the sort of character they want, do things they want to do, and tries to tie their character to the game world and each to the other.

He seemed to be saying that the other extreme, the GM sitting down with a prepared setting and saying, "this is what we'll play, now each of you go off alone and make a character" was the more normal experience. Certainly I've done that, but I find those campaigns aren't very long-lived. The ones that last and are fondly-remembered are those which everyone puts a bit into.

For example with this Roman campaign, we'd discussed a few options. I offered three or four different campaigns, saying, "these are the ones I've got some ideas for, if you guys have any different ideas you'd like to play through, speak up - there may be some I couldn't GM, but I don't mind being a player." Of those, they chose the Roman one. Of the three original players, two were interested in a postapocalyptic game but the third had just finished my last one and wouldn't be keen, and two were interested in a medieval fantasy game but the third (a different one) was already beginning a game like that with another GM. One player wasn't present at this discussion but at that stage I wasn't entirely sure if he'd be playing with us, and anyway I felt sure I had a good idea of his preferences from playing with him for some time. So we settled on the Roman one.

I explained my basic idea was that they'd be clients of a patron, an important man in Roman Republic politics, and as he and other factions rose and fell, so too would their PCs - they'd seek their patron's advancement at first, and from that get their own advancement. They'd thus be influential in this pivotal time in Roman history. They'd change history. I said, "there are other things we can do, but that was my idea. Sound good?" They liked that idea so we went with it.

Next I sent out the details of their patron and his family, and a couple of links about Roman history and daily life. This let them begin character creation by thinking of how they could be tied to their patron, and where they'd fit in Roman society. With those emails being group emails, people could comment on one another's characters, and try to fit them together a bit.

I've used an approach like this a couple of times before. I find it works pretty well for giving players and GM both a sense of investment in the game. One thing I did in one campaign (but not this one) was to ask the players to come up with for their characters one place, person and thing (something portable) - which was important to their character for some reason, and give me the story behind it. In this way, the players actually added something to the setting even if it was just a little corner of the forest.

I realise that's unusual, asking the players to add something to the setting. But that process of ideas going back and forth - isn't that common? Sure, it mightn't always happen with email, more often at a game session. But don't most gamers contribute their ideas and try to tie their characters to the game world and each-other?

Quote from: Kyle AaronI realise that's unusual, asking the players to add something to the setting. But that process of ideas going back and forth - isn't that common? Sure, it mightn't always happen with email, more often at a game session. But don't most gamers contribute their ideas and try to tie their characters to the game world and each-other?

This process is usually the first session of any campaign that I run. I've found it works best with Traveller since I can actually have the players create the very world that their character comes from.

This is something that I believe has to have a Gamemaster, though. A collaborative effort to create or enhance a game world demands that there is one person as the Final Editor, otherwise the primary theme or even campaign tone can get diluted or even turned to mush as all the competing contributions become contradictory.

This happened ...by accident and intention the first 4 or 5 sessions of the current campaign that I'm running.

 one player wanted to be from an oput-of-the-way Star system where Androids had civil rights - So I figured out a way to put that in an underused part of the Deneb Sector. (Subsecter P actually)

 The other players wrote up histories of their characters and i try to integrate it all . Mainly worried or worked out what they all did during the Fifth Frontier War.


- Ed C.

Quote from: Kyle AaronI find it works pretty well for giving players and GM both a sense of investment in the game. One thing I did in one campaign (but not this one) was to ask the players to come up with for their characters one place, person and thing (something portable) - which was important to their character for some reason, and give me the story behind it.

I agree fully. I use the same, call it "symbol" - it might be either a thing or a belief. You can have a family sword, lasting for generations or you can follow your fathers way, became a Jedi knight... ok, well... the point is, they really have to invest in the setting. Also, I have the rule, that in case of danger/death they can "lost" the symbol and survive, success... You can guess how many times did that actually use it. Never. They were tempted of course, but they usually rather failed or even died that put it away...

Quote from: Kyle AaronI realise that's unusual, asking the players to add something to the setting. But that process of ideas going back and forth - isn't that common? Sure, it mightn't always happen with email, more often at a game session. But don't most gamers contribute their ideas and try to tie their characters to the game world and each-other?

Actually, it is not that commong, I guess. As far as I can say, most players expect to be entertained not to create entertainment themselves. And that begin even before the game. So it is really rare to meet players eager to contribute with ideas or add something to the setting. Despite that, I acutally been lucky to both lately...

we've rarely done it.  usually the pre-game collaboration would be limited to the occasional skill-needs of the group, like "we still need a cleric" or "we've got three pilots.  does anyone have nav?"  that's not to say there isn't background stuff done between players & gm, just that it usually develops in play.

funny, 'cause i was trying to do just that for a CoC one-shot i wanted to run this summer.  attempting to get 4 or 5 people to do their chargen in advance, with emails (as opposed to at the table) just to tie things together has been like pulling teeth :mad:

Quote from: beeberfunny, 'cause i was trying to do just that for a CoC one-shot i wanted to run this summer.  attempting to get 4 or 5 people to do their chargen in advance, with emails (as opposed to at the table) just to tie things together has been like pulling teeth :mad:

It can be like that, I know. Interestingly, I just this afternoon got an email from a friend telling me about his game group starting a new campaign. We have one player in common between the two groups. My friend was unimpressed that he himself had made a big effort to struggle through the complicated character generation and have a character ready, a second player had presented no less than six different characters he could play, asking the group which it should be, while the third, the one in common, had done nothing. Partly as a result of that, their planned four hours of gaming was 45 minutes.

This same player for my campaign had presented a background of a couple of hundred words and a complete character.

Any differences to cause this? Well, I said that if they didn't have a character and background, they couldn't play. Anyone without a character was welcome to sit and watch while everyone else played.

The other difference was the back-and-forth everyone engaged in. This player participated a bit less in it than the others, but apparently just listening in on it creates some kind of sense of investment. The other GM is a bit more Viking Hat than me, "this is the game we're playing, these are the rules, now make a character. What can I tell you about the world? Well it will depend on what kind of characters you make."

Perhaps if you begin by asking them which setting and system they'd like to have - offering them a choice of 3-6 in each - then they'll be more interested in the details of those. It's a bit like how you're more likely to sit through the whole of a movie you chose at the DVD store than one you accidentally found on the tv. Once you've chosen the thing in the first place, you're more interested in the outcome.

So perhaps you should be firm, beeber, while at the same time considering things like this thread and this article? I don't know - it's worked well for me. I just don't know how common it is - either that it happens, or that it works.

I guess even my failed imploded game group, the nature of the implosion showed that players had a sense of investment in things...!

i've just left the door open, basically.  "just get me your characters whenever, and maybe we'll run this in the fall."  grad school kind of takes precedence, yes?  :raise:

maybe i'll just give them pre-gens instead

Most of the "setting" in my current OtE campaign was a group effort. I normally pitch a couple of ideas and the players tell me what they are intereted in...the problem is that they are interested in all the ideas so I have various concepts in various stages of development.

Sometimes like for the OtE game, the setting is pretty complex and I need the players to contribute more than just their characters. This was also the case for my Active Exploits one shot. Other times it's just me taking care of business - which suits me fine. Most of my campaigns are "discovery" type games , so it's better that my players don't no much about the setting.

Chargen is always done as a group. I've ceased doing the "strangers meeting in a bar" thing. In fact after explaining the setting and getting feedback, I leave it up to them to figure how their characters know each other or work with them in this aspect of the game.

I've been lucky to have always had players who are enthusiastic about my camapigns and can't wait to roll up characters and you know create something.

Regards,
David R

Years ago I thought planning sessions were a waste of time.  I wanted everyone to build their characters solo, give a 3 minute discussion of the character, and then jump into the game and start playing.

Today I dedicate one or two sessions to campaign and character creation.  We start with a blank slate and go from there, adding in organizations, locations, NPCs, themes, and everything else.  I find it to be much more satisfying and it also pulls the players into the game much more often.

In terms of how common it is though - I'm the only person I know, outside of my group, who does this.  Among all the folk I've played with I can't recall anyone else doing this.  Just build characters, show up, and play the game.

We do the "sit down and make characters together" bits, but don't generate the entire campaign as a group. Our games are still long-lived and fondly-remembered, which I think comes from the story being player drive as it progresses.

Rather than try to mesh everyone's backgrounds into a story up front, I mesh their actions into a story as they make them. I don't much care what their backgrounds are, except at those points where they affect the game. If you want your grandfather's sword to play a role, bring it to attention in various scenes. Don't just drop it in the background and expect me to weave it into a plot that doesn't even exist at those early stages.

It's a lot more work for me to generate new stuff every week based on what happened last week, but when I've tried to do it in advance most of it has been wasted effort because my players go in a different direction.

Quote from: Kyle AaronHe seemed to be saying that the other extreme, the GM sitting down with a prepared setting and saying, "this is what we'll play, now each of you go off alone and make a character" was the more normal experience.

I would think that they are the norm, when you consider gaming on the whole.

Quote from: Kyle AaronI realise that's unusual, asking the players to add something to the setting. But that process of ideas going back and forth - isn't that common? Sure, it mightn't always happen with email, more often at a game session. But don't most gamers contribute their ideas and try to tie their characters to the game world and each-other?

I, personally, like it, but, again, I'm not sure how much of the norm it is. The GM is god paradigm has deep roots.

Seanchai

I've tried this twice with both my group here and back home.  It's so outside the norm for them that very little actually happens except making characters.  We could've just made characters on our own and played just as easily.  They cared more about game systems they wanted to play than campaign premises or types of characters.  A lot of it has to do with time.  They'd rather be playing than trying to determine what everyone wants to play.

Kyle, you've said it enough times yourself... most geeks are lazy.
 
I ran a couple of Savage Worlds one-shot adventures for my old D&D group.  All of them were;
 
1. Given ample time to prepare
2. Intimately familiar with the setting
3. Given copies of the rules (I used the SW "quickstart" rules)
4. Gently reminded over a period of 2 weeks to at least come up with a character concept
 
All of them work desk jobs where they have access to their email every minute of the day and they all have 'net access at home (so communication was not an issue).  Now, I can understand if one or two of them couldn't put a character together in a two week time frame because of work or home committments.  And I can understand if they didn't have time to learn the rules, but at least came up with a concept.
 
But of course, come game day... 6 players and not a single idea amongst the lot of them.

Hmm, it's true that many geeks are lazy... and shy! But that doesn't account for some will do more in one group than the other. It must relate in some way to the approach of the GM, the makeup of the group, something like that?

I do think that ironically enough, daily internet access doesn't help. The immediacy of the communications can actually make us more lazy about responding to them. Just looking at the spelling and grammar in emails from my woman tells me that - as a translator, spelling and grammar should not be a problem for her, and actually it's not, but in an email... I think it's perhaps that because they can reply to it at any time and it'll reach the others instantly, they're in no hurry to make that reply, and end up not doing it at all.  

Having emails also makes us lazy about using other forms of communication, such as telephone calls and face-to-face speech. Here I am boasting of how much our group communicates, but it's just by email.

But really the truly lazy players are easily dealt with. "Nothing ready? No ideas? Okay, you can be a specator this session." I think there's a difference between just normal geek-lazy, and the truly lazy. Normal geek-lazy, you can inspire and encourage them. Truly lazy are always useless no matter what. As a GM you need to be a bit ruthless, I reckon, and confident that there are many more gamers out there. I view truly lazy gamers as like dole bludgers. Why force dole bludgers to work when there are naturally hard-working people out there you could hire, and who'd be grateful for the chance? Why force truly lazy disinterested gamers to do stuff when there are enthusiastic and dedicated gamers out there who are without a group and would be delighted to do stuff in yours?

Your SW group sounds like they were truly lazy. Weren't they the same group who normally played another game, and one of them would come along, lie down on the couch and say, "wake me when it's time to roll for combat"? That's truly lazy.

Quote from: Kyle AaronYour SW group sounds like they were truly lazy. Weren't they the same group who normally played another game, and one of them would come along, lie down on the couch and say, "wake me when it's time to roll for combat"? That's truly lazy.

Sort of.
 
One of the players frequently interupted the game sessions with his snoring. And I caught at least two other snoozers at various times. But I never put it down to laziness... rather, the horrible GMing (not me, thankfully). You'd think, as a GM, that if you had players falling asleep during your games that you'd take that as a hint.
 

QuoteBut that doesn't account for some will do more in one group than the other. It must relate in some way to the approach of the GM, the makeup of the group, something like that?

Or their level of interest in the campaign.
 
Tell me we are going to play a cyberpunk campaign, and I'll get real excited and engaged in the game. Tell me we're going to play Vampire, and I'll be "meh". Of course, as a GM you can influence the level of excitment a player feels for a game, but only to a certain degree. If the GM does a really good job of pitching that Vampire game, I might get more excited and more engaged... but nothing is going to get me interested in playing, say, Rifts.