I think that in a long-term game, roleplaying can create adventures, but in a short game, adventures must create roleplaying. Let me explain.


The Game
Had a one-off the other day, Call of Cthulhu. Mainly it was to introduce a few players to each-other - I'd gamed with each of them at some time, but many of them hadn't gamed with each-other.


Getting Feedback
Normally when I GM I ask for feedback at regular intervals. I wasn't GMing this time, but I was hosting, and I was the person who'd introduced all the people to each-other. So normally I ask, "What do you think of the rules, the setting, the GMing, the other players, the other characters, and your own playing? What do you like, and what do you dislike?" I do this so I can improve the game, and sort out any small troubles before they become big troubles. Usually I just ask after the first session, and every 6-8 sessions after that. When I ask after the first session, that's more, "do you want to game with any of these people again?"

Normally when I ask, there are rarely any surprises for me. My openness to feedback means that I usually get the lowdown before asking for it specifically. And if the group's together for more than a couple of sessions, we're able to see any issues.

But when it's a group after just one or two sessions, and the players are new to each-other - then there are many surprises. So I got the feedback from this session, from the other five people there, and it was like it was six different game sessions! Each had their own quite unique perspective.

In a group together for a while, people share their ideas, and their several perspectives become just one or two, they put everything together into a stew. But in a one-off, they can't do that.


The Issue - we died!
Anyway, there was only one significant issue, and that was one player who got pissed off because he acted in character, felt he did the reasonable thing, and had his face eaten by Hastur. Okay, to a degree that's Cthulhu, you die horrible pointless deaths, that's just what happens in that game, big deal. The problem was that when he said he couldn't see any other option, the GM basically told him, "no, you could have done so-and-so." To which the player said, "but my character didn't know that." "Yes but you're not a real person, you're a character in and adventure."


Adventure, roleplaying, which came first?
So this got me thinking about roleplaying and adventures. Some people think that adventuring leads to roleplaying - as your character encounters and responds to situations, their personality comes out. Others think that roleplaying leads to adventures - as your character expresses their personality and interacts with others, this causes events which are adventurous.

As I saw it, we (me and the player, compared to the GM) just had different ideas of what should happen in a game session. The GM's idea - going by his GMing and what he's said - is that we're there to have an adventure, and the roleplaying will just arise naturally out of that. That's why he expected us to use out-of-character knowledge to affect in-character actions and decisions; "We are having an adventure, so we should investigate this guy whose party we're going to." Whereas we thought we were there to roleplay, and an adventure would arise naturally out of that. "What's my guy's motivation? Why does he care about this?"

It's just two different ideas of what should happen in a game session. Me, I usually share the point of view that roleplaying ---> adventure, but that's because when you've several sessions, you can tie characters into the adventure, etc. No special bending needed. In a one-off, I share the GM's point of view, that adventure ---> roleplaying, because otherwise nothing will happen and it'll be a boring session. Okay, I don't go as far along the axis as this GM did, but still. It was different ideas of what a game session's supposed to be about, and that caused some tension.

Another player noted that the characters in the group were somewhat independent, running off doing things by themselves. That was the setup the GM gave us, though. He asked us what was our character's connection to the main guy inviting us to his party (where he was summoning Hastur), but he didn't ask us our characters' connections to each-other. So right from the get-go we were separated. I guess he just assumed we'd be a "party."

That's just an assumption of the hobby. "You meet in an inn and decide to adventure together." Zombie drone monotone voice - "we are instant friends and always hang out and trust each-other with our lives." The flipside is the guy who has his character do something stupid which wrecks the party, and says, "but I was just playing in character!" I favour the middle-ground, as always. But I'm guessing the people who think adventure ---> roleplaying, those are the ones who think the party should be instant friends, and it's fine to use out-of-character knowledge to guide and justify in-character actions.

Anyway, that's just a little observation that came out of the game session where Hastur ate my character's face.

What do you guys reckon?

[Incidentally, I kept in mind RGPundit's recent comments about the whole Cthulhu Mythos, and I roleplayed having fascinated but terrified incomprehension... that's why my character died, because, especially with its "face" covered, a hooded figure, he simply couldn't imagine how alien and malevolent the thing was - so he went up to it to talk to it. So my roleplaying in the true spirit of it got my guy killed :cool: ]

That's very interesting. I'm kinda in the camp that adventure creates the roleplaying.

For this reason, I have one obvious weakness to my games: the first session hump. To whit:

• I generally let the players make whatever characters they want, completely independent of each other. So we get a lot of really diverse guys with no real reason to hang out together.


• I eschew things like merits and flaws and personality mechanics. I also don't allow backstories to be entered into record (campaign wiki) until the character reaches second level: As a GM, I ask for blank slates.

So in my roleplaying philosophy, the blank slate defines himself by reaction to events and situations. And the weakness is, that whole first session players are making the initial decisions that will eventually form their entire persona.

The benefit of this is players end up with well-formed complex characters.

Quote from: Abyssal MawThat's very interesting. I'm kinda in the camp that adventure creates the roleplaying.

For this reason, I have one obvious weakness to my games: the first session hump. To whit:

• I generally let the players make whatever characters they want, completely independent of each other. So we get a lot of really diverse guys with no real reason to hang out together.


• I eschew things like merits and flaws and personality mechanics. I also don't allow backstories to be entered into record (campaign wiki) until the character reaches second level: As a GM, I ask for blank slates.

So in my roleplaying philosophy, the blank slate defines himself by reaction to events and situations. And the weakness is, that whole first session players are making the initial decisions that will eventually form their entire persona.

The benefit of this is players end up with well-formed complex characters.

This pretty much sums up how I approach things.  But I like long campaigns.  I used to ask for detailed backgrounds, but found that they didn't do much to improve our play.  Characters develop in play, both their "present" selves and their backgrounds (from the current game: "hey, Ken, would my guy retired Army Colonel have served in a local action here?"  "Sure, he's from this part of the sector.").

I can see your point about one-shots, JimBob.  Starting the game with a blank slate does have that problem overcoming the initial inertial hump, and that's not good for a one-shot.  But I haven't really ever run or played in short games like that, so I can't say for sure if that's how I'd do it.