Quote from: HorusArisen;967545I was chatting with this chap and he was saying that every time he ran a sandbox game his group floundered and became aimless and the game fizzled.

Sounds like he invited Bingo players to his game (that were only there to fill in their character sheets, while being told a great story about how their characters win at everything), instead of inviting role-players.

Quote from: S'mon;967808I do a slightly meta thing in my big sandbox Wilderlands game where I have a Campaign web page that details the known campaign area at the kind of detail level PCs would know. Then now and then I add rumours to the page. Some of these concern past PC deeds, but some are new. Players who read the page get to 'overhear' these rumours! But I can also use it myself as an aide memoire for NPCs talking about stuff.

Just been updating a Dungeons section for the area around one village, Bratanis - wonder if anyone will read it...

Local Dungeons
This area has been inhabited for thousands of years, and  there are many ruins and dungeons in the hills around Bratanis. Adventurers often use the Bratanis Inn as a base for their expeditions.
2 miles north of Bratanis lies Goblin Gulley, with its ancient Demonbrood slave pits.
4.5 miles south-east of Bratanis, the Ruins of the Gorgon lie on a north-facing wooded hillside, about half a mile south from the meadowlands along the river. The ruins are said to have once been a temple of Midor, the orc god, and are the lair of feral redcap gnomes.
4 miles west of Bratanis in a dry gorge are the Nerath Caves, which bear signs of that fallen empire. Once the lair of terrible Gaunt Hounds, said to have been defeated in 4444 by the heroic Captain Lance Harcourt, the caves are now believed safe, and recent treasure hunters have returned empty-handed.
An old ruin called the Sunless Citadel is said to lie buried in a deep crevasse 3 miles due south of town, across the Thrace river. Goblins live there, and grow apples from a magical tree.
24 miles west along the Pilgrims' Trail is the Tomb of Belaras, Temple-Crypt of this Ghinoran Saint of Apollo-Mitra, which serves as a testing ground for would-be Mitra priests and holy warriors, still tended by a small cadre of priests.

And here are the rumours from that village for the past 13 game-months, about 2 real years - some other hub villages like Thusia & Selatine have a similar amount of detail:

Bratanis Rumours:
M1 4446: Aeschela is secretly paying tribute to Warlord Yusan, who holds her sister Thuvia, in defiance of the Lords' Alliance to oppose him!
M2 4446: Bratanis has been troubled by hobgoblin raiders. The barbarian Eardvulf slew a dozen of them in hill ruins four miles east of Bratanis.
6/2/4446: Ruggio has overthrown Aeschela and made himself Lord of Bratanis! He keeps her naked and chained at his feet! He plans to join the Lords' Alliance.
6/2/4446: Bjornalf the Warlock has persuaded Ruggio to marry Lady Aeschela!
M5/4446: Ruggio murdered Aeschela, betrayed the Lords' Alliance, and joined with Yusan!
12/6/4446: Ruggio not found among the dead after the disastrous Battle of Yusan's Fall, 4.5 hours march south of Krens' Cairn.
1/2/4447: Ruggio found & killed by Hakeem in the Vale, Hakeem rescuing Priestess Octavia from his brigands.
M2 4447: Shelos was kidnapped by cultists from beneath Sky God Idol, but rescued by adventurers and the slave Misha - the Lady Thuvia gave Misha her freedom.
M2 4447: Two miles north of town, in the woods a mile past Erhurr Farm, lies Goblin Gulley. Archermos slew the Goblins, but beware the ancient abomination that lurks in the depths of the Demonbrood slave pits!

Man, whose idea was it to start a town in the middle of all that danger? Is there some special ore that can only be found there? Why would anyone live two miles from demonic slave pits and four miles from feral gnomes? :eek:

Quote from: Dumarest;967826Man, whose idea was it to start a town in the middle of all that danger? Is there some special ore that can only be found there? Why would anyone live two miles from demonic slave pits and four miles from feral gnomes? :eek:

Are you familiar with the Wilderlands? The whole planet is like that!

The villages in this campaign are all fortified, with their own Lord, who normally has his own Warband. And being the Wilderlands, a Badass Planet, everyone can fight.

Basically a human village is much the same as a large orc or goblin lair in terms of resources; probably the main difference is that humans are more likely to have friendly neighbours who can help them out.

As for the demonic slave pits (Dyson Logos' Goblin Gulley) - they were built by demonbrood/tieflings thousands of years ago. Following yesterday's game, when the place was cleared of recent-arrived goblin immigrantss, the only monsters there now are safely locked away. Some of the other areas are currently void of monsters.

Quote from: S'mon;967810I like to roll a d6 for 'unfollowed' stuff, typically the higher roll, the better for PCs (so 1= very bad, 3/4 = neutral, 6 = very good). That avoids the temptation to have all villain plots succeed, all NPC allies of the PCs be incompetent losers, etc. Maybe Lord Redshirt faces the Witch King Zhengyi at the Battle of Fordyford, gets a 6, drives off the Witch King's forces and is acclaimed Hero of Damara.

That's not a bad idea. I am building a new campaign at the moment. so that might go right in my house rule document.

Quote from: Dumarest;967826Man, whose idea was it to start a town in the middle of all that danger? Is there some special ore that can only be found there? Why would anyone live two miles from demonic slave pits and four miles from feral gnomes? :eek:

Hey, I live in New Jersey, within ten miles of a nuclear reactor of the same design as the one at Fukishima and right in the Jersey Devil-Haunted Pine Barrens. I'll take feral gnomes over Piney methheads any day.

In any case, I bet the demonic slave pits can provide reasonable, affordable manufacturing for businesses in nearby villages.

No, I don't know the Wilderlands...wasn't that a Judges Guild thing from way back when? I've never owned any settings...Greyhawk, Invincible Overlord, Forgotten Realms, they're all outside my wheelhouse. Or is that your own creation?

Oh wait, I do have a copy of Dark Albion, I guess that counts as a setting even if I don't use it for that.

Quote from: Dumarest;967852No, I don't know the Wilderlands...wasn't that a Judges Guild thing from way back when? I've never owned any settings...Greyhawk, Invincible Overlord, Forgotten Realms, they're all outside my wheelhouse. Or is that your own creation?

Wilderlands is the Judges Guild setting, my campaign is set in the Ghinarian Hills (sort-of Greek) in Barbarian Altanis, the Conan-meets-Dejah Thoris part of the setting. I use the 3e Necromancer Games version (Altanis developed by Rob Conley) but make the scale 15 miles/hex instead of 5 miles/hex and add a lot of my own stuff to fill the extra space.

Bratanis does have an unusally high number of local dungeons but per setting canon the whole of Altanis is littered with ruins from many previous human, abhuman and semi-human civilisations.

Sounds pretty cool. Pretty map, too!

Quote from: cranebump;967562This. But be prepared to adjust as events unfold (I'm speaking of the player, here).

Also: the evolving world has forces in it who have goals as well, and where these goals intersect with the players/PCs, you gain additional directions to choose from.

"Throw away your backstory" seems harsh. I find backstories help shape an interesting character to role play and generate goals and hooks for the GM to use.

Quote from: Nexus;968004"Throw away your backstory" seems harsh. I find backstories help shape an interesting character to role play and generate goals and hooks for the GM to use.

I get that. But I think Black Vulmea's advice to generate three goals accomplishes about the same thing, in shorthand. I also think system has a say, sometimes, in how to approach this, as I detailed in the post about Dungeon World "past adventures" that players generate in the "prequel" to play.  A game with a professions or background list also does some of the relevant work for you, for example, if I list my Barbarians of Lemuria character's careers as "Slave, Thief, Mercenary, Sky Pilot," I've already got the makings of back story, which I can expand upon before, or after play begins.  

I think if back stories work for you, then, by all means, go for it. You can, as you say, mine some goals and hooks from the get go. In the main, though, I'd rather get to the adventure as soon as possible, so brevity is the soul of "let's just get to it, eh?"

(P.S. That DW campaign I ran had me conducting sort of lengthy character interviews to gather hooks and two of the four characters died 1/4 into the campaign. Back story ain't much use if you're dead.)

Quote from: Nexus;968004"Throw away your backstory" seems harsh. I find backstories help shape an interesting character to role play and generate goals and hooks for the GM to use.

Personally I think backstories are essential. You don't need pages of backstory for every NPC, but a little depth of background can be great in play (especially if it produces conflict between characters and groups).

With any GM advice, I think there is always the danger of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

I prefer a (mostly) sandbox with a fallback option, whether ignorable hooks or whatever, for those times when the entire group turns up in less than optimal form, and then explicitly volunteers their noses to be led around a little. I suppose I could instead run a different game on those sessions, but it isn't always obvious at first.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;968011Personally I think backstories are essential. You don't need pages of backstory for every NPC, but a little depth of background can be great in play (especially if it produces conflict between characters and groups).

With any GM advice, I think there is always the danger of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

That's why I like Lifepath chargen whenever possible.  It adds depth and history to the character, helps the player discover who the character is while rolling him up, and can add hooks into the setting and party.  It might curtail the people who like to show up with three pages single-spaced, but it's awesome for everyone else.

Quote from: CRKrueger;968096That's why I like Lifepath chargen whenever possible.  It adds depth and history to the character, helps the player discover who the character is while rolling him up, and can add hooks into the setting and party.  It might curtail the people who like to show up with three pages single-spaced, but it's awesome for everyone else.

Well, I don't usually show up with "three pages single spaced" but I don't care for "life path" character generation (or random character generation in general) except as a change of pace for a one shot or short game. Its a matter of wanting to play the character I want and am invested in not what random chance hands me.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;968011Personally I think backstories are essential. You don't need pages of backstory for every NPC, but a little depth of background can be great in play (especially if it produces conflict between characters and groups).

With any GM advice, I think there is always the danger of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

For me, a backstory is definitely an essential aspect of the character. As a gm I try to have at least a little for any major NPCs. Of course, players generally aren't interested n those but want to know the life story of Eddy (who didn't have a name until they asked) the hot dog vendor they just met.

Quote from: Nexus;968106For me, a backstory is definitely an essential aspect of the character. As a gm I try to have at least a little for any major NPCs. Of course, players generally aren't interested n those but want to know the life story of Eddy (who didn't have a name until they asked) the hot dog vendor they just met.

With NPCs, I find backstory pays dividends down the road. I don't have the NPC tell their sad tale of woe when the players meet them, but usually backstory comes up in play either when players are asking them questions (say "who is your father anyways?") or if something occurs that makes an NPC's background relevant (for example if there is a group of people after the NPC for something they did and they ambush the party-----and again, questions from the PCs are usually how the backstory comes out---"Why did those people want to kill you?").