As I mentioned in a post that shouldn't be too hard to find, the inevitable Age of Wonders has come and gone. Like I previously mentioned, it is why we have rare artifacts... and why we don't all have access to them and why they are legendary.
I mentioned before one major thing that I have never touched upon is the actual end of the age. Well, I did finally. Had to. I made the general mistake of tying four different organizations to the various magical and technological disasters that have stemmed from the very long and agonizing death of the Age of Wonders and it's tortured remains that came afterwards... in other words... the 1300+ years that came after that... IE: My campaigns over the last 13 years or so in the same world.
Trust me, I got the original map from 1998 that I colored with markers... complete with desert that disappeared because I got over-zealous with the green but I was not going to redraw the damn thing since it was on card stock.
Suddenly, every little problem and justification was dragged into the light. At first, it was easy. It was simple. They were just ancient powerhouse organizations. That is all. Don't ask questions. Wait! What are you doing? You actually want to know about them? Okay... here is the pamphlet/Wikipedia stub about them. That is enough, right?
I mean, one of them is an organization that hunts evil... think the harpers from forgotten realms meet the templars and decide to co-op with some paladin type refuges from Wheel of Time. Toss in a bit of Imperium of Man Inquisition for fun and profit.
One of them searches the countryside for monsters. They don't care about evil. They just want to safeguard the people from terrors that lurk in the darkness. They guard a massive wall and draw some inspiration from refugees from A Game of Thrones.
One is dedicated to the hunting of the dark and forbidden arts of technology and it's proscribed sub-sect, magical based technologies. They detest the wonder weapons of the Age of Wonders and the rise of the Industrial Revolution that came in it's flame covered wake.
Another is an order of spell casters trying their best to police themselves, hoping no one remembers that at one time, it was their own kind... the god priests and terror inducing wizards who had brought the world to it's knees in the first place. A self regulating body to prevent the rise of another lich king or similar wanna-be godling from rising from their ranks. Think Psi-Corps... but for ALL spell casters... divine and arcane.
The last is simply an order of warriors meant to be the counterbalance for the previous group. Supreme warriors who hone their abilities without aid of magic or enhancement because the leader of the organization has access to five great artifacts that can negate all magic for a certain area. When the mages fail or a truly terrible threat rises, the masters of this order sorte to solve it.
This was enough for months and months.
That changed.
That changed when suddenly players attached themselves to these organizations as former, disillusioned members. Suddenly, I need to figure things out. Histories, doctrines, and the such. The lore that backs these details suddenly means something now.
I couldn't be happier.
It is just suddenly means I need to actually work again... because someone might actually stumble across a shred of truth and start actually assembling the great mysteries that have been laying dormant in my notebooks for years. They occasionally stumble and solve part of them but never truly get it all... but suddenly, there might be a player who might start asking the questions as to the origins of the two worlds I run on... and it might make sense.
For the first time in years, I might have someone who might be able to play the game on the level that I used to run on. Not on the person on person level or the party on party level... no, to debate policy with ancient powers, to give their versions of a B5 level speech and maybe even steal the keys the worlds from my hand to shape it to their will like the players of old that I have had the pleasure to run for.
I couldn't be happier.
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Thursday, December 15, 2011
3 month update for the giant Risk map
As with any good engine, there is a good deal of engineering that goes into it. Trial and error... emphasis on the failure.
What have I learned from this process?
The rules I have created for province improvement and construction was well received. It was simple and after a very minor bit of book keeping work on a seasonal basis in game, it was understood. I ended up going with a seasonal basis for the game because it freed up the players to be able to still adventure and do what they want most with gaming... to play their characters.
They actually started to try to lay the ground work for a feudal system into play. When confronted with weeks long travel times, suddenly the idea of why nobles had so much power as they did outside the control of a king became more apparent to them. It was a beautiful moment as a GM to sit back and actually have them get nervous over picking who their regent or majordomo or the new lord of a newly claimed province. The idea that they are not able to police or get to the entire width and length of their kingdom made them actually slow down their ambitions.
When confronted with the idea of such expansive kingdoms that might take a month and a half to just march an army from one border to the next, suddenly that 200 man garrison within a major city did not seem like it was much, even if it is enough to bring down an average adventuring party. Time suddenly came into being important. That LotR-esque multi-month foot journey on a quest to sabotage a rogue noble might give that noble time to do something mean to prepare. Suddenly, that orc army from Return of the King seems less insane.
What have I really learned?
I need a better way to utilize armies effectively. Or at least run their battles.
There is no other way of saying it.
No matter how well I model the feudal system (or more accurately, it self-organizes itself), no matter how indepth I put the politics or the intrigue that goes behind the game of thrones, the moment the armies hit the field, it falls apart.
Player psychology puts themselves as being a cut above the rest and who doesn't think this way? We all want to be Conan the Barbarian, slaying all those who stand before us or fight like Aragorn. But there is a disconnect the moment that there is a marching band of 800 men, banners flying in the air.
Yes, they are a mass of level 1 to 3 NPCs. They are all powerful characters. They have butchered goblin or orc warbands that attack wildly in the dark of the night but suddenly, when faced with an organized army in an open field with their own special units attached to it and an intelligent commander, all the adventurer tricks went right out the window.
I have done this before, in an earlier campaign setting, when a player who was playing a shape changing berserker charged an entire motorized infantry company and their support vehicles. It took most of a day to roll out all the attacks of that combat. All 200 or so plus their supporting vehicles and support weapons. It was an odd campaign honestly... glad I laid that game to rest.
The long and the short of it is this... while he managed to kill a few and disable one of the vehicles, he was brought down... but it took four hours to run 3 turns of combat. And he wouldn't run away... he was depending on the idea that he could do the impossible, that he was invincible only because he had an incredible AC and a TON of hit points to soak what was a few pin-pricks at a time. Problem is... 200+ attacks per turn over 3 turns was just too much for one man to do.
Yet I still want players to feel like they can do something during a major battle. I want it to feel incredible for them. It is why we tell the stories and tales, yes? To feel like we are part of some epic fight? Yet how do I divorce players from thinking they are playing a table top version of the Koei made Dynasty Warrior series?
Because that is what I think they are thinking when they think of their characters verse an army.
Some mighty incarnation of Lu Bu capable of shattering ranks of infantry by merely charging into their ranks or pulling some Baron Munchhausen style insanity, thinking it will actually turn the tide of battle.
How else do you term riding a catapult bolder into battle and using feather fall to not die from the impact? All to get surrounded by foot soldier company.
Because they are not fighting disorganized orcs who don't know how to fight but groups of proper centuries, ordered and disciplined... and not just one century but a full on cohort... plus auxiliaries! Sorry, anything short of Hercules or Thor is going to be stop the power of a single cohort... let alone a full on Legion. Which is what sometimes is hanging on the wings.
Now, I can always just take it as my players (and players in general) are arrogant and think that since they can bring down a dragon or slay a lich or survive a trap filled dungeon or decode a mysterious legend that they are pretty capable. But put a roman-esque legion in their way or a mechanized SS grenadier company or what ever... and they think tackle them like it was a simple orc horde.
Oh well... this is the next great challenge in improving the system.
Do I keep the armies as mere set peices, fighting their great wars in the background while the players lurk about sabotaging supply lines, assassinating commanders, stealing plans... in essence, being commandos or James Bond special agents fighting small skirmishes with a few people at a time...
or do I figure out a way to put the players in situations akin to the storming of Normandy or Iwo Jima, the battlefields of El Alamein, the bloody fields of Agincourt, or the narrows at Thermopylae...
without dragging the game down with a million dice rolls that detract more than add... no game should ever be each player gets to roll their 2 or 3 attacks or 1 spell and then the GM has to roll 1000 times for both the player's allies and the enemy.
Hopefully I will get an update that ISN"T 3 months from now... but prep work always sucks up so much time.
What have I learned from this process?
The rules I have created for province improvement and construction was well received. It was simple and after a very minor bit of book keeping work on a seasonal basis in game, it was understood. I ended up going with a seasonal basis for the game because it freed up the players to be able to still adventure and do what they want most with gaming... to play their characters.
They actually started to try to lay the ground work for a feudal system into play. When confronted with weeks long travel times, suddenly the idea of why nobles had so much power as they did outside the control of a king became more apparent to them. It was a beautiful moment as a GM to sit back and actually have them get nervous over picking who their regent or majordomo or the new lord of a newly claimed province. The idea that they are not able to police or get to the entire width and length of their kingdom made them actually slow down their ambitions.
When confronted with the idea of such expansive kingdoms that might take a month and a half to just march an army from one border to the next, suddenly that 200 man garrison within a major city did not seem like it was much, even if it is enough to bring down an average adventuring party. Time suddenly came into being important. That LotR-esque multi-month foot journey on a quest to sabotage a rogue noble might give that noble time to do something mean to prepare. Suddenly, that orc army from Return of the King seems less insane.
What have I really learned?
I need a better way to utilize armies effectively. Or at least run their battles.
There is no other way of saying it.
No matter how well I model the feudal system (or more accurately, it self-organizes itself), no matter how indepth I put the politics or the intrigue that goes behind the game of thrones, the moment the armies hit the field, it falls apart.
Player psychology puts themselves as being a cut above the rest and who doesn't think this way? We all want to be Conan the Barbarian, slaying all those who stand before us or fight like Aragorn. But there is a disconnect the moment that there is a marching band of 800 men, banners flying in the air.
Yes, they are a mass of level 1 to 3 NPCs. They are all powerful characters. They have butchered goblin or orc warbands that attack wildly in the dark of the night but suddenly, when faced with an organized army in an open field with their own special units attached to it and an intelligent commander, all the adventurer tricks went right out the window.
I have done this before, in an earlier campaign setting, when a player who was playing a shape changing berserker charged an entire motorized infantry company and their support vehicles. It took most of a day to roll out all the attacks of that combat. All 200 or so plus their supporting vehicles and support weapons. It was an odd campaign honestly... glad I laid that game to rest.
The long and the short of it is this... while he managed to kill a few and disable one of the vehicles, he was brought down... but it took four hours to run 3 turns of combat. And he wouldn't run away... he was depending on the idea that he could do the impossible, that he was invincible only because he had an incredible AC and a TON of hit points to soak what was a few pin-pricks at a time. Problem is... 200+ attacks per turn over 3 turns was just too much for one man to do.
Yet I still want players to feel like they can do something during a major battle. I want it to feel incredible for them. It is why we tell the stories and tales, yes? To feel like we are part of some epic fight? Yet how do I divorce players from thinking they are playing a table top version of the Koei made Dynasty Warrior series?
Because that is what I think they are thinking when they think of their characters verse an army.
Some mighty incarnation of Lu Bu capable of shattering ranks of infantry by merely charging into their ranks or pulling some Baron Munchhausen style insanity, thinking it will actually turn the tide of battle.
How else do you term riding a catapult bolder into battle and using feather fall to not die from the impact? All to get surrounded by foot soldier company.
Because they are not fighting disorganized orcs who don't know how to fight but groups of proper centuries, ordered and disciplined... and not just one century but a full on cohort... plus auxiliaries! Sorry, anything short of Hercules or Thor is going to be stop the power of a single cohort... let alone a full on Legion. Which is what sometimes is hanging on the wings.
Now, I can always just take it as my players (and players in general) are arrogant and think that since they can bring down a dragon or slay a lich or survive a trap filled dungeon or decode a mysterious legend that they are pretty capable. But put a roman-esque legion in their way or a mechanized SS grenadier company or what ever... and they think tackle them like it was a simple orc horde.
Oh well... this is the next great challenge in improving the system.
Do I keep the armies as mere set peices, fighting their great wars in the background while the players lurk about sabotaging supply lines, assassinating commanders, stealing plans... in essence, being commandos or James Bond special agents fighting small skirmishes with a few people at a time...
or do I figure out a way to put the players in situations akin to the storming of Normandy or Iwo Jima, the battlefields of El Alamein, the bloody fields of Agincourt, or the narrows at Thermopylae...
without dragging the game down with a million dice rolls that detract more than add... no game should ever be each player gets to roll their 2 or 3 attacks or 1 spell and then the GM has to roll 1000 times for both the player's allies and the enemy.
Hopefully I will get an update that ISN"T 3 months from now... but prep work always sucks up so much time.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)