Ok so I have been pondering what makes an encounter truly pulp for a while now. And after discussing it for a fair bit of time with some of my players I have reached the conclusion that it’s time to consult the mighty board. Now I have read both the first and second DMG about spicing up encounters. I have also read mr Bakers great article of how to make encounter more pulp. I have even tried to build a few of them myself, and borrowed a few as well.
Now every encounter always have the following elements present: The PC’s, The monsters andNPC’s and Environment. Sometimes Traps and in 4th ed the occasional skill challenge is mixed in. But how do we use these tools to create a pulp encounter?
First the 4th ed DMGs suggest that one uses interesting encounter. And I think it is an important advice, find ways to make the scene of the battle memorable.
Second it is suggested that we use varied monsters with interesting abilities. I find encounter building to be quite similar to deck building in trading card games. You choose a theme of the monsters, find a few good combos and base everything on this.
So if we do this correctly we get a fairly interesting encounter, but I still feel we lack something to make it truly pulp. I suggest that we make a list of tips and tricks to make an encounter more pulp. Stuff to include so that it all gets a bit more over the top.
- Change the scenery during the encounter. Make things happen that either turn things from bad to worse, the volcano starts to erupt, there is a tunnel approaching as you are fighting atop the lightning rail and so on.
- Mix in several interested groups, let people show up during combat that wants the same as one or more of the already involved parties. Then starts the fun of figuring out who to cooperate with, or if it’s best to split.
- People changing sides in the middle of the encounter.
- Something huge starting to chase/eat/pound on the PCs who most likely are at the wrong place at the wrong time
And from here on I’m a bit short of suggestions. So what elements do you my fellow Eberronians use for your pulp encounters?
PS: Part of my solution has been to make less encounters but with bigger XP budgets. This gives me more room to play around and since I don’t need so many it eases the burden of making them all stand out.
PCs using environment in their actions. Sometimes, when you describe the scene, they'll figure out thqt the chains hanging from the prison wall could serve to climb it, run on a wall or swing acroos the room. Some other times, they won't figure it out. In these cases, make a small skill challenge to figure out the 'puzzle' of the room-encounter, and reward them by telling them what they could do to gain some advantage.
One other thing that I like to do is set traps for the PCs which they can use against monsters. Example: While in room A, the PCs walked on a pressure plate and a volley of arrows was launched aiming at them. In room B, some brutes pose a difficult threat to the heroes. Solution, go back to room A, set back the trap with a skill challenge while the defender holds the brute, make the brute walk on the pressure plate with either push, pull, slide or marking it and move to the other side of the trap and let him take all the damage. In this way, rooms have multiple purpose and adventurers might need to get back to already visited places in the dungeon to acheive something. Another example: A riddle in room A appears when the blood of the brute spread in the cracks of the floor. However, the riddle is incomplete or it indicates a secret door or illusionary wall in an already visited room.
I like to make my PCs go back and forth and reuse what has been done, but not only between rooms, also between adventures.
Rekko
PCs using environment in their actions. Sometimes, when you describe the scene, they'll figure out thqt the chains hanging from the prison wall could serve to climb it, run on a wall or swing acroos the room. Some other times, they won't figure it out. In these cases, make a small skill challenge to figure out the 'puzzle' of the room-encounter, and reward them by telling them what they could do to gain some advantage.
If you really want the PCs to use the environment to their advantage, wouldn't it be better to just tell them the options if the players don't spot it? I mean, what is the point of adding an environment effect that fits the pulp image and then the players or monsters don't use it?
If you really want the PCs to use the environment to their advantage, wouldn't it be better to just tell them the options if the players don't spot it? I mean, what is the point of adding an environment effect that fits the pulp image and then the players or monsters don't use it?
Good point. I don't know exactly why I do it this way. I think maybe to prevent railroading, or I want the players to figure it out on their own instead of 'it's the DM who told me what to do'
Anyway, they are so used to it by now that the occasion is rare now when I need to point them in the right direction. Even, sometimes, they use the terrain in ways I didn't expect.
Rekko
i'd define pulp by four S:
- splatter-moves in both directions. the more, the better.
- surreality of all actions - it is a lot more pulpy if you use environment to its fullest.
- smart - the one who uses his wits best will always win
- style. nothing offsets or sets an encounter more back than bland, boring opponents.
as for how to achieve that:
well, first, change the rules to fit your scenario better. e.g:
- short rest can happen within seconds, the fight can go on immediately. (makes it feel more realistic in certain encounters)
- make stuff easy to use. if someone wants to fire a ballista to fight the ogre, let him. make it an easy to medium check, not a hard one - noone ever likes missing with a cool action.
then, you'd have to teach your players on the pulpy style as well. you have to have a good grip on this, then you can show them how to:
- properly use terrain against them
- how to make cool actions even without being overpowering
- how to get something good out of combat even against overwhelming odds.
etc.... the most part, it's about interaction that needs to be increased and enforced within your players. if they don't react, pulp might not be the thing for them.
i'd define pulp by four S:
- splatter-moves in both directions. the more, the better.
- surreality of all actions - it is a lot more pulpy if you use environment to its fullest.
- smart - the one who uses his wits best will always win
- style. nothing offsets or sets an encounter more back than bland, boring opponents.
I have to disagree with the first 'S'. Although you don't explain what you mean by 'splatter', I'll assume you mean gory. I enjoy graphic description of wounds and critical blows as much as the next guy, but pulp is NOT gory. It can be, but it is not essential. In fact most pulp is non-graphic.
Also, how is utilizing the environment surreal? I agree that it can be pulpy, but surreal? I don't get it.
Smart. Isn't this something that should come into play in any style of game you play? And what if you are role playing a character with little to no wits? I guess you don't get to win.
You have good points about pulp style, but your four S's are unnecessary.
yeah, i agree that the 4s was not one of my best ideas. i just wanted it to be easily remembered. 
I would say that the greatest thing you can do to keep a game pulp is to make sure the players are on the same page. My circle of gamers includes a number of gamers who are good with sticking to a genre, and some who are apt to backslide into "standard" thinking. If you have good roleplayers who are as into pulp as you are, you will have a lot easier time than if they slip into 'high-fantasy mode' or worse, 'World of Warcraft mode'.
An element of pulp that I have found important is the Powerful Foe. The Bad Guy who is obviously too powerful to be taken out by rolling initiative. This guy is tough enough to waste time on a monologue, pull his punches, and otherwise underestimate the PCs. He must be defeated by a combination of wits and guts.
If you're looking for pulp you need only look to my last encounter for inspiration. It begins with the group being assaulted by a small squad of Foulspawn in Stormhold District, Sharn. The foulspawn have been let loose from their confines within a nearby tower (the tower once housed a research centre for the Closed Circle). They are travelling with a Bard who knows how to countersong the dangerous "song" that the Dolgrimm are singing.
So there they are battling on the walkways between the towers. Third round of the encounter and a shadowy humanoid figure suddenly bounds down from another walkway, dashes along the main thoroughfare and flying kick's the Dragonborn Warlord in the face before backflipping into a low guard stance. Now we have a Dolgaunt monk in the fray.
Fourth round and one flank of the group looks like it's about to cave in. Suddenly Dolgarr behemoth that is attacking the paladin and warlock is mysteriously felled, a crossbow bolt made of shadow piercing his heart. As the Dolgarr pitches forward the duo look behind and see another figure cloaked in shadow, hanging from one arm from the roof, a hand crossbow in the other hand. It is the rogue that the party thought fell (ie was knocked off a walkway and into free-fall between the districts of Sharn) to his doom last session. He has returned, now empowered as an Assassin (RP'd him trading part of his soul to the shadow to both survive the fall and become even stronger). The rogue flips over from the lip of the balcony and drops the crossbow, drawing his Khopesh and dashing forward to disembowel another Dolgrimm.
Pulp is all about style, it's about flare, it's about making it feel like a silver age comic combined with perfect movie timing and flashie one-liners.
My last encounter was rather pulpy it involved the PCs fighting off some thugs and the animated remains of their former friends. During the first combat they got robbed and after dealing with the enemies immediately started the pursuit of the robber, chasing him into the Orien enclave and jumping through a portal closing behind them a second later.
Next session will open with the PCs accessing the portal god knows where and continuing the chase.
Ok so I have been pondering what makes an encounter truly pulp for a while now. And after discussing it for a fair bit of time with some of my players I have reached the conclusion that it’s time to consult the mighty board. Now I have read both the first and second DMG about spicing up encounters. I have also read mr Bakers great article of how to make encounter more pulp. I have even tried to build a few of them myself, and borrowed a few as well.
Where can you find the article that Baker wrote about making things or encounters pulp?
You may find it right here, most of it transfered to the 4th ed DMG but hey, its a few pieces of goodyness in there still.
a good look at pulp is quinten terrintino's work, off the top of my head I think of kill bill for its pulp effects {kicking up a table to block enemy attacks for 1 round is pretty cool but two grand weaponmasters (kid vs the schoolgirl) go at it for ten rounds with all their expertice and the hero wins with a 2x4 with nails in it to the villians temple.
Or the fight between the bride and the one-eyed assassin, the trailer is so small they cant use their swords to full effect, that is easily implying with game mechanics that they can not wield their weapons either versatile or two-handed due to the enclose space. That is putting the enviroment to good use.
The legendary weaponmaster retired as a sushi bar owner is pulp in some regards as a way left field approach. He doesent live in luxury or oppulance for as much as his skills could demand, he just makes sushi while he keeps 30 priceless katanas in a room upstairs.
turning away from kill bill we have resivoir dogs and the massive FUBAR that follows, very pulp with all its deceptions and triple crossing.
To me, making my encounters pulp means making them cinematic. Making them dynamic. Making them alive.
I'll give you some examples.
In the very first fight of the very first session I ran with my current group, they had to fight an Emerald Claw kill team (4 custom-made skirmishers I dub Emerald Claw assassins) bolstered by two EC brute-types. I made this in a market place, so i took my dungeon tiles, put a fountain tile, some stalls, a pair of carts with an ox hitched to them, and whatnot.
Eventually, someone startled the oxen, and they started to move, crushing someone beneath them and eventually overturning and causing a barrier.
One of my players said, "I looked up and realized that scenery was killing people. I was like awesome."
Another fight had a bunch of deamons bursting through a wall (like blowing a hole in it and jumping out) and start slaughtering civilians. So, I took those dungeon-tile people-tiles, and started moving them around. PCs that got stuck may have been knocked over.
A third one was an ambush by the PCs of an EC patrol in the woods. It was by a stream, and just describing how the slain minions floated down the stream made my player's happy.
For encounters I haven't run yet, well, I envision them like I would envision them in a movie. My PCs will, hopefully, take their airship and hop onto the Lighting Rail, where they will fight EC guys on said train. The Airship, in the meantime, will be threatened by flying zombies with alchemical bombs, so the airship pilot and hopefully the ranger will ahve to take care of that while the others deal with the train full of baddies. Hopefully, they will defeat the baddies just enough so that they can get away before the train plummets off of a gap in a bridge caused by a shot-down flying zombie with an alchemical bomb.
The climax for the sneaky guy will, hopefully, be a fight on the top of a tower in Sharn during a lightning storm.
The climax for the campaign will hopefully be trying to stop the Evil Mastermind in his foundry deep in the Cogs, with pools of molten lava.
In short, if you can see it happening, and describe it, like it would look in a movie or anime, then that's a great start for pulp.
Very nicely put. Pulp IS most definately about description. Short and Sweet descriptions. Keep a thesaurus close by and make even the most simple thing appear as something special. If your players take an interest in it, be familiar enough with the mechanics of the game and make whatever idea they come up with work. Remember. The DMG's suggest using the word YES in your games. The word YES when DMing will most definately help your wild and lurid descriptions become something the party remembers from week to week.
That, too, is a good point. If they come up with something that's crazy, but cool, go with the Rule of Cool: Cool stuff happens. I find myself saying, "Sure, why not." a good amount.
Do you also want us to address out-of-combat stuff? 'Cause i have discovered a newfound love for passing notes.
Oh man. There was this one time when my party was in the woods following the trail of what they thought were bandits. I ask for perception rolls, nature rolls, that sort of thing, and the ranger hammers it. I tell the ranger that these look like organized, disciplined movements. My Warforged Artificer is, of course, a veteran of the last war (and an escapee from Thrane), so he passes me a note with a history check result on it, asking me if he knows anything. I write back, "these movement patterns follow Karrnathi special operations doctrine."
He states to the party that he's fiddling with his armbow, and even mimes playing with a screwdriver and his hand, and just states, "But we're nowhere near Karrnath."
EVERYBODY looked at him, and he explained.
That's the kind of stuff that would happen in a movie. That is pulp.
That really IS amazing stuff... I wish that my players would do neat things like that. We "pass notes" to one another, but actually, its just texting. We use our phones. Faster, I suppose, but as efficient.
Regardless... That IS cool as hell. Tops anything my players have roleplayed in about 2 years. lol
Well, what sort of stuff have you been doing? I mean, part of the appeal of roleplaying is that it's funny, in addition to being cool and dramatic. The aformentioned artificer and the airship captain of the party constantly bicker. The captain told me that she wants to rig a trap door in the artificer's cabin/hold to drop the artificer if she pulled a lever; the artificer told me that he's attempting to rig it to not work.
But yeah. What stuff have you been doing?
If you want pulp, go rent the Indiana Jones series, pick up some Doc Savage and The Shadow novels, and dig in. I have to warn you that those books are really, really not written well, but as you sift through the rampant racism (it's funny because the people who wrote Doc Savage* specifically disallowed the ethnic villains that were so prevalent in other pulp series such as Flash Gordon; the guy who wrote Doc Savage had to throw them in on the sly), sexism so extreme that it reads as homoerotic to the modern reader, and outright silly bad technology, you will get a great idea as to what "pulp" means.
Pulp is about far-off locations, mysterious femme fatales, plots to destroy the world, hordes of bad guys who act an awful lot like minions in DnD, heroes with massive, jutting jaws, villains with sometimes pretty darn stupid ideas that nonetheless almost come to fruition, evil henchmen with all kinds of weird idiosyncracies about them (one Doc Savage novel features a guy with the ability to kill someone with a poisonous touch and, inexplicably, a love of bon-bons), gadgets that save the day... and so on.
Actually, another good source of pulp-y entertainment is the James Bond series, particularly from the 60s and 70s. If anything, Bond is toned down a bit from the classic pulps, but there's still enough of it to where you can see where it could be there if things were exaggerated a bit. Star Wars also has a bit of a pulpy feel to it, although it's more what I'd call space opera. Anything that reminds you of Bond or Indy is probably ripped from the pulps to a greater or lesser extent.
*Disclaimer: my as-yet-unpublished novel is a satire of the pulps. Yes, I did a good deal of research.
Indiana Jones in a fist fight isn't very interesting. But Indiana Jones in a fist fight on top of a moving German tank that is part of a military convoy he is try to rescue his father from...is very interesting. Legolas from LOTR shooting an arrow into an enemy isn't particularly exciting. But Legolas climbing atop an Oliphaunt and dispatching its entire crew of Haradrim by himself, then taking out the Oliphaunt itself...is freaking cool!
Think back to the action scenes that moved and excited you. Don't be afraid to emulate them.
For example in Uncharted 2 there's a part where the building you're in falls over due to being blown up by a helecopter.