Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Keith53 Sep 23, 2009 17:41:29	Let me pose yet another question about tastes (meaning no correct answer but perhaps insightful answers), dealing with inclusion of intrique and mystery in a LFR adventure plot.  Caveats: we must stay within the design amount of play time, we must comply with the LFR policy/goal of "simple plots, complex combats" is better than "complex plots and simple combats," and I don't want to panic my Global Admin, Shawn Merwin.  (I am not going off the reservation, Shawn.) What is your spin on intrique and/or mystery in a LFR adventure--how much is desirable?  Any likes or dislikes? Do you want all mysteries solved and all intrique uncovered by the conclusion of the adventure? How do you react a mysterious item, person, event or piece of information that does not seem to fit that particular adventure story?  Dismiss it as a red herring, leave the adventure and start chasing that clue, or file it away as possible foreshadowing. Those of you who played Living Death, you probably are aware that spinning webs around mysteries which cover up enigmas tends to be the way my creative side drifts (and I have to fight against that in LFR--I knew that going in).  One way to enhance drama and to increase continuity is to introduce story elements and foreshadowing (or teasers) early, with some reoccurance, and bringing to conclusion later in an adventurer's career. Oh, yes, Waterdeep is a bastion of intrigue. So, what about a visible plot and a shadow plot?  (shadow not used in the D&D or FR meaning.) Always willing to read/listen to constructive ideas and different perspectives, without making promises about what I can (or am allowed to) deliver. Keith
#2 CarlT Sep 23, 2009 18:14:28	One of my players has indicated displeasure with the simplistic nature of the LFR adventures she has played, referring with fondness to some of the LG adventures we played. Based on my conversations with her, she would absolutely want to see more intrigue, more mystery, more anythng that provides a meatier plot.  Oh, and she wants more puzzles too and not ones that are abstracted into Skill Challenges.  But since Skill Challenges are the way its done now, she's probably out of luck on that one unless I make changes specifically for her. Part of the problem, I suspect, is the short nature of the adventures and the slow release schedule (within a region) which means that you have to either shoehorn a mystery into a short plot or stretch it across several - and its hard to sustain a mystery from one adventure to another.   When you know that you won't be able to play in part two of an adventure for six to nine months and may never be able to complete an arc due to level banding, it's hard to care about unresolved mysteries.  ("Hey guys, remember that adventure you played last summer?  No?  Well, here is part two..."). Never mind how I feel about the mandate towards simple plots.  Sure, I felt that LG went overboard with its "Every plot must be a wheel within a wheel" approach.  But isn't there room for some middle ground between the two?  Or better yet, can't the game accomodate a range of plot complexities?  Carl
#3 rsouthard Sep 24, 2009 9:54:06	Ok I am going to take a stab at this one.   Mystery, intrigue, plot, all of these thing for me boil down to two things for me. Do I care how this story ends and can I do anything to change said ending?   I realize that I might be oversimplifying and that the answers to the above questions are subjective, But I do find myself in some adventures not caring how the story ends. Heck, there has been a few times I have asked "Why are we in this fight/skill challenge/scene again?" With some LFR adventures, the plot seems to consist of the following: Read some boxed text, roll some dice, fight something, rinse, repeat, choose a bundle, see you next week.   Ok so what can be done to fix this? Well here are a few things that I like to see.   #1. Something that creates tension. Every adventure need something that rubs the players the wrong way and makes them feel......well anything really. This tension can even be created externally, with a time constraint for example. It just has to motivate the player into wanting to do something/anything.   #2. The Twist. No, I am not talking about Chubby Checker, though he was awefully cool! It might seem cliche, but every adventure needs a twist of some sort. It is hard to get into a story when you know the ending. (imho) The best movies or tv shows are the ones where I am trying to figure out the story.   #3. I matter. What does that mean? Well it means that the player needs to feel that their actions matter. That something will be different because of the choices they make. That their actions have consequences, even if they are not good. This is the critical step that takes PC's from a jumbled bunch of stas on paper and turns them into a character.   I have no idea if anything I types made sense, but I hope it did. The bottom line is that adventures are stories (albiet short ones) and they need all the elements that make a story good.
#4 sdrowsfognik Sep 24, 2009 12:04:22	Yes Keith, absolutely yes. Some of my favorite adventures to run and even play have been investigative/mystery type adventures. I would love to see something along the lines of this: A mystery-based subplot that would allow the PCs to uncover and discover one piece of the mystery, success in discovering one piece of the story should not be garaunteed just by following the module tracks and not being dense, you should have to work somewhat for that revelation. There should be a Story Award that is only given to parties that uncovered the "clue" or what have you, and possession of that Story Award should allow characters to pick up the trail as a subplot in another mod. I don't know how doable that would be, but it could be pretty nifty if done right, and there are a number of well-written adventure chains out there that are actually making their Story Awards matter in subsequent stories. I like when that happens. But just in general I would say I am a fan of intrigue and mystery, and when I run an adventure I tend to enjoy and play up any intrigue or mystery inherent in the module. Oh, and she wants more puzzles too and not ones that are abstracted into Skill Challenges.  But since Skill Challenges are the way its done now, she's probably out of luck on that one unless I make changes specifically for her. Check out CORE 1-3 Sense of Wonder
#5 CarlT Sep 24, 2009 13:31:07	Check out CORE 1-3 Sense of Wonder We played that at GenCon last year, but there aren't very many others...  On the other hand, I just downloaded AKAN1-3 Property For Sale and noted that it had a puzzle in it so hopefully that will help. #3. I matter. What does that mean? Well it means that the player needs to feel that their actions matter. That something will be different because of the choices they make. That their actions have consequences, even if they are not good. This is the critical step that takes PC's from a jumbled bunch of stas on paper and turns them into a character. This, absolutely.  For example, one of the adventures she specifically mentioned from LG (as in "Why aren't there any LFR adventures like this?") was COR6-02 Rallying Point for Bright Sands.  This adventure had a puzzles (on a larger scale than a door lock) that had to be solved and the characters played a direct (and yet plausible) role in determining the long-term political outcome of the region.  What they did mattered.   Here, I think the (locally) slow release schedule is hurting us.  I see some plot lines designed to allow the players to matter on a larger scale - but it typically takes 15 months for all three adventures of a major quest to be released so that the players are rarely able to see a story to completion and even if they can so much time has transpired thay hardly care any more.   I guess if it came down to it, I think the basic flaw is the whole "complex combat/ simple plot" approach.  I would much rather see simpler (and thus faster combats) if it means that there is more time for plot.  Yes, I know that WoTC wants to show off their fancy combat system with its increased tactical depth (and in fairness one of my other players greatly enjoys that aspect of 4E) - but if the short timeframe of a LFR module means that we have to sacrifice one or the other I"m not sure we aren't better served by having meatier plots.  At least some of the time. Proposal:  Adventures where there is one signature fight that is complex and interesting (to make the 'powers that be' happy/ hopefully 'stay on the reservation'), with cool terrain etc. and then several small, simple fights that are designed to be over quickly = and use the time 'saved' here to allow for more depth in the plot. Or are there other obstacles to more interesting plots than time within the round? Carl
#6 Bigfluffylemon Sep 25, 2009 4:10:15	I'm not quite sure what to think about this one. On the one hand, part of the LFR appeal is that mods are neatly packaged. On the other hand, disconnection is not good. I like overarching plots, certainly. And if there is a bit of intrigue or mystery, it certainly helps to make you want to play the sequel. A good example is the Nercomancer series in Waterdeep. As individual mods, I wasn't particularly taken with Wate1-3 or 1-4, but they have made me very keen to play Wate1-6, solve the mystery and determine the identity of the mysterious necromancer. The main problem with those specific mods is that the plot, especially in 1-4, was downright confusing. Intrigue can be good, but it should be kept to a few mods, and each individual mod needs to keep it low enough that a player not playing the arc will be satisfied, and not overwhelm people with detailed story. And I definitely second the cry that the PC's investigation and decisions should have a real impact on the mystery/intrigue.
#7 Lord_Toast Sep 25, 2009 8:26:20	Do you want all mysteries solved and all intrique uncovered by the conclusion of the adventure? How do you react a mysterious item, person, event or piece of information that does not seem to fit that particular adventure story?  Dismiss it as a red herring, leave the adventure and start chasing that clue, or file it away as possible foreshadowing. Those of you who played Living Death, you probably are aware that spinning webs around mysteries which cover up enigmas tends to be the way my creative side drifts (and I have to fight against that in LFR--I knew that going in).  One way to enhance drama and to increase continuity is to introduce story elements and foreshadowing (or teasers) early, with some reoccurance, and bringing to conclusion later in an adventurer's career. Oh, yes, Waterdeep is a bastion of intrigue. So, what about a visible plot and a shadow plot?  (shadow not used in the D&D or FR meaning.) Keith 1) A little bit of intrigue &/or mystery in an adventure never hurts. 2) Everything solved before the end of the episode...err adventure, I dislike this idea. 3) It would depend on the character I am running. My half-orc investigator would determine a particular piece of evidence as a red herring and still file it away for future. While my Halfling rouge would chase the clue down. 4) I have no opinion on this question at the moment.
#8 Alphastream Sep 26, 2009 3:07:45	This is a tough one. I agree that the disconnected aspect of LFR makes it hard to have intrigue/mystery cross beyond one mod. If I look at CORE1-2 and CORE1-6 that started The Radiant Vessel Against Thay series, they really have some cool bits. I suspect that, had this been in LG with a more concentrated release schedule, players would have really dug that premise. Not that they don't, but the effect is watered down across many mods, many PCs... players just have almost no idea which PC of theirs played what mod without looking at log sheets. The mystery started in the Thay series is, I think, a really cool one. But, when I start a run of What Storms May Come, it is hard to get an initial reaction from the players/PCs. They just don't come armed for story the way players did in regional mods or with clear plot arcs as in LG. There was practically no way a player showed up to play a Geoff mod without having a really good recollection of all that came before and exactly what their PC did in the previous dozen plus adventures! Despite that, I don't think we should give up. We should continue to have some story arcs that register. Part of that is understanding the nature of the players/campaign. Within a mod, I think the themes of intrigue can be great. I recall fondly a political intrigue mod in Bissel where you had to find dirt on several candidates for some barony (I forget the exact details) and it had some really cool themes in it. But, with intrigue or mystery you have to watch out for the investigative mod, which must be done well to avoid being boring.
#9 elder_basilisk Sep 26, 2009 4:37:15	The LFR format contains a massive challenge for creating effective mystery and (to a lesser degree) intrigue: Replaying. You can play the module for the first time and try to figure things out. However, if you were able to satisfactorily figure things out the first time, the second time through, will not be the same experience. So, if the mystery is the primary draw of the module, it will lose a lot of that attraction on replay. That is not true for other kinds of modules. By analogy, if the module is an action movie, different party mixes and different die results can make the combats interesting the second and third time through. They do begin to get stale after a while, but they lose much less in replaying than a mystery does. At least conceptually, intrigue offers the possibility to take multiple routes through the module which would help to keep the module interesting through replays, but practically, most "intrigue" related LFR mods, actually end up with extremely linear plots. It is more straightforward hack and slash concepts like Imp 1-4 (Bandits on the Farm) that have most effectively used multiple pathways to create different experiences for replayers. I suspect that this phenomenon has several causes: 1. Intrigue is complex almost by definition. Therefore, if you allow the PCs to come up with the plans and double and triple crosses, it is very difficult to plot a module so as to fit into a 4 hour time slot and ensure a satisfactory conclusion. The more freedom players get, the more likely they are to effectively miss the plot. A straightforward assault like Imp 1-4 has a much more limited number of potential paths and is much easier to plot out. 2. The design philosophy of 4e, particularly skill challenges, stipulates that players should end up in roughly the same place whether they succeed or fail. Thus, failing to gather information doesn't prevent you from finding the street gang's hideout; it just means that you lose a healing surge on the way or that they gang has warning that you are coming. From the perspective of the designers, it appears that one of the intentional features of skill challenges is to give investigation and skullduggery predictable and linear results. As a necessary consequence, using skill challenges to accomplish out of combat tasks (of which there should be many in an intrigue mod) makes it more challenging to write a non-linear mod.
#10 ibixat Sep 26, 2009 8:04:04	I'm all for some intrigue and story arcs that are tighter, the problem I believe is the release schedule.  It's nearly impossible for story arcs to be played out with people remembering the details clearly.  The reason I say this is because the arcs usually take 3 mods to play out, go from a 1-4 to a 4-7 to a 7-10 and are released over the course of a 6 to 9 month period.  If it were possible to truly schedule it out and meet all deadlines and coordinate it the best story lines would be released over the course of a month or two(or three), with 4-5 parts to them spanning several regions and all within 1 maybe 2 level bands.  No one is going to complain about the next part of a quest coming out too soon after the first part, but they will complain if it's 6 months later and in the same level band. I look at the mini for inspiration on this, basically the content of 2 mods a month for 6 months and one major plotline etc. How cool would be be to see that in novemeber there were two story arcs being released like this Nov 1 - Fools Rush in questline part 1 in a 1-4 mod from cormyr and the Evil gods never Die questline part 1 in a 7-10 mod from aglarond. Nov 8 part 2 of fools rush in also a 1-4 set in the dalelands and Evil gods never die Part 2 in a 7-10 set in waterdeep Nov 15 part 3 of FRI 1-4 in baldur's gate and EGND part 3 a 7-10 in the moonsheas Nov 22 part 4 of FRI a 4-7 in east rift and the final chapter in the quest, and EGND part 4 a 7-10 Core set in a place close to waterdeep etc.   Nov 29 a new questline out, Part 1 of the Too many questlines to keep track of series a 4-7 in Tymanther then 5th and final part of EGND series, also a core but now paragon, set in some exotic locale.   Anyway, my point being intrigue can be setup but most quest lines run the course of too many months between mods since they are "stuck" in a single region.  I see a multi-region questline coming and I hope it can "speed it up" some
#11 Keith53 Sep 26, 2009 12:55:53	I fully understand the limitations placed on complex story arcs about our current regional production schedule, in addition to target market.  I don't anticipate that changing, at least in the near future, but I am encouraged that LFR is continuing to grow and evolve.  Perhaps we will see WotC adjust further at some point. Keith
#12 ibixat Sep 26, 2009 13:26:20	I fully understand the limitations placed on complex story arcs about our current regional production schedule, in addition to target market.  I don't anticipate that changing, at least in the near future, but I am encouraged that LFR is continuing to grow and evolve.  Perhaps we will see WotC adjust further at some point. Keith I didn't mean to imply in any way that you didn't understand the limitations due to scheduling, was just saying that to me and most people I know that it is the biggest hurdle to being able to have really cool arcs that come together to tell great stories over time, so we have to deal with mod authors giving us the best story possible in 4 hours rather than just part of a great story in 4 hours.  I'm very happy with how a lot of mods pull that off at this point as well.