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Melinglor
Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 21
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 Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2007 4:17 am Post subject: [D&D3.5] Playing the fulfillment game |
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Over in Pseudo-Gamism, I was describing a play experience where I wasn't seeing fulfillment or support of my goals, so I switched goals, and suddenly found support and the beginnings of fulfillment. Levi thought this was interesting:
| Levi wrote: | | Melinglor wrote: | | Oh, and as an attempt to "speak to technique," I'll say that I've put some of this to the test; I followed some Forge advice to seek enjoyment not through the challenge but through character goals--that is, not "story goals" but goals like "acquire new spells." I did exactly that, explaining to the GM what my new concept was and what prestige class I wanted to use for it, and he ate it up and got me started on a quest for it. So that confirms a lot of these conjectures for me. |
I'd actually like to hear more about that. Probably in a different thread, but still. |
So here's me all obligingly starting a new thread about it. An easy proposition since it's mostly cut'n paste to start with. Here's the original Forge thread of my AP, but I'll excerpt out the relevant bits--first, a paraphrased (but not much) account of my first attempt at goal fulfillment:
Me, after asking for chargen guidance and being told to "make anything": "So I've got a Warmage who was a thrall to the Red Wizards of Thay who razed his village; he's deserted and now wants to gather support to topple the Red Wizards."
Joe: "You're recruited [as are all the PCs] by an organization which tells you you're the chosen ones who must save the Universe from destruction, somehow, someday."
Me: "I tell 'em I'll be happy to help them out if they help me topple the Wizards."
Joe, as the organization leader: "We won't be doing that, the universe thing is more important."
Me: "OK, on my downtime I hit the streets to find pockets of support for bringing down the Wizards."
Joe, following a pretty good Gather Information roll: "You find nothing."
Me: "........"
Next I tried abandoning "story goals" in favor of relishing pure tactical challenge, only to discover that it's actually a pretty "soft" campaign tactically. The Forge thread is my exploration of that the upshot of which is that on folks' advice there I switched goals yet again, with this result:
I talked to the GM about my idea for a character goal: following Telar's epiphany about the nature of magic (i.e. Creation instead of Destruction, with a healthy dose of Obi-Wan's explanation of the Force) with a quest for knowledge, seizing the secrets of the universe and gaining a new and startling grasp of magic's power.
The nuts 'n bolts component to this is pursuing a Prestige Class in a couple of levels, Mage of the Arcane Order, which advances your own spellcasting ability while letting you pull other spells (i.e. not on the Warmage list) from a Spellpool a certain amount per day, though you have to "pay back" the pool in Spell power within a week or so. My idea is that instead of belonging to a guild of Mages who share the Pool, I'd be drawing directly on the fabric of the Universe, while "paying back" the energy I use to maintain cosmic balance.
Joe was pretty into this (I thought he would be, he loves exploring D&D magic), and said he'd be willing to tweak things a bit for me, like with some shitty prerequisites. When we started play, I had Telar approach his mouthpiece-NPC, the guy who gives us orders, and tell him about his epiphany and lament the fact that they'd be leaving this magic-rich age too soon for him to explore it (the group was sent back in time by accident, to before the Fracturing of Magic, and were now soon to return to our own time). The NPC responded that there was also magical power in our era, and some few still wield Whole Magic, if they can be found. I was angling for "give me a quest for new magic power quick,before we return home from the age of more potent magic!" But instead he gave me "don't worry, you can still find what you're looking for after the return." This is good 'cause it relaxes pacing (I can't get into MotAO until level 8 anyway) and presumably gives Joe a chance to come up with good stuff for the quest.And it sounds like (especially with another player going "NOOO! Bad idea!" the whole time and likened Whole Magic to possessing a nuclear bomb) Joe's setting me up for an even greater power than just the Prestige Class. I'll have to see what he cooks up. So yeah, a nice initial success on the Character Goal front. (I'm planning to also broach the whole Red Wizards thing again after we return to our own time, with the angle of opposing them using my new freaky powers from the Golden Age of Magic. We'll see how that goes.)
Contrast that with my first attempt--world of difference. My technique was the same in both cases: tell the GM briefly what I'm after, then approach an NPC in play and ask for it. Is it just a case of a guy with no social give-and-take instincts only supporting what he personally happens to like?Or is there more going on here?
Levi, the ball's in your court here, 'cuz I'm not sure exactly what interested you about the topic.I'll look forward to you enlightening me.
Peace,
-Joel |
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Levi
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| Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2007 8:53 am Post subject: |
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I'm not exactly an enlightening kind of guy, mostly... but there's something going on here that I think might be important.
I'm asking this because, to me, there's this whole playstyle thing I've seen a lot, but most style-talk utterly ignores.
Imagine yourself the most totally railroaded game around. But also imagine that at the same time players are given a great degree of freedom with the internal workings of their characters - to the point where if they do clever stuff with character mechanics, they are often applauded for it.
In terms of "making decisions in the world", it's expected that the players will be participatory. The adventure is thus-and-so, and along with it you go.
This is considered all groovy by those that like it, because the players who dig this style of play keep their rich and interesting play mainly inside their character group - or even just inside their character; much of it being significant number-play.
It's a style where the play is very much in specific places, and it's not for everyone...
And it looks like your DM wants that style.
Does that sound about right? Could you comment on where it is and isn't?
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Melinglor
Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 21
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| Posted: Wed Nov 28, 2007 7:20 am Post subject: |
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| Levi wrote: | Imagine yourself the most totally railroaded game around. But also imagine that at the same time players are given a great degree of freedom with the internal workings of their characters - to the point where if they do clever stuff with character mechanics, they are often applauded for it.
In terms of "making decisions in the world", it's expected that the players will be participatory. The adventure is thus-and-so, and along with it you go. |
I'm nodding along with all this.It looks very familiar,and I think you've put your finger on a key to this playstyle: the whole "your character is your playground, the railroad is mine" thing.
| Levi wrote: | | This is considered all groovy by those that like it, because the players who dig this style of play keep their rich and interesting play mainly inside their character group - or even just inside their character; much of it being significant number-play. |
Yeah, for sure--if you read my original thread, there's all kinds of secretive, almost solitaire elements of play going on: the Warforged has an illusion spell and won't let anyone know he's a warforged for some reason, to the point where the player gets snippy if he thinks someone's letting that knowledge bleed into their character's actions. One character has some mysterious class or something that she won't even tell the players--she mainly uses rogue-y skills, but has something mystic going on as well--because she seems to think the big reveal is mindblowing and has to be handled just right. The psycho mage-killer is hatching some humungous plan that so far is just a bunch of private rolls with the GM. And so on.
And the stuff that IS out in the open is the "number-play" stuff, as you said--"with my Keen Falchion and Power Attack, I'm gonna do SO much damage!" "When I make Arcane Archer, I'll be able to pepper whole armies with a rain of magic arrows!" etc. And character interaction is mostly intra-party banter; any interaction with NPCs is either mission-receiving or bargaining for new magic weapons and the like.
| Levi wrote: | | And it looks like your DM wants that style. |
Yep, he sure does. And as I've been relating above, most of the players seem to instinctively dig it. I say "instinctively" because there's never been any discussion of this goal, and every campaign we play isn't like this,only this one guy's. Of course, the players who are most into the style hang out with the GM more than I do, so there may be more of a bond and affirmation of play aims than I'm privy to.
Peace,
-Joel |
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Melinglor
Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 21
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 1:08 am Post subject: |
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Hey Levi, just curious-where are you at regarding this thread? The brief exchange do it for ya, or do you have anything more to ad that you haven't gotten around to? Just wondering; it's kinda hard to tell if a topic is live or not on GC.
Peace,
Joel |
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Levi
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 1:24 am Post subject: |
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I'm pretty sure I've figured the stuff I was looking to - but I'm not sure how to *express* it yet. Still trying to mash stuff together; it'll likely be a whole new discussion.
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Melinglor
Joined: 31 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 7:19 pm Post subject: |
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| OK, cool. Works for me. |
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Melinglor
Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 21
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| Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 10:49 pm Post subject: |
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Hey, before the site bites the dust, I wanted to ask. . .did you ever figure out how to express your ideas from here? it'd be great to see a followup if one exists somewhere, or if you were still willing to write one.
peace,
-Joel |
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