RPGaDay 17&18 (almost back on track)

After the stuff up a few days ago, I'm in the second day of re-aligning the RPGaDay posts. So that means we're getting back to where we should be...(but running a day late)

17. Endurance (which was actually the prompt from day 15)

Endurance reminds me of an idea we had for conventions in the 1990s. Australian Freeforms have been mentioned a few times here on the blog. They're basically a style of gaming for 15+ players, sometimes reaching a hundred or more, with various roaming GMs and a co-ordinating GM. They're a very immersive style of play, and can e hard for tabletop gamers to grok. Typically the games start slow with everyone having their own agendas, but one-by-one those agendas become entangled and each players motives start pulling on groups of players, and decisions have to be made. 

At those conventions in the 90s we would often hire a venue for an entire long weekend (Sat-Sun-Mon). Registration for games would occur on the Friday evening, sometimes with pre-registration in the weeks leading up to it, and players dropping into spare slots over the course of the convention. Naturally freeforms had the widest range of potential spaces for players so they became a popular game format. There was often a morning, an afternoon, and an evening session, sometimes a late-night session. 3 to 4 hours each. A short game would be a single session, a more intense game might take up two back-to-back sessions. However, it was raised that we were leaving a decent chunk of the hire time unused... thus was born the idea of the "midnight-to-dawn" freeform. I only ever saw it in action once, but I've heard rumours of other events happening. It was tyhe true embodiment of endurance gaming, an immersive experience that lasted through the final session as a wind up, and then a 6 hour period of not breaking character. 

Our premise was Mage the Ascension... there was a customised set of rules and a bunch of GMs who were really familiar with both the modified system, the original system and the wider setting. I remember it being on a university campus, and the university security were notified of our event... the rest is a blur, but I remember it was awesome.

18. Directness (which was actually the day 18 prompt, so we're back on track)

Sometimes a game needs to meander a bit to find its way, sometimes it needs to be direct. Personally, I like have a variety of conditions and end points that can arise during the course of play, where each of those elements arises organically while generally pointing to a potential end point destination. Aiming specifically for a given end point and making every decision a direct line toward that end point is a type of narrative railroading that I just don't enjoy at all, whether as a player or as a GM. However, I do like sessions to conclude in a satisfying manner, so I can see the virtue of directness at some times. It's often about a balance between the two extremes.

Being indirect can be helpful, especially when planting seeds, but once enough seeds have been planted I usually step back and let the players handle the direction and directness of the story as they head toward the conclusion. I don't necessarily know what the conclusion is going to be, but I aim for it to be dramatic regardless.