I'm just wondering if NM made any videos prior to his untimely death and whether those videos are accessible as I would like to see them. I would have thought that any such videos should stay up as a record of what and how the story was being reported.
Sorry if this post sounds like I'm really down on the campaign, I'm just giving a voice to the doubts in my head. I have generally been enjoying playing the game but I need help shaking these doubts.
We're entering session four or five of the campaign and my players haven't solved any myths yet. Don't get me wrong, they all say they are absolutely loving it. One player is saying the game is getting better and better every session. I guess I'm feeling slightly frustrated at what feels like lack of progress. My players must have procced about 10 omens across 3 or 4 myths. They are now narrowing in on one myth, the Wheel.
My feeling last session was that the first few omens for the wheel are all very similar and don't really give enough information to give players a direction or a lead to follow. I improvised that the players came across another wheel to unjam and when they did so, this caused some islands to rise out of the ocean. The players have gone to those islands which I improvised were deserted except for a single islander who had been dead but who has now been re-corporealised. They captured and constrained the islander and tried to tickle him to get more answers. That's where we ended the session because I just feel stuck.
Sometimes, it feels like I am just being asked to come up with endless new content on the fly and that I will just be able to make everything add up. This is a tall order. I also somehow feels railroad-y and like all the player's decisions are arbitraty, like the players are just along for the ride. They just need to pick a direction of travel and I do the rest, regailing them with the next omen or presenting them with a new settlement or hazard. I try to present difficult decisions but ultimately, I think the PC's know whatever decision they make it doesn't make a tonne of difference because there isn't much rhyme or reason to the world.
Does anyone have any suggestions? Should I prepare more and if so, what should I be preparing? I have deliberately not worked out what the myths mean ahead of time. I have just focused on the settlements and the NPCs in those settlements and trying to give them interesting problems and motivations. Obviously, that didn't pan out when I just invented a new island settlement on the fly though. Let me know your thoughts.
I am wanting to try a PtbA game because I am sold on the concept of both the GM and the players having moves with the risks and rewards being laid out on character sheets, etc. To me, it sounds like PbtA games can fascilitate narratives that direct decendents of DnD don't really support well.
My campaign idea is that players are seventeenth century witch-finders who come into a town beleaguered by paranormal occurances. Players need to conduct an investigation of the distrustful townfolk and get to the bottom of what is causing the issues.
I initially thought that, rather than PbtA, I could adapt Dogs in the Vineyard, which was incidentally also created by D. Vincent Baker, but I thought there might just be an RPG that I don't know about that fits better.
Call of Cthulu or a Gumshoe system are other options but I'm not especially convinced that the BRP or Gumshoe system support complex social environments very well.
Any advice would be appreciated.
We've all seen this situation before. A player wants to leap over the mezzanine balustrade, swing from the chandelier, get the jump on Count Mangrod III and kick him into the fireplace before he is able to utter the Final Curse. Or perhaps you have a player that is arguing that they are technically keeping the sacred flame alight if they can catch an ember in a ball of fibre and put it in a tinder box. They saw it on youtube once. Its how neolithic people transported fire. It is usually clear that the GM needs to make a ruling. Whatever system you are playing, the rules aren't always going to help you.
Part of the complexity of both these situations is that there are many different ways the GM could resolve things. You could give the player multiple checks in the first example, you could identify risks in the second. You could disallow either stating it isn't the vibe of the game. You could allow either without any checks.
Whatever the case, it is important that the table is able to get on board with your decision. If players think you made the wrong call, the game might stop being fun.
I think it is really important to include players in the rulings process. This goes for all sorts of things: getting comfortable asking players what they think and being honest and open with players, respecting their creativity and reasoning skills.
GMing for me only actually started to feel fun when I took that pressure off myself to have all the answers. It is incredibly powerful to be able to say to your players: "What do you guys think?". Giving players that extra bit of power was such a revelation to me. They enjoy the game more and I enjoy the game more.
I use table consensus for other aspects of GMing as well. If I am struggling to invent details for a room, I ask the players for ideas. If I have an idea which seems a little implausible I will state it and check that the players understand and can believe it.
The wider point, I suppose, is that you can take a humanistic approach to GMing. Collaborate with the players. It makes for a much calmer and more inviting game.
Hi - I use a USB IP Link wifi network card. It's 10+ years old. I'm having an issue where my internet cuts out 5 to 10 mins after boot. I looked at dmesg and grepped for the netword card name and it said it is "disauthenticating due to inactivity".
Has anyone come across this before? This might be a network card issue rather than a void issue but I wanted to check in here to see if anyone knew. I have tried rfkill and it isn't showing anything blocking the device.
I ran the game for 2 friends and my partner today and it was great. I haven't GMed an RPG in about 5 years and I've had this book waiting on the shelf for about six months, so it had been a hot minute since I had read the rules. I only decided in the morning the day they were coming over that I would prep a session on the off-chance they were interested. After the session they said they want to meet up weekly to keep playing! Couldn't have hoped for a better result.
The hardest part was deciding how to start the game. I ended up starting with a Feast of the Sun festival in a castle which was interrupted by a murder by poisoning. My players completely ignored it and went to find some myths (rightly so!).
Edit: typo