More on Story Questions
9 Chapter was a blast for me. I've never thought that someone will write down my thought of how to handle the meaning of a scene. And then a milestone of set of scenes. And an arc for bunch of milestones. It was something that gave me chills. Then I've played Microscope RPG a lot. And at some point I've lost the way I used to set and execute the story questions for a games. People around didn't realize what I wanted to ask them with the whole surrounding area of all the rolls, mechanics, rules introduced to the scene.
Now I do realize that if you're not introducing players into the story question you're asking--it's getting quite hard to explain what for you're playing at. It's like a Fate Golden Rule in reverse. How a GM makes an obvious statement about the reasons of a scene to happen at first place. And setting a mechanics, that gives you a way to handle a game part to achieve or not the stakes at the table. And it seems like a great tool to synchronize the scene list you actually want to make to be able to uncover the arc for the character.
My new love with the story questions started with the Mindjammer game from beloved Sarah Newton. The 22nd, 23rd Chapters of the said book are just masterpiece. They are incredible. I just can't explain how valuable, and insightful those become for me. Using this Themes, Styles, Tones, Tropes, and Genre system to create a big great campaign to play out. It's just incredible. It's like a more complicated to ask questions in a bar. Instead of speaking about something really complex, you're playing this out. What's a family is in a constantly changing future? Dark realistic gritty setting of mining on an asteroid. Playing against a monster on it with your colleagues. But the game is not about the monster--it's an instrument to ask you questions for a milestone. Who's your family now? Where are they?
It's great way to make a really overcomplicated conversation between players. And do not use it for burning your life with goblin's blood spelt out on a grass or dungeon floor. It's the way to ask you, how should we live together with an angry green people who wants his own happiness, and good living. But they can't cooperate for some reason. They want to be a respected well species. How can we play this out? The actions of your character would be the answers. This depicts to me the meaning of "drama" word. Choice of a player--answer--conversation I have with him. This still gives me so much chills in my loved hobby.