Mary K. Kuhner wrote:
> I'm finding this in reverse at the moment. I'm (trying to) run
> the _Age of Worms_ mega-module, which goes from 1st to 20th+ level
> (in AD&D) over the course of twelve adventures and maybe a year
> game-time.
IMC, that'd be 19 years game time minimum, and more likely pu****ng
25 with deaths and such. *Never* more than 1 level per game year, never
again anyway, not until the next time at least. 8]
Obviously, that requires modules get the odd boot to the head.
> I keep finding that I've missed doing something and now it's far
> too late--even the next session.
I find that even with the relatively small encounter numbers needed
to progress in 3e, affording a great expanse of downtime to PCs lets
players get at least a little attached.
Families and estates are great, having a son at 3rd level, a
daughter at 5th, taking over as head of the night watch; that allows a
character to take root in the world and to seem more familiar.
It's not fireballing some zombies outside town: it's marrying the
****pwright's daughter, building up a library, fireballing the zombies
that killed the new brother-in-law, providing for his widow, getting
promoted in the town guard, and knocking up your wife.
Sure, the fireballs and other gamey stuff still take up the
majority of the session, but I reckon it all has a little more
attachment to the world when one takes a couple minutes here and there
to go over a character's life that year.
> Similarly, the modules have an arc about how one NPC starts out as
> a mentor (level way above the PCs') and how it's supposed to be
> a major characterization point when the PCs surpass him and must
> advise and protect him instead of vice versa.
Heh, 30 fights later .... Downtime helps there to, as the da****ng
gentleman who was the mentor of your 18 year old wide-eyed Fighter
becomes a middle-aged guy with a paunch who's sat on his ass for a
decade that your 30 year old grizzled veteran returns to rescue.
> I know some people on this newsgroup have done Adventure Path
> games before. How did you deal with the pacing? Did you introduce
> lots of side material in between the main arcs?
With all modules, I have to redo them a bit to allow breaks, the
bad guys have lives too and all that. I mean, the PCs are allowed to
bite off more than they can chew, get in over their heads, that's all
part of the fun; but generally there's something out there for them that
they can defeat in detail and return home to drink away the horrid
memories of.
> Just accept that the PCs' relation****p with NPCs and the world
> changes with dizzying speed? Something else?
When the chief bad guy is at least four game years from being in
your reach, it doesn't matter so match that you'll be fighting him late
next month IRL. How much you glossed over the non-combat stuff along the
way is fairly unim****tant, that fact that your character is acknowledged
to have *lived* through that time, in whatever detail level keeps folk
happy, just works for me.
It's OK that you kinda forget what your character was like a couple
levels ago, because that was a couple years game time. It's still tricky
to get a good handle on what your character can do *now*, but such is
life. I could throw in endless little easyish side quests if the players
want to polish up their skills at a certain level, but no one's been
much interested.
> Are there character personalities which should/shouldn't be
> preferred in such a game?
Not really. As always, PCs with defined goals and attachments to
the world around them are great for the game.
--
tussock
Aspie at work, sorry in advance.
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