In article <46054cf5@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, tussock <scrub@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Seems quite sensible, you've got a "no loose ends" thing going. I
>might point out to players that there's thousands of problems in the
>world they're /not/ solving, one more's no big deal, but they do get
>quite determined about the odd thing regardless.
I think I make a distinction between the thousands of problems that are
out there, but not pressingly brought to my attention, and the handful
of problems that *are* pressingly brought to my attention.
My views here may be colored by having played under a GM who truly
didn't care if any given problem ever got solved. If the
players were not proactive and aggressive about picking up a problem and
solving it, nothing *ever* got solved, which made for an extremely
unsatisfying game after a while. So as a player, I try to pick out
an interesting-looking problem and push it hard. I hope that the GM
will work with this by presenting problems which the PCs can actually
engage with, and trying to background problems which they can't.
If the PCs can't do anything for six months about the flood-McGuffin
plotline, I would personally not like to see it introduced by the
murder of a major NPC ally and a just-too-late-to-save-him combat
scenario. To me, that's a pretty strong hook, too strong to casually
unhook. But mileage differs a lot here.
Jon ran one game for me where looming in the background, all game long,
was the Saluvian invasion of the Bandit Kingdoms. The game was in
a Bandit Kingdom city, and everyone was thinking and talking about
the invasion, but it wasn't central to the PCs and they successfully
avoided trying to do anything about it, all game long. The GM made
sure not to present hooks that would force the PCs to engage with
the war, though. He had background details about it, but he didn't
draft the PCs' buddies into the army, or have Saluvian spies try to
kill them, or give them a magic item critical to the defense of the
city, or anything like that. This is, for me, the line between
loose ends and unwelcome red herrings.
Mary Kuhner mkkuhner@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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