FallofCamelot |
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Yay a chance to be positive for a change! :)
Here goes:
Epic scale: I don't want a 30 foot tower. I want a 200 foot tower with buttresses and gargoyles and a sense of all encompassing DOOOOOOOOOMMMM!!!!!! (ahem)
Good vs. Evil: OK I can deal with shades of grey but I also want my shining knights and irredeemable villains. Sure it's not realistic but if I wanted realistic I'd do my taxes.
Politics: I want rival nations at each other's throats with a single word standing between peace and all out war.
Evil cults: Everyone likes an evil cult amarite?
Grimmy |
setzer9999 wrote:Tacticslion wrote:Dooooooooooooot.wth? Did we miss something? lolNope, I just needed to mark this as "Hey, when you're less busy, come over here and post."
So, in order: Grimmy, Mikaze, Setzer9999, QXL99, Zerombr, Grimmy (again), TriOmegaZero, Moro, and Orthos pretty much said what I would, almost as I was coming up with it (i.e. I'd come up with an idea before reading the post, and then read that they'd posted it or a similar enough idea). I mean, it wasn't exact, but it was pretty neat to experience. So, read their posts, and that's what I've got for now.
Ooh! Except, add: psionics, gods, epic and mythic-type stuff, factions (and the politics involved with them) and both ancient and new civilizations (and sometimes ancient civilizations made new again).
Also, occasionally, anachronisms.
Heheh I was pretty sure that's what Doooot meant :)
Bob Evil |
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Consequences.
(what a GM answer, huh?)
No, no, I like this.
There's currently a light novel out where the epic showdown between the hero and the demon queen is derailed when the queen points out if the war between demons and humans is ever ended, both societies will collapse due to internal socioeconomic factors and the death toll for each will virtually explode. The mutual war effort is basically the only thing keeping the two of them from becoming stagnant. The only way to resolve the issue is to team up and create a sustainable alternative economic model right under their noses.
Makes me wish more fantasy properties dealt with the logical implications of their plots.
Suzaku |
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Being able refluff items so that you can make character who's mechanics reflect your character. Want to make an officer who has arcane training while being able to inspire or rally her troops, she has the bard mechanics but is not a minstrel what's so ever.
Want to develop a spy who has super natural abilities, like turning invisible being able to walk in an area not fear setting off a weighted trap? Well he's certainly not a ninja.
Dreaming Psion |
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I like paradoxes in my games, just because they can be so fun and insidious. Social elements that seem impossibly incompatible at the surface coexisting with each other, yet once you get beneath the surface their are unseen circumstances that explain their coexistence. Like dualistic cultures who have such high etiquette standards that by day people pay lip service to them, but since everybody can't live up to them, at night when nobody's looking their morality becomes unglued. So like a society that's simultaneously lawful and chaotic. Delusional villains who try to do the greater good but end up upholding evil. Starcrossed loves of members of rival philosophies or religious faiths (like if you had a priest of Shelyn and Zon-Kuthon going at it). Fallen celestials and risen fiends, the wisdom of insanity and the madness of rationality. Dogs and cats living together! HYSTERIA!
Mostly b/c I like fantasy worlds to kinda be like giant what if simulators. A lot of the situations that are common in fantasy aren't possible in RL, so you can pose all sorts of different questions you can't in real life. Like what causes that white knight paladin NPC to fall so far and so spectacularly to an antipaladin or blackguard? What is it about that about-face that makes him so powerful in his new form? What convinces a man to hate so much the things he used to hold up so dear?
I'm also fond of hinting and foreshadowing, for both a thematic and practical standpoint. Thematically, giving players a continual trickle of information they can assemble as they like builds up a sense of mood and lets their imaginations work against them. OTOH, practically by giving players snippets of the various bad things about to happen, it allows them to prepare better and gives them early chances of figuring things out.
Horror and humor (along with heroism) are always something I enjoy too. If I get too much of any one thing it wears on me after a while, and alternating between various moods in game seems to mix things up well. Like you can release the pent up emotional energy of one feeling by stimulating another one.
Generally, I guess I just like a certain feeling of weirdness in game. This doesn't have to be like Cthulhu eating your brain weirdness or surreal nothing makes sense weirdness; it can be as subtle as npcs with vaguely disturbing or seemingly nonsensical mannerisms, like the innkeeper who has a lazy eye who always seems to be staring at you, or the alchemist who licks his lips right before answering your questions. The unknown and the morbidly curious, which might alternatively elicit shudders or elicit laughs, depending on the situation. A magical item with a curious name and past, a side effect and a unique (if slightly disturbing) ability. The bystander who seems always to end up where the heroes goes, but seemingly has nothing to do with their endeavors. That sort of thing.
DeathQuaker RPG Superstar 2015 Top 8 |
Laurefindel |
'findel
Kelsey MacAilbert |
Let's see:
Guns: I like them pretty, I like them useful, and I like them to be everywhere. Almost all of my setting ideas are guns everywhere settings.
Technology: Can't write without it.
Magic: Same as technology.
Magic and technology working together instead of being rivals: My default assumption.
"First world"/"third world" divisions: I always possess them.
High standards of living: In my settings, the average person is generally reasonably well off if they live in the "first world".
Undead: My favorite monster type.
Dragons: My second favorite.
Goth-style Witchcraft: Aesthetically gorgeous.
Fortifications: I love things meant to keep other things out.
Seiges and assults on fortifications: Why I love fortifications so much.
Paratroopers and air cavalry: Exciting!
The sea: Also exciting!
Gender equality: If it doesn't have it, I didn't write it.
War: It will break out often.
Tacticslion |
Laurefindel wrote:What, like a Redwall feast?doctor_wu wrote:I like food in my games.Food as a sustenance for the players, or food as a storytelling element for the characters?
Just knowing that you know enough to talk about that makes me ridiculously happy. Like, I don't even need to know whether you like them or not (I do, as a general rule, though some are better than others), but the fact that you mentioned it makes me so pleased.
Also, I put toilets, cleaning areas (ala bathrooms), and food stuffs as part of my games.
Canny thiefy goblins for me, too, please. :)
(One of my best GM stories involved a player actually being a goblin psion in an E6 3.5, and using their size, attitude, and the like to their advantage to make a really basic, totally "blah-here's-a-game-I-came-up-with-tonight" game into something akin to a short super-epic "Oh my word, I can't believe you did that!" experience of awesome. It was pretty amazing.)
TriOmegaZero |
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Also, I put toilets, cleaning areas (ala bathrooms), and food stuffs as part of my games.
Well, the Dex fighter ended up failing his check with a one, and said 'I turn and throw up on the other fighter'. I tell the Str fighter to make a Reflex save.
He also rolls a one, so I tell him it lands on his face. He then proceeds to roll a Fort and fail it, throwing up on the Dex fighter. The party then has to backtrack to the kitchen and create water in the sink to wash up.
Freaking hilarious scene.
Tacticslion |
TriOmegaZero:
And watchmanx:
EDIT: for tag fixing and clarification.
3.5 Loyalist |
TriOmegaZero:
** spoiler omitted **And watchmanx:
** spoiler omitted **EDIT: for tag fixing and clarification.
Oh, didn't realise I was a Gygaxian in that sense. Yep, crafting, monty haul and magic item slot filling obsession are some of the biggest problems facing dnd. Seen it completely hold players in its sway, "that item, it was necessary to my character concept! *whimper*"
Icyshadow |
I like having some unusual races in my settings. Fantasy is the only genre where those really seem to have a place.
I like outsiders, for the most part. Even though their alignments stick to them like glue, even they can change.
I like it when the heroes get to do heroic things, change the world and be remembered for their deeds even after they pass away or ascend to a higher plane of existence. That's kind of the idea if you want to make the group the next legends of the campaign world (which certainly would happen after defeating a Runelord or something equally awesome), just like Heracles and Sigurd got their own epic tales that have survived to this day and age.
TimD |
I’ll jump in on this minor thread necromancy :)
1. Good Group:
Almost anything else is correctable as long as you’re playing with the right group. “Good group” meaning out of play, of course, it’s even more fun to play with a group of good people playing evil characters! This also includes everyone being on the same page with the “grey scales” of the campaign. Some folks like their G-Rated games and others prefer things that would make the MPAA say “there is no rating we could release that under”, good groups are on the same page with what they want and can handle.
2. Consistency & Verisimilitude:
If there are guns, there should be spells designed to foil them.
If you guns, you should expect PCs or NPCs to try to create and utilize better guns.
If there are psionics, there should be magic designed to hinder or neutralize it.
If there is magic, there should be tactics to combat it.
Also, I like non-magical solutions to magic problems. As an example, I really miss Gorgon blood being used to make walls tangible to etheric entities. Unique solutions that fit the campaign setting can add great flavor.
3. Flavorful & meaningful NPCs and locales:
While there may not be an archmage or a master duelist in every small town, it’s nice to know where the best cheeses are made and the areas known for their excellent weavers. Immersion, immersion, immersion.
4. Varied conflicts:
Not just good vs. evil, but also internal conflict when even the good guys can’t always get along. I like blue-blue conflict because it adds more to a game than “kill it and take its stuff”, especially when you’re in conflict with your allies. I like it when not all challenges are custom tailored to the PC's CR and they sometimes have to run away to live to fight another day or when the master swordsman can disarm a pair of common brigands in less time than it takes them to draw steel.
-TimD