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I have a curious question. One of my players in my Reign of Winter game has expressed that the pace of my RoW game feels a lot like a video game.
He feels like we are not taking time out to actually enjoy the adventure path, and it feels like we are simply doing stuff just to do it.
The only thing that I can think of is introducing an adventure that they can simply pass up, but, where it is intriguing to the PCs themselves.
Are there any other options other than this? I am a big video game gamer, so I don't want it to feel like it is Skyrim or something of the sort. So, help/advice would be very nice.
Thank you!
Is the player meaning the pace of the game? If so, maybe let them have a chance to role-play more often, maybe? I've been in games where the people just wanted to literally go from encounter to encounter with little "meat"/role-play in the middle. If this isn't the case, could you explain a bit more as to what makes them feel this way? Just kind of hard to give advice when we don't understand all the details or issues. I'll check back later tonight and try to help more. :)
Spend some time roleplaying! I have neither read nor played RotW, but I imagine there's NPCs to interact with, villages to visit and non-combat encounters. If so, spend more time on them.
You should try to play the NPC's as individual characters. They have their own lives, and might not be around when the PCs want to talk. They'll remember how the PCs acted last time, and will be annoyed if the PCs are rude. If PCs forget stuff, NPCs will remember, and they will also remember that they've allready told the PCS this or that.
Spend time on the world. Describe how it looks and feels. Follow the players. If you only describe what's important, it'll be a railroaded adventure. But if you spend time describing unimportant stuff occasionally, they'll have real options on whether or not to interact with the world. That also means you'll have to be prepared to improvise an encounter if they decide to go into the cave you've just made up, or that you'll see your work wasted if they decide to ignore the haunted house you spent time designing.
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One word: characters. As the GM, you're not just the narrator - you're an actor. Skyrim has beautiful visuals and fluid combat, but there's one thing it lacks: personal interactions with NPCs. If your PCs' interactions with NPC are limited to "oh no my *blank* is missing, please fight the bad guys to get it back" then they might as well be playing Skyrim and crushing the same old draugr in the same old dungeon. In your case, it doesn't matter what the quest is, or whether it's optional or "mandatory"; it's why they're doing it that's important.
Get your PCs involved! Give them reasons to care about the NPCs and what happens to them. I don't know Reign of Winter so I can't give you specific advice, but you need to get PCs invested in the results of their adventures for reasons besides loot and XP. This will probably mean spending time with NPCs and getting to know them, which in turn means you need to be able to craft and portray likeable, interesting NPCs. There's a massive difference between a dragon attacking a village you stopped at for a day, and a dragon attacking the village you grew up in, where you learned to fight, where you attended weddings and funerals and births and baptisms. (Protip: referencing your PCs' unique backstories is a great way to get them emotionally attached to proceedings.)
Remember, your greatest strength over a game like Skyrim is that you are constantly developing your story. In Skyrim, everything an NPC can do or say is programmed into the game; all their stories and emotions are simple and preset. You are not limited in this fashion. PCs staying at the inn? Make up a backstory for the bartender. Give him some personality. Maybe he recognizes them when they return from adventuring. Let them slowly change from a couple of random adventurers to his regulars. Want to take it a step further? Don't just change his relationship with the PCs, change him. Make dynamic characters that grow and mature over time, and in response to their circumstances and interactions. Maybe the dragon attacks the village, but the bartender survives - and is completely changed by the experience, from a warm-hearted grump to a steely-eyed, cynical man, bent on revenge. Maybe it turns out he used to be a fighter, and he dusts off the magic sword hanging off the bar and travels with the PCs to wreak his vengeance on the beast that stole his home and the lives of his friends and family. NOW how do the PCs feel about going off to kill the dragon?
You have the freedom to turn any NPC into anyone you want. Don't let that go to waste.
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I do, I've tried to exploit every roleplaying opportunity I could. It is primarily, I believe, the way the AP is playing out. I keep telling my players what some of the details are (minor and nothing seriously opening up the plot) just so they could get a better grasp of Golarion.
Any oppertunity I could think of I have been trying. Check out this thread some of them have been off hand ideas. Others have been roleplaying encounters.
They've asked me to introduce as much as I could, but, he still feels like it is being very video game like.
The problem I had with adventure paths is that I had trouble turning them into the players' story. If the PC's interests do not lie within the adventure, then they're basically getting railroaded into it. A player pretty much has to design their character specifically for the adventure path, which I suppose is what separates an AP from a really long module.
The problem I had with adventure paths is that I had trouble turning them into the players' story. If the PC's interests do not lie within the adventure, then they're basically getting railroaded into it. A player pretty much has to design their character specifically for the adventure path, which I suppose is what separates an AP from a really long module.
What Cyrad said is spot on. Is the character that is complaining from the suggested list for that AP? When making characters myself, I really try to stay with suggested classes/archetypes for AP. First few times, I did not and like Cyrad is saying, those characters really seemed lost and insignificant in the adventure.
Like others have stated, myself included, I have not used RoW, yet. Working on Skull and Shackle with one group and Carrion Crown with another. So, in short, sorry not being much help here. But if you're adding the elements to the campaign and the players are not biting, not sure if there is really much you can do.
Maybe take some critiques from the group as a whole and see what they are saying. Past that, unsure what to say. Good luck and hope things work out for you.
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He is a Wizard/Rogue, most of Reign of Winter deals with White Witches that carry around scrolls, spellbooks, and many other magic items that are useful to Wizards and Fighters.
He's been doing a lot of stuff, and got a face full of a Glyph of Warding with a Bestow Curse inside of it. There are plenty of things he has been doing, it's just the feel and the pace the game is going at.
Unfortunately, I do not know much about RoW, so suggesting modules/adventures/etc. isn't something I can really do.
It sounds as though perhaps the player in question wants to occasionally stop and smell the proverbial roses, but perhaps the other players do not? There are a lot of players who really do want to just go from fight to fight to fight. I know I have one player in particular who the moment we get into anything resembling a non-combat encounter will pull out random sourcebooks and start flipping through them. So much so that often times the other players have to ask him two or three times to make a skill check because he is so tuned out.
Its possible there are others in your group that are the same way. They don't want to spend time talking to NPCs when they could be bashing the heck out of monsters.
The other potential issue here is that the player in question's character has goals that he wishes to accomplish that do not jive with the set path of the campaign. Maybe the Wizard desperately wants to find the formulae for a potion that can let him talk to his deceased sister. Perhaps he's looking for the lost Ring of the Schwartz. Maybe he just wants to found his own wizarding college.
Simply put, take a look at the backgrounds that the players created for their characters. A good background usually gives the GM a clue as to why the character decided to become an adventurer (a notoriously dangerous occupation) and what it is the adventurer hopes to accomplish by undergoing these assorted quests. Once you have this information, you can then start seeding your own hooks and your own side adventures that will draw the players that much further into the action. Plus, you can also seed these hooks into the actual adventures in the path thereby making the PCs want to tackle the adventures. Not because its necessary to get to the end of the story, but because their character has a personal stake in the adventure.
I second the suggestion of adding in more RP. Some players are uncomfortable role-playing, but you can ease them in a bit by giving them an opportunity that doesn't seem so odd. For example, have an NPC ask them where they learned to fight so well. Usually they will start talking about something that already happened in game, so everyone else should be familiar with it as well. Usually the other players will want to add in their two cents as well.
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I'll consider that. I've asked them for backgrounds at the start of Reign of Winter and I have a few ideas. The player in question said that he is in the process of making it, but it's been about two months. So, I only have the details he's brought up in game, and have added in a few things that will engage him further.
Take what the writers of the Adventure Path gave you and make it yours.
I am running Curse of the Crimson Throne right now. I have deconstructed it and put it back together, scrapping encounters, introducing new characters of my own making, bringing other characters in earlier than written, and creating whole other encounters that are tied into my players' characters. (Particularly the ones that provided me with background information for their characters.)
I'm planning to have my players create new secondary characters for a parallel side adventure in order to give them some background information and insight into the overarching plot that will be unactionable to their primary characters.
Whatever you do, don't run the adventure as written--make it your own creation.
When your players start sitting around the table more interested in discussing the characters and events of the plot than moving on to the next encounter, that's when you know they're fully engaged, and it's time for you to sit back and watch.