By Kevin Manus-Pennings
Like so many of us, my introduction to role-playing was Dungeons and Dragons. Specifically, it was Advanced Dungeons and Dragons when I was in high school, probably around 1988. My group of friends divided into gamemasters and players and we would play during breaks between classes, on the weekends, and on camping trips. Our gamemasters would use modules or even created their own adventures. We even had a talented artist who could draw the most fabulous maps and had great story ideas.
Unfortunately, the more adventures we had the more I grew unsatisfied. So often there seemed to be no real reason for my character to be a part of the party as there was no real goal for me in play or, indeed, for so many of the other players. We were just here and we were going to explore this keep or what have you. The arbitrariness of it all began to take the shine off the fantasy apple that I once loved.
Admittedly, some adventures would have some important goal for one of our characters. In one instance, two of our group were pursuing a powerful staff, but as there was only one staff and two seekers, that became problematic as well, and in a way that threatened to split the team. In addition, an NPC (the staff’s creator, in fact). So now most of us were faced with a mission that held nothing for us, could split the team, and earn us a powerful NPC enemy in the future. (At some point, a few of our characters literally napped in a bedroom of the castle while our wizards fought the staff’s creator, but that’s whole different article.)
Other missions were more clearly beneficial for us, but again, lacked any specific reason why we would have chosen them. Yes, we would earn gold from the village or other employer, but the automatic assumption that we would accept for that reason alone began to wear thin. Essentially, the larger world and the adventure had no connection; really, I suppose, our outer lives and any adventure had no connection.
Eventually, I started gamemastering with my friends using Rolemaster, 2nd edition, and gradually moved to an approach where the player/s began in a town and had to make their own enquiries into anything strange or unexplained. They would search out tales of local lore and decide which one to investigate or explore. The players would be in charge of what jobs they took and even which they abandoned. They were completely free to choose and if a player was uninterested in a mission that a party chose, that member could always negotiate for more loot and so on.
Before I get ahead of myself, let me say that I have never prescribed to the “railroad” style of play wherein I would orchestrate outcomes of any kind. The one exception might be cases where a player was having delightfully bad luck or the antagonists were having delightfully good luck. Here, I might intervene, especially if the players were feeling somewhat beat down. I took two basic principles to heart in making these decisions: fun and interesting. I’ll address these issues more in later articles.
Now obviously, I had to adapt to the very changes I had made. I would sketch out several ruins and several antagonistic NPCs so that no player’s choice would have to wait on me to fulfill it. If I was running several groups, I could even swap material between them, change some things and keep the variety coming. This approach was made easier, I should note, by the fact that I rarely allowed players access to floorplans or any other form of “battlemap.” First and foremost, I could never understand in other games how we could possibly have that knowledge. As for monsters and the like, I was always good at making those up on the fly and the treasures were procedurally generated by tables.
Thus, my sandbox was born and I was happier with this approach than the more episodic systems I had seen. But more changes were needed and that brings us to the next article: The Advent of Continuous Style.
© 2022 by Kevin Manus-Pennings
Karandrin 