Tee and Ranthir, on their way back to the Ghostly Minstrel, met Tor at the mouth of Delver’s Square. The Barundian grinned. “Did anybody order some clothing?”

Tee was eager to see her new dress, but not as eager as Elestra. As the elf headed back to her room, the young girl dashed out of hers: “Tee! How do I look! Do I look all right? Do you think it’s okay if I bring my viper?”

Tee looked her up and down. Then she considered her words carefully. “No. I think you should leave the viper here. It’s rather… large.” Then she guided Elestra into her room and carefully fixed up her make-up and the back of her hair.

Tor, meanwhile, was dropping off Agnarr’s clothes from Nestor’s. After a moment of consideration over the barbarian’s generally unkempt appearance, he decided to drag him down to the Row Bathhouse.

After that, all of them were busy getting ready. Read more »

The original 3rd Edition game came pre-packaged with a hand full of specific combat maneuvers (bull rush, disarm, etc.). I’ve always found it odd that this list was so rarely expanded upon in supplements, with designers apparently preferring to ladle on more feats instead. Over my nearly 20 years of running D20 systems, however, the Rule Supplement document I maintain for my personal campaigns has slowly accumulated a number of new combat maneuvers. These are presented below, along with a few expansions to the existing rules where appropriate.

ACTION OF OPPORTUNITY

Instead of attacks of opportunity, characters may take actions of opportunity. An attack of opportunity can be taken as an action of opportunity, but actions of opportunity can also be used for other purposes. Feats and abilities which normally grant additional attacks of opportunity instead grant additional actions of opportunity. If a character has used all of their actions of opportunity in a round, they may still attempt an action of opportunity by using their immediate action (if it is still available to them).

AID ANOTHER [Standard]

If you’re in position to make a melee attack on an opponent that is engaging a friend in melee combat, you can attempt to aid your friend as a standard action. You make an attack roll against AC 10. If you succeed, you can choose to grant a +2 circumstance bonus to hit, a +2 circumstance bonus to AC, or provide flanking if you are not doing so already (regardless of your relative position).

Any character with a base attack bonus of +5 or higher may be able to offer additional assistance with a successful Aid Another check. For every 10 points that their attack roll exceeds DC 10, they grant an additional +1 circumstance bonus.

AIM [Attack]

When making a full attack, you can choose to sacrifice all of the attacks you could normally make and take careful aim at a specific target. On your next attack against that target, you gain a +4 circumstance bonus for each attack you sacrificed. You cannot take any other action or move more than a 5 foot step before making your attack without losing the circumstance bonus. Since you are focused on aiming, you are considered flat-footed until you make your attack.

Quick Aim: If you can make more than one attack as part of a full attack maneuver, you can choose to sacrifice one of your attacks in order to gain a +2 circumstance bonus to a single attack taken on the same turn. You can sacrifice multiple attacks to gain multiple circumstance bonuses, and these circumstance bonuses stack with each other.

Example: If you can normally make four attacks when using the full attack maneuver, you can sacrifice your third and fourth attacks to gain a +4 circumstance bonus to your first attack. You could also sacrifice those attacks and gain a +2 circumstance bonus to each of your first two attacks.

BACK-TO-BACK [Free]

On your turn you can choose to fight back-to-back with an ally as a free action. The ally must be within 5 feet, and must choose to fight back-to-back with you. While fighting back-to-back, you and your ally work to protect each other – shoring up each other’s defense and, literally, watching each other’s back. You and your ally make attacks at a –2 penalty while fighting back-to-back, but so long as you are fighting back-to-back you cannot be flanked.

Note: You can fight back-to-back with multiple allies. However, in order to fight back-to-back with multiple allies, all your allies not only need to be within 5 feet of you, but within 5 feet of each other. (This clarification is only significant for odd-numbered groups wishing to fight back-to-back.)

BIND WEAPON / SHIELD [Attack]

As a melee attack you can attempt to bind an opponent’s weapon or shield. Attempting to bind a weapon or shield provokes an attack of opportunity from your target.

After the attack of opportunity has been resolved, you and your target make an opposed melee attack roll. The wielder of a two-handed weapon gets a +4 bonus on this roll, and the wielder of a light weapon takes a -4 penalty. If you and your opponent are of different sizes, the larger combatant gets a bonus on the attack roll of +4 per difference in size category.

If you beat your opponent’s roll, you have successfully performed a bind on your opponent’s shield or weapon. Weapons and shields involved in a bind, whether yours or your opponents, cannot be used: Bound shields provide no armor bonus and bound weapons cannot be used to make attacks.

The instigator of a bind may end it as a free action. The target of a bind can attempt to break the bind as an attack action by succeeding at an opposed attack roll.

Special: Binding a weapon or shield is considered a variation of the sunder action. Characters with the Improved Sunder feat do not provoke attacks of opportunity when attempting to bind a weapon or shield.

CALLED SHOT [Free]

When using the attack action or the full attack action, before making attack rolls for the round, you may choose to accept a penalty on all attacks from the round in order to gain a bonus to the damage roll of your first attack. For every -2 penalty you accept you gain a +1 bonus to damage. The total penalty cannot exceed your base attack bonus. The bonus to your damage roll applies only to your first attack (even if it misses or otherwise causes no damage), but the penalty to attacks lasts until your next turn.

Design Note: This effectively makes Power Attack a feat which improves a basic maneuver.

DISREGARD FLANKER [Free]

You can disregard attacks from an opponent flanking you. When you do, that opponent doesn’t get the +2 flanking bonus when attacking you and that opponent does not provide a flanking bonus to any of its allies. Ignoring a flanker, however, provokes an attack of opportunity from that flanker, and you lose your Dexterity bonus to Armor Class against that flanker. You do, however, continue to threaten that flanker. If the flanker is out of attacks of opportunity, you can ignore the flanker (and deny the flanking bonus) with impunity.

You must make the decision to disregard a flanker as soon as the foe moves into a flanking position. You can change your decision as a free action on your turn. (You still have to disregard a flanker you can’t see.)

DRIVE BACK [Attack]

As a melee attack, you can attempt to drive back your opponent. In doing so, you are attacking in a way that should force your opponent to back away from you. When you perform the drive back maneuver, your opponent can either choose to move 5-feet directly away from you or remain where they are.  If they choose to move, they suffer no adverse effects. However, you can choose to follow them (also moving 5 feet) if you have the necessary movement remaining this turn. If they choose not to move, you resolve your attack against them with a +2 circumstance bonus.

The movement taken as part of the drive back does not count against your opponent’s movement for the round. Your movement does not provoke an attack of opportunity from your opponent, nor does their movement provoke an attack of opportunity from you. However, this movement may provoke attacks of opportunity from other combatants.

ENGAGE [Attack]

As a melee attack you can choose to engage one opponent within reach. If an engaged opponent attempts to move away from you or if they attack anyone else before your next turn, you may take an attack against them at the same Base Attack Bonus as the attack you used to engage them (this attack is in addition to any attacks of opportunity you would normally be able to take and does not count against the limit on the number of attacks of opportunity you can take each round). You gain a +2 circumstance bonus to this attack.

If your opponent attempts to make an attack of opportunity against a different character while you’re engaging them, you take your attack normally. If the attack is successful, however, your opponent must make a Concentration check (DC 10 + damage dealt). If the Concentration check fails, your opponent loses the ability to make that attack of opportunity (although they may still take an attack of opportunity later if one is provoked).

Note: Even if you have more than one attack per round, you cannot engage a single opponent more than once (although you can engage multiple opponents at once).

FIGHT DEFENSIVELY [Free]

When using the attack action or the full attack action in melee, before making attack rolls for a round, you may choose to accept a penalty on all attacks from the round in order to gain a bonus to your AC. For every -2 penalty you accept, you gain a +1 dodge bonus to your AC. (For example, by accepting a -6 penalty, you would gain a +1 dodge bonus to your AC.) The total penalty cannot exceed your base attack bonus, although characters with low base attack bonuses (less than +4) can still accept a -4 penalty to their attack rolls for a +2 dodge bonus to their AC. The penalty to attacks and bonus to AC apply until your next turn.

Total Defense: When using the attack action or the full attack action in melee, you can sacrifice all of your attacks and dedicate yourself to a total defense. You gain a +2 dodge bonus to your AC for each melee attack that you would normally make. (For example, if you could normally make three attacks using the full attack action, then you could gain a +6 dodge bonus to AC for using total defense as a full action.) This bonus is in addition to the normal bonus you would receive for fighting defensively or using Combat Expertise at your maximum penalty.

INTERVENE [Action of Opportunity]

If you are within 5 feet of an ally who is targeted by a direct melee or ranged attack you are aware of (but not an area effect), you can use an action of opportunity to attempt to take the attack in your ally’s stead. If the attack hits you, you take damage normally. If it misses, it also misses your ally. You must declare your intention to place yourself in harm’s way before the attack roll is made.

OUT-OF-TURN-DODGE [Immediate]

Any time a character is about to be attacked, they can give up their next turn to gain a +4 dodge bonus to their AC as an immediate action. A character must be able to apply their Dexterity bonus to AC against the attack (so a character can’t use an out-of-turn dodge while flat-footed, for example) and the out-of-turn dodge is declared before the attack roll is made. The character’s initiative does not change, they simply do not take an action on their next turn. The character gains this dodge bonus until the next time their initiative comes up after their “skipped” turn.

PROTECT [Immediate/Action of Opportunity]

If someone within your threatened area is about to make an attack of opportunity against a target other than yourself, you can use an action of opportunity as an immediate action to prevent them from doing so. You and the combatant attempting the attack of opportunity each make an opposed melee attack roll.

If you succeed, you use your attack of opportunity to preoccupy them and prevent them from taking the attack of opportunity. (This does not count against the total number of attacks of opportunity they may take in a round, however, and they may still take an attack of opportunity later if one is provoked).

If you fail the opposed melee attack roll, they can resolve their attack of opportunity normally. This counts as an attack of opportunity for you.

QUICK DODGE [Immediate/Action of Opportunity]

At any time when you are about to be attacked, you can use an action of opportunity to gain a +2 dodge bonus to AC as an immediate action. The dodge bonus is only effective against a single attack. If you can take multiple actions of opportunity in a round (through the use of the Combat Reflexes feat, for example) you can still only gain a single bonus against one attack, although you can use additional attacks of opportunity to quick dodge additional attacks.

SPRINT [Move]

You can sprint at twice your normal speed in a straight line as a move action. You lose any Dexterity bonus to AC while sprinting unless you have the Run feat. You cannot sprint if your maximum run speed has been reduced to three times your normal speed (due to wearing heavy armor or carrying a heavy load, for example). Sprinting twice in the same round is the same as running.

This material is covered under the Open Gaming License.

Go to Part 1

Scott McCloud is better known these days for Understanding Comics, one of the greatest books ever written about art and the creative process; a towering achievement which laid bare the heart of the comic book medium.

(You may have seen me previously discuss Understanding Comics here, here, here, or here.)

Before he created Understanding Comics, however, McCloud created Zot!, one of the greatest superhero comics ever written. The first ten issues of Zot! – the so-called “color issues”, because the rest of the series transitioned into twenty-six black-and-white issues – are a must-read superhero / science fiction epic. And it’s here that we find our third scenario structure challenge.

At the heart of Zot! is the Key:

Not quite a McGuffin according to my stuffy, traditionalist definition of the term, although largely indistinguishable from such for the first six or seven issues of the story, and close enough for our purposes in any case. The Key is a holy relic held sacred by the people of Sirius IV and said to be capable of opening the Doorway at the Edge of the Universe.

The Key has also been stolen.

As the series begins, Zot chases the Key (or, more accurately, the trail of people looking for the Key) through an interdimensional portal to our Earth. There he meets Jenny, and through a series of hijinks they end up forming a small team of unlikely heroes who are pursuing the Key.

But they aren’t alone. In addition to the original owners and the thief, now that the Key is out in the open a whole bunch of factions have become interested in acquiring it. The first few issues of Zot! each have a procedural heart to them, in fact, with Zot needing to deal with some different crazy foe who wants the Key for themselves.

This includes Dekko, a Machiavellian machine who believes that the Doorway – a product of technology which predates all technology – is the “final ascendancy of Man’s perfect art and the end of Man’s greatest flaw: Himself.”

There are also the De-Evolutionaries, who believe that humanity would be better off if it went “back to the trees” (and use de-evolutionary guns to turn people into chimps to make that literally happen). They want the Key because passing through the Doorway will legitimize their crazed religion.

Where the story becomes truly special, however, is when these different factions begin collapsing back into themselves; interacting with each other, forming and breaking alliances with each other, and developing complicated and rich relationships with each other (and with the object of their desire).

McGUFFIN KEEP-AWAY

This scenario shares a lot in common with the Race to the Prize that we analyzed last week: A target object of value with multiple factions competing for its ultimate possession. The key difference (pun intended) is that rather than being the ultimate goal of the scenario, in Zot! the McGuffin is in play and actively shifting possession over and over again.

In the case of Zot! the initial scenario hook is that the item has been stolen. But you can just as easily have the McGuffin secured and instead have the initial scenario hook be the need to steal the item, which then initiates the McGuffin Keep-Away. To some extent the distinction is merely one of perception, however, since the structure ultimately boils down to “X currently has the item, who can take it from them?” The “original owner” of the item is just the one currently in possession of it.

This keep-away dynamic makes the scenario more difficult to design and run. Without the clue trail of the treasure hunt, creating a through-line for the scenario becomes more complex. It also becomes trickier to clearly set up rivalries and the competition between teams, because in the default mode there’s no sequence of events that needs to be achieved before snatching the prize. And as soon as somebody (whether it’s the PCs or somebody else) snatches the prize, they’ll be in the wind.

Okay, so what makes this scenario work?

1. Create X number of factions seeking the McGuffin, in a process that will be fairly similar to that used for Race to the Prize.

Zot! features a couple of interesting variants here. First, there are a number of proxies who end up shifting their alliances (or, at least, which faction they are currently working with) several times throughout the narrative. Second, there are entire secret factions which are using other factions as a front for their own activities. The character of Prince Drufus, for example, notably ends up as both. In fact, he frequently ends up working with the PCs (Zot, Jenny, and their friends) – sometimes because their goals are in accord; sometimes unaware that they are not; and sometimes despite the fact that he knows they are not.

In this, Zot! also highlights the value of giving the factions distinct ideologies which nevertheless overlap with each other. Let’s call these Venn diagram alliances: It’s a powerful technique because the points of commonality will drive the factions to work together, while the points of difference will create conflicts within those alliances which will eventually rip them apart. Remember that this includes the PCs! And, furthermore, remember that you, as the GM, don’t need to determine what the PCs’ agenda will be. These types of ideologically complex environments are great specifically because they force the players to make tough, meaningful choices.

One easy format for these ideologies are characters who desire the same outcome but disagree about how it should be accomplished. (And, inversely, those who desire different outcomes but currently agree on the necessity of a particular course of action.)

2. The keep-away. For each faction, you’ll want to know what tactics they use to steal the McGuffin (stealth, force, etc.) and, if they succeed in obtaining the item, what tactics they’ll use to secure it. Often this can be improvised during actual play, but if you’re unsure about improvising this sort of thing then prep exactly how each team will operate and what they will do (particularly when it comes to securing the item). And, of course, some of these elements will require prep for maximum effectiveness.

Dekko, for example, retreats to his fortress of Castle Dekko for defense. Another thief uses technological camouflage to hide in plain sight. Prince Drufus has a squad of attack robots at his command. The methods and resources you can design here – both mobile and static – are pretty much limitless, and you’ll want to try to vary things between factions. If everybody is just a squad of goons who then retreats to a fortified position, the scenario will become considerably less interesting.

3. The method to find the item. This is the dynamic that’s tricky to get right, but on which the whole scenario structure really depends. Because, as noted before, if somebody can grab the item and then just trivially disappear, the scenario just doesn’t work.

Zot! addresses this problem by giving the Key a unique radiation signature which can, with some expertise and knowledge, be used to track its general location. This includes tracking it to different planets and also into other dimensions, so there really is no way to escape and take the Key “off the board” (so to speak).

Eventually, however, someone figures out how to cloak this radiation signal. This forces the other factions interested in the Key to intuit what the current holder of the key will use it for (i.e., opening the Doorway at the Edge of the Universe), allowing them to once again zone in on it (i.e., put the Doorway under surveillance and security).

Relying on this kind of intuition can be a little risky when it comes to RPG scenario design (since you can’t control exactly what your players will think of or when they’ll think of it), so for a more robust scenario you’ll want to use the Three Clue Rule. Remember that your clues can include intelligence from other factions that have made the intuitive leap. (“It looks like Indiana Jones is heading for Moscow. He must know something we don’t, let’s follow him.”) The web of alliances between factions can also allow you to become proactive here by having other players approach the PCs with an offer to work together (or simply slip them information they feel will be to their advantage).

The more general realization to make here is that this method of discovery very easily collapses into a chokepoint, and like any chokepoint it becomes a potential weak spot at which the scenario can break. If, for example, you design the scenario so that the PCs need to make a test in order to detect the Key’s radiation and they fail that test, that can very easily turn into the PCs having no idea what to do next.

So you want to avoid that chokepoint. In many ways you can think of this as the default action of the scenario (if the PCs have no idea what to do next, they can attempt to find the current location of the item). You’ll either want to make that default action automatic (so that failure isn’t possible), make it meaningfully repeatable (so that there’s a cost to failure, but you can always try again; a partial success test is another way of accomplishing this); or multiply it (so that if one method fails, the PCs can try another method; this would be a variant of the Three Clue Rule).

4. An endgame, usually in the form of an ultimate goal to be achieved with the item – delivering it somewhere, using it for something, preventing others from using it for a certain amount of time, or maybe just figuring out how to definitively destroy it or hide it so that other factions can’t use it. (This last point, of course, flies in the face of #3, so it should require significant effort of some sort in order to achieve this, giving other factions plenty of time to interfere before the endgame is truly achieved.)

Without some form of definitive endgame, the scenario will never end: The McGuffin will just continue being endlessly passed around. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but what it usually means is a growing sense of frustration and futility as the scenario chews up its inherent interest but continues hanging around without any satisfactory resolution.

One variant to look at here is a PC-specific endgame: The great game surrounding the McGuffin continues, but the PCs have accomplished whatever their goal regarding the McGuffin is and are content to exit on their own terms.

SIMPLIFY THE STRUCTURE

Zot! is big and it’s complicated. The scope is multidimensional and multiplanetary, with time travel complicating things even further and the fates of entire worlds at stake. Rather than immediately tackling something of this scale, it might behoove us to take our scenario structure out for a test drive with something a little more modest.

Let’s try this: The Maltese Falcon has, at long last, been found. Its value is immense, but particularly so to the practitioners of the ancient rites of magick, who know its true purpose. It has been placed as a lot in highly exclusive, black market auction that takes place aboard a small, ultra-luxury cruise ship on the high seas.

This premise allows us to further control the scope of the scenario: Barring extraordinary efforts, the action will be confined to the ship until it comes back into port. Neither the PCs nor anybody else will be able to vanish as soon as they’ve stolen the Falcon.

In addition to deck plans for the ship (which you can probably find online), you’ll also want to prep:

1. The factions involved. This will include the current owner of the Falcon and the security team for Penumbral Holdings, the mysterious organization behind the black market auction. Let’s also toss in a couple of sorcerous sects plus a team of mundanes (who just want the Falcon for its jewels and are way out of their depth here).

2. For the keep-away, you’ll want to prep the initial auction-related security protecting the Falcon. Maybe the PCs are the first ones to steal it, maybe they’re not. Either way, you’ll want that initial condition.

3. For the next step, we need to take a step back and think about how we want to organize our prep for this boat. I’m going to argue that we can prep the week at sea as a big social event, using the party planning scenario structure. Parties are usually short affairs, but the structure can easily be expanded to multiple events over several days. Nick Bate and I did something similar for the second part of the Quantronic Heat mini-campaign for Infinity.

With that knowledge in our pocket, we can now consider the method to find the Falcon. For the sake of argument, let’s say we’re running this scenario with Fantasy Flight’s Genesys system. In that case, we might look at something like this:

• You need to achieve X number of successes over any number of checks in order to figure out who currently has the Falcon. Primary checks would focus on social interactions with the other factions onboard. Investigating where the item was stolen from could also contribute additional successes. (Alternative methods might also include sorcerous divinations.)
• Advantages on these checks can be used to determine aspects of how the item is currently being secured (guards, security measures, etc.).
• Disadvantages or Despair might alert one or more of the other factions about the PCs and their intentions. Or attract the attention of Penumbral Holdings’ security team.

4. Our endgame here is simplified by the constrained premise we’ve used: When the ship makes landfall, whoever is currently holding the Falcon will most likely be able to vanish without a trace. The goal of the PCs is to be the one holding the Falcon when the clock runs out.

A possible wrinkle on our endgame is a simple question: Why would Penumbral Holdings put the ship into dock if the Falcon is still missing?

The primary explanation might be exigent circumstances: There may be people onboard that Penumbral Holdings can’t afford to piss off. Or the sorcerous wards preventing teleportation might expire at the end of the week no matter what. Or the true nature of members of Penumbral Holdings prevents them from remaining on the material plane of existence for more than a week.

Alternatively, this might become part of the action: Those holding the Falcon (including the PCs) may need to hijack the ship and bring it into port so that they can make good their escape. Or there’s a rendezvous craft that’s going to arrive at such-and-such a time.

RUNNING THE KEEP-AWAY

The spine of our Maltese Falcon scenario is the social event, advice for which can be found in the original Party Planning article. For the factions, you’ll probably want to prep progressions like those we discussed last week in Race for the Prize.

The social event spine is really a crutch of sorts, giving you a firmer structure to fall back on and build the McGuffin Keep-Away on top of. In its absence, you should be able to just keep spinning events forward through a combination of your faction progressions and responding to the PCs’ actions.

The first issue of Zot! for example, could be framed as the GM triggering the following progressions / faction features:

• THIEF: Attempts to use an interdimensional portal to hide the Key on Our Earth.
• SIRIUS IV: Successfully tracks the Key [locating it on Our Earth] and dispatches a robot kill squad to its location.
• [At this point, the PCs – who have been keeping an eye on the Sirius IV faction – track the robot kill squad to Our Earth and destroy it. They also find the Key and choose to turn it over to the proper authorities in the form of the CPZP.]
• THIEF: Checks his hiding place. [Finding the Key missing, he tracks it.]
• THIEF: Uses a stealthed robot to steal the Key.
• DE-EVOLUTIONARIES: Track the Key and brazenly attack [the CPZP council meeting].
• [The PCs fail to detect the Key being stolen and fight a big battle with the De-Evoluationaries.]

The linear nature of this, mirroring the structure of the original story, may be deceptive. So consider how the GM can trigger the exact same progressions but end up with a completely different result based on the actions of the PCs:

• THIEF: Attempts to use an interdimensional portal to hide the Key on Our Earth.
• SIRIUS IV: Successfully tracks the Key [locating it on Our Earth] and dispatches a robot kill squad to its location.
• [At this point, the PCs – who have been keeping an eye on the Sirius IV faction – track the robot kill squad to Our Earth. They fight, but lose. The robot kill squad captures the Key, but the PCs aren’t aware of this fact. The PCs regroup and pursue the robot kill squad.]
• THIEF: Checks his hiding place. [Finding the Key missing, he tracks it.]
• [PCs arrive back at the home base of the robot kill squad and continue their surveillance. The Sirius IV faction leaders, learning that the robot squad has secured the key, board a shuttle and begin flying towards the compound.]
• THIEF: Uses a stealthed robot to steal the Key.
• [PCs don’t spot the thief’s robot sneaking into the Sirius IV compound.]
• DE-EVOLUTIONARIES: Track the Key and brazenly attack [the Sirius IV robot compound].
• [The PCs notice the stealthed robot sneaking back out of the compound in the chaos. They attack that robot as the Sirius IV shuttle arrives onsite. The Sirius IV representatives spot the PCs, but are ambushed by De-Evolutionaries as they move to intercept. The PCs destroy the thief’s robot and take the key back. Taking the ruined remnants of the robot back to Zot’s Uncle Max, they use it to identify the thief.]

In actual play, what you’ll generally end up with is a cluster of raid (when the PCs go to steal the McGuffin) and siege (when the PCs have the item and need to protect it) scenarios. The more the factions interact with each other, the more crazed these scenarios will become.

BEYOND THE DOORWAY

Our use of the Maltese Falcon in our hypothetical scenario already points the way towards the Dashiell Hammet novel and John Ford movie as another example of this scenario structure in other media. As with Zot!, the scenario begins with the McGuffin already in keep-away mode. (You could also interpret that back story of The Maltese Falcon – with various treasure seekers attempting to trace the Falcon’s trail – as a Race to the Prize scenario, the conclusion of which then bounces directly into a McGuffin Keep-Away scenario).

Another Humphrey Bogart film to consider is Casablanca, in which the letters of transit function as the McGuffin. The thing to note here is that even though the McGuffin DOESN’T change hands repeatedly, the narrative remains interesting. So don’t feel as if you need to force the item to bounce around amongst your various factions: It’s perfectly okay if it settles into the hands of the PCs (or some other faction). As other factions come to barter with (or threaten) the controlling party, the drama will continue to flow.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is an interesting example to break down. There are fewer factions, but a larger number of rogue agents pursuing independent goals within the arena defined by the McGuffin Keep-Away. Consider, too, that the McGuffin in this case – the Green Destiny sword –  has a specific utility which is useful for the keep-away itself. This not only creates an interesting transition of advantage as the McGuffin bounces around, but also encourages the faction currently controlling the item to use it, often creating large, clear paths for the other factions to follow.

Go to Challenge #4

IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

Harvesttime – Part 3: Tee and the Greeting of Old Friends

This fracture, however, is minor compared to the Reformist movement which began in Astalia (one of the Vennoc Protectorates).

When creating our fantasy worlds, one thing I think we inherit from both published examples and our grade school textbooks is an encyclopedia impulse: We want to list every elven king. We want to create a comprehensive map. We want to nail things down.

What I’ve learned, however, is that it’s better to leave yourself room for future ideas.

For example, I’ll consciously avoid constructions like “The Last Blah-Blah” or “there’s only two Bleurghy-Bloogedy-Bloogs in the whole universe!” This is something that I think is even more vital when developing a shared universe, and something I very specifically cautioned writers against when I was working as the Line Developer for the Infinity RPG: Unless your idea requires a hard limit applied to the entire setting… don’t do it.

And of course, sometimes you do need to draw a hard line. The One Ring isn’t the One Ring if it isn’t the One Ring; it can’t be part of a JCPenney jewelry collection.

(How to know if your idea requires its uniqueness? Simply ditch the uniqueness and see if the idea still works. Is your “Only Female Ninja in the Whole World” still a cool character even if she’s not the only female ninja? Probably. Can you throw the One Ring in Mount Doom and save the world if Sauron has a whole cabinet full of Master Rings? Probably not.)

But the real trick I use is to create deliberate “gray spaces” within my world design. There are actually two of them featured in the Harvestime PBeM campaign journal entry: The Vennoc Protectorates and the Reformists. I have very specifically avoided defining exactly how many nations there within the Protectorates and I have similarly avoided figuring out exactly how many or what all the Reformists sects are.

Why?

When I was creating the Western Lands, a very early step was drawing a map of the Five Empires. (Which were, at the time, called the Five Nations. I renamed them when Eberron ended up using the same nomenclature half a decade later. Personally, I had Kipling and the Iroquois Confederacy bouncing around in my head to make “Five Nations” feel particularly catchy when I brainstormed it. I’m guessing Baker did, too.) But I immediately spotted the trap: I had designed Seyrun, Barund, Arathia, and Hyrtan to cover a broad swath of fantasy tropes, giving me a lot of canvas for fitting in all kinds of ideas. But they were also inherently limited: I had one Emperor. If I needed a different Emperor, I didn’t have one.

So the Vennoc Protectorates – inspired by the Holy Roman Empire and Ancient Greece – exist as a confused tangle of ever-changing city-states, duchies, kingdoms, principalities, and alliances all operating under a loose, common banner. So if tomorrow I think to myself, “You know what would be a cool? A kingdom secretly ruled by Deep Ones!” all I have to do is squeeze in another Protectorate.

The other option, of course, would be to just keep adding bits to the edge of the map. That works, too. But it can also be a little too easy: It encourages you to keep spreading your ideas out, instead of bringing them together, forcing them to rub up against each other, and seeing what happens in the collision.

For the same reason, I limited the Western Lands to a single pantheon of exactly nine gods. I’ve recently discussed how that decision has forced me to develop that pantheon in depth rather than just cramming more thinly realized gods into the setting, but I also recognized that I needed to give myself room within that pantheon to develop cool ideas and variants. If there were just nine gods supported by nine specific churches, the resulting palette would be fairly limited. I wanted the ability to continue adding cool fantasy religion ideas to the game world, and I also wanted to be able to create stories based around religious tension.

The Reformists were a gray space that allowed me to accomplish both goals. The Nine Gods cover a broad array of divine/mythological archetypes; the Reformists allow me to interpret those archetypes into myriad forms. If I need a nature cult that venerates nymphs, that can be reflected within the imagery of Sayl or Tohlen or both. (Maybe the cult believes nymphs are the divine children of those gods?) If I need steampunk machine worshipers, I can place them within a facet of Vehthyl. If I need a repressive religious autarchy, I’m not prevented from doing that by the limitations of the Imperial Church. These will all fit into niches within the Reformist gray space.

The Temple District

IN THE SHADOW OF THE SPIRE

HARVESTTIME – PART 3: TEE AND THE GREETING OF OLD FRIENDS

PBeM – November 12th through December 1st, 2007
Harvesttime in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty

When Tee said her farewells to Tor and asked him to pick up her dress from the Jade Woman her intention was to return to her room and recuperate the injuries she had suffered. Instead she found herself pacing endlessly, lost in eddying currents of hopeless thought.

She knew that only a scant distance away, the Harvesttime Festival in Narred was getting ready to begin. There would be song and dancing on the green. The community hall would be opened for food and drink. All her kin and friends would be there.

It was more than she could bear – to be so close to her old life and yet unable to touch it.

Unable to stay where she was, but unwilling to lead any danger to her community, she decided to seek counsel from Doraedian. She headed towards Iridithil’s Home. But when she arrived, Doraedian wasn’t there. He had been summoned away to a meeting of the Twelve Commanders and would likely go straight from there to the festival at Narred.

Intensely frustrated, Tee returned to the Ghostly Minstrel. By the time she got there, she’d made her decision: She sat down and quickly wrote out notes for her childhood friends – Aradan, Rissien, and Santiel – saying that they should meet at her house as soon as they could. She paid a messenger to deliver the letters and then hurried over to her house.

By this time she knew that the crowds of the Harvesttime Festival would have already gathered around the communal hall and Moon Lily Pond. So, being as discrete as possible, she circled south around the Herbalists’ Guildhall. Approaching her house from behind, she came up Vadarast Street. The familiar, if somewhat disturbing, scents of Bueles’ potion shop just a few buildings down Iron Street brought back sharp memories as she slipped around the corner of her house and, with a cautious glance, unlocked the door.

She was fairly certain she wasn’t noticed, although she could see the crowd gathering across the Narred green. Her thoughts were naturally distracted as she quickly gathered up the drop-cloths and tried to make the house look a little less deserted – not so much lived in, but at least a little more familiar… a little more welcoming.

Then she sat down to wait. Read more »