Dungeons & Dragons - Role Playing Tips
Roleplaying Tips Weekly E-Zine Issue #105
Romance In Rpgs: 6 Tips
Contents:
This Week's Tips Summarized
Romance In Rpgs: 6 Tips
- Take It Seriously
- Conflict, Conflict, Conflict
- Know When To Dim The Lights
- Stay In Character
- Mix It Up
- Remember, It's Just A Character
Readers' Tips Summarized
- General GMing Tips: Game News Flashes & Let The PCs Talk
- Working Information Into Your Game
- Language Creation Trick
- Photoshop Mapping Tip
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A Brief Word From Johnn
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Romance In Rpgs: 6 Tips
Guest tips by an anonymous contributor
- Take It Seriously
Romance is a fabulous method to create plot, but if the
players don't realize that this IS plot, then it's
completely wasted. If they aren't mature enough to handle
the topic--and you should know if your players are actually
ready--don't even try. Oftentimes, the PLAYERS will initiate
the romantic plot, not the GM. In that case, stand back,
get comfortable, and go with the flow.
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- Conflict, Conflict, Conflict
A match made in Heaven is hardly interesting. If a player
character picks up a sweet girlfriend in Generictowne and
they live happily ever after, that's great for him, but it's
no story.
Consider putting in some barriers that make the relationship
workable, but difficult:
- The ultimate cliche: the characters are working for
opposite sides...
- The characters are in love, but not of the same race.
- The characters are not of the same social class and aren't
sure as to the reaction society will have.
- The characters are the same sex.
- An assassin falls in love with his or her target.
- A soldier falls in love with a superior officer.
Put a barrier to the romance, and how the characters cross
it becomes an excellent story.
Also keep in mind that the relationship doesn't always work
out. Sometimes character personality conflicts prevent a
romance, but playing a failed or crumbling romance can be
just as interesting as playing one that works despite
barriers.
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- Know When To Dim The Lights
It's up to you to judge the comfort level that your players
can deal with. Usually a simple mention of a kiss and a
flick of the light-switch should be MORE than enough to
accompany any romantic situation. When the story gets
graphic, it stops being about romance, and starts being
about sex, which can be offensive to many, just plain silly
to others, and is barely conducive to a story atmosphere.
One exception that can become difficult to deal with is an
"evil party game" and...slightly darker situations. I have
seen evil party games that were completely explicit: quite
frankly, nauseating to all involved.
However, I'm not ashamed to admit that I did have a rapist
villain in one of my games. The players were all comfortable
with my game and my style. I simply took a player whose
character was captive to the villain into a side room, and
said to her "He is going to rape you." She nodded, and that
was it.
The story was about how her character dealt with the
aftermath of that situation, and not the moment itself.
(Very interesting: the character was a "classic victim" and
ended up developing quite a twisted love relationship with
that villain...won't bother you with the details but it
ended up being the most intriguing romance I have EVER
RPed!)
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- Stay In Character
Don't make all characters in love into instant Casanovas.
It cheapens the atmosphere. If a character has other
priorities or other duties, don't neglect them too much to
focus on the romance. You don't want to lose characters you
have spent time developing in other areas and make them into
nothing but "yes dear's" once they are bitten by the love
bug.
If the village idiot starts uttering Shakespeare, or the
spoiled princess turns into the ultimate girlfriend,
instantaneously, you've made a mistake somewhere along the
line. The number one place this gets screwed up is if an
evil character falls in love with a heroic one. Sure, it's
a great story, but make it believable, please! (The players
DID believe it when the above villain began to really fall
in love...after he'd been blasted by holy light during a
dying paladin's last divine intervention.)
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- Mix It Up
A novice GM once shocked me by saying that she never used
ANY married characters, PC or major NPC, in her stories. She
thought that it ruined conflict if certain characters were
automatically "unavailable". In my opinion, of course, that
is completely wrong. It's boring for all characters to be
young, available, and looking. What's wrong with a married
villain? A player character with a wife and kids? A PC or
major NPC who is already betrothed? It doesn't ruin the
atmosphere to explore new situations; it makes for
variation.
Also keep in mind that not all characters respond to romance
in the same way. I once increased the difficulty of a
seduction roll tremendously on the grounds of "he's not your
type". The player knew the NPC quite well and agreed with my
assessment of his opinion. Some characters can and should
fall head-over-heels, and others will take a bit more
encouraging.
One NPC in my recent game nearly refused a date with an
interested girl because he was certain she just wanted to
pry information. But others spill their guts at the first
wink, Captain Kirk style.
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- Remember, It's Just A Character
Don't bring the romance away from the table. Don't live-
action the kissing sequence. It can lead to some serious
problems when a player character's romantic interest tries
to become a player's real life romantic interest. And it
gets much worse if/when the characters or players break up.
From experience, I've found that the most awkward situation
is two player characters playing their own sex in a
developing relationship (got into some big fights about that
one away from the table). It's actually less awkward when
the relationship is PC to NPC, or if one or more players is
playing the opposite sex. It just seems less "real".
Be smart. You don't beat up your friends after you leave the
combat; you don't take your character's romance home with
you, either. Ever.
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[Comment from Johnn: I think one of the best tips a GM
struggling with romance in his game can take from this
week's column is to just add romance to the campaign as a
background situation, and not to try actually roleplaying it
out.
For example, giving the villain a spouse or romantic
interest is a great start. That's NPC to NPC romance and
easier to GM. Perhaps the PCs see the villain having a
romantic dinner, or courting a fair lady--that should add
romance to your game in a comfortable way.
Here are two other articles on the topic, if you'd like to
read more:
Romance In Games: It's The Chase That's Fun
http://www.roleplayingtips.com/issue10.html
Romance In RPGs by Delphine Lynx
http://www.roleplayingtips.com/articles/romance_in_rpgs.php
And here is a page with a ton of great PC and NPC romantic
roleplaying ideas:
http://www.1001waystoberomantic.com/one.html ]
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Tips Request: "Module Planning Tips"
I've decided to run two classic AD&D modules:
- B2 Keep On The Borderlands
- T1-8 Temple of Elemental Evil
And I need help and advice on prepping them for good,
quality play. I'm reading through them, but wondered how you
plan and prepare to run published modules for your
campaigns?
Any tips and advice will be appreciated.
Email me personally at:
johnn@roleplayingtips.com
Thanks! :)
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Readers' Tips Of The Week:
- General GMing Tips: Game News Flashes & Let The PCs Talk
From: Brian
Johnn,
Wanted to say I've been reading your site for a while now
online, and it's great. I keep coming across novel ideas
that I'm happily (and evilly) incorporating, or ones that I
come across and go 'Oh, yeah, that works great! I know that
one!'. Great site, and hope you keep it going strong.
But I wanted to put in my 2 nuyen on a couple of tips that I
don't believe you've covered yet:
- A Twist On Campaign Journals... Game News Flashes
One of the things that I've found most effectively sets the
mood, and helps get people into character very quickly, is
pre-written news flashes. The group I'm currently using this
with is a Shadowrun crew, and as befits the milieu, I send
these out by e-mail as 'NetFlashes', complete with
time/date/place/service stamps, although I also have them
available in 'hardcopy' when the players show up.
These also feed very well into the concepts of having the
world running on its own, without revolving entirely around
the PCs.
Admittedly, this group meets only sporadically (about every
third month), so I have plenty of time to write these up,
but it's actually reasonably easy, if you keep a few things
in mind.
- Be Brief: These are flashes, not Pulitzer Prize winning
investigations. Think of top-of-the-hour headlines, with
maybe five sentences total. This also applies to the
amount of news. I do three on average, or at most four, per
update.
- You're writing about the World Outside: One of the
things the players seem to appreciate the most is that I
don't detail just the events touching upon their actions in-
game (from the previous session or earlier). I have one
player who is (in-character) totally obsessed with the
sports team I've invented, and they look forward to each
update like a real fan. Plus, it's YOUR world, do what you
will with it.
- Hints AND Red Herrings: At this point in the game, the
characters are very low power, so almost none of the things
I write ever directly relate to their actions, and sometimes
are intended to get them thinking in the wrong direction.
However, I do use the flashes to set up scenes in advance,
and if the players are clever, and put 1 plus 2 together,
sometimes they even get 3, and plan accordingly.
For example, I had the PCs intercepting a courier at an
airport at around the same time that an important
international delegation was scheduled to arrive. One of
the characters remembered reading the flash about the
delegation and the military honor guard that would meet
them. The character remembered and, assuming high security,
didn't pack any heat. They weren't stopped at the doors, and
they met the courier on time.
- If the characters DO make a splash: If the PCs have
been involved in something that is significantly newsworthy
(i.e. the airport mentioned above was then attacked by a
terrorist group; alas, this game was back in July), then
put something in the flash about it, whether in a direct
read, or in an oblique way. It gives the players a real
feeling of belonging to the world, and just occasionally
will get them in hot water.
- Let the PC's Talk
I find that this frequently stems from my news updates, and
it's a heck of a lot of fun to watch sometimes. It also
works best if the world has 'something else going on' not
requiring PC involvement.
When you are playing a game with an overarching campaign
goal, or a massive conspiracy, or any particular figures in
the shadows, it can be very informative to the GM to let the
players talk to each other, sometimes at great length, about
what's going on, usually as they try to figure out why
things are happening the way they are.
In the beginning, when I knew exactly what was happening in-
game, I would just let the players talk, which would eat up
out-of-game (as meta-game talk) and in-game time. ("You've
just had an hour long conversation about where those vampire
terrorists came from. You're getting hungry. And the rest
of the people in the lobby are staring at you.")
However, about half of the time, one of the players would
come up with a scheme or reason so outrageous, or so
intrinsically cool, that I just had to write it down,
whether or not I ever planned on using it. And because I'm
in charge of the world, there's nothing stopping me from
changing my plans to what the players talked out, just to
surprise them. Plus, it allows me to take their ideas and
start brain-storming off of their accidental input to create
new plots and characters.
These sorts of conversations have had the effect of getting
ALL of the players to periodically look up at me and look
for whether or not I'm smiling. If I am, they start to
worry, even if I have nothing up my sleeve. It's great for
playing with their minds, which sometimes is the point
behind some whole scenarios.
- Working Information Into Your Game
From: Paul B.
Johnn,
I have an established campaign world that I am constantly
adding bits and ideas to, and there are two main ways in
which I pass on information:
- The Campaign
Each campaign I run is based around an event that
will change the way in which the world is run. By playing
the adventures, the players come across important world
defining facts.
For example, in my current campaign, the players were
transported back in time through a portal, and everyone kept
referring to the humans in the party as "Dragon Lords".
Eventually, they worked out that Dragons and Humans had some
kind of link. And they ended up in the court of the Dragon
Council, which advised them that Humans are Dragons who have
ascended to the human form (in Draconic, the words "human"
and "dragon" sound like the same word).
They have been able to use this information to bluff their
way through incredible dangers.
- Special One-Off Adventures
I use one-off adventures to give information to players
(but not the PCs). I like that the players know what's
going on in the world and I am happy for this knowledge to
help guide their characters actions.
For example, over Christmas breaks our normal roleplaying
sessions are halted, but a few old gamers come back to visit
family and such and we often hold special one-off
adventures. In the last pre-Christmas adventure of 2001, all
of the characters were captured by kobolds (actually whipped
into submission; +5 brilliant energy shock whips are
wonderful things). So I gave all of the players pre-made
characters and sent them on a rescue mission for the
captured PCs. The mix of players meant that some of them
were very keen to save their PCs, but the players who didn't
have PCs in peril were given special tasks to thwart the
rescue attempt.
During this mission they found out exactly how powerful the
members of the dragon council were (because they played
members) and what the plane of the gods was like (because
that's where the setting was). By the way. If you die on
the plane of the gods (in my setting) you go straight to the
nine hells, do not pass the prime plane, do not collect
200gp.
In the previous year's session, the last regular adventure
saw the characters steal a diamond that was a cage for an
extremely powerful wizard (Level 100). They also found a
crystal ball with the suggestion curse on it suggesting that
the players dispel the magic on the gem (that was holding
him inside). Once he was freed he possessed one of the PCs
and then magic jar'd his essence into something more
powerful.
The end of year special session was again with special
characters (where they first learnt of the dragon council's
existence). This was to recapture the escaped wizard (who
was also a dragon lord). I want the players to realize the
havoc that their PCs cause to more powerful beings.
Oh and on a side note, I used sock puppets made from old
socks and stuck on craft eyes for the last special session
and the pre-made PCs. At first, the players looked at them
strangely and were slow to put them on, but when I pointed
out that for each character I had given a strange habit that
I expected them to role play, they got right into it.
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- Language Creation Trick
From: Nat
Atevefistefem Bimtariv
That means Language Creation in Drang-Mi-Laran, the new
language I've just created. I've just found out how easy it
is to create a basic but fully workable language.
There was a list of sounds in my dictionary:
a as in cat, a as in ago, ah as in calm, air as in hair, ar
as in bar, aw as in law, ay as in say, b as in bat, ch as in
chin, d as in day, e as in bed, e as in taken, ee as in
meet, eer as in beer, er as in her, ew as in few, awr as in
demure, f as in fast, g as in get, h as in hat, i as in pin,
i as in pencil, j as in jam, k as in king, l as in leg, m as
in man, n as in not, ng as in sing, nk as in thank, o as in
top, oh as in most, oi as in join, oo as in soon, oor as in
poor, or as in for, ow as in cow, p as in pen, r as in red,
s as in sit, sh as in shop, t as in top, th as in thin, u as
in cup, v as in van, w as in why, y as in say, yoo as in unit,
yoore as in endure, yr as in fire, z as in zebra, q as in
quill, q as in qualm, x as in xylaphone.
So, I worked by simply replacing English letters with a
different letter, always trying to think about the different
sounds and where the tongue moved. Therefore as "t" is made
in the front of the mouth, "a" is made in the back etc. I
tried to choose a combination that would come up with a
minimal number of unnatural sounds like dopkmbvcxk that
clearly wouldn't be the part of a language of a human race
such as the Drang-Mi-Laran's.
The finished result was:
a=t, b=c, c=b, d=k, e=m, f=g, g=g, h=w, i=r, j=y, k=d, l=a,
m=e, n=v, o=i, p=b, q=z, r=i/r, s=u, t=a, u=s, v=n, w=h, x=x
y=j, z=q.
This formula meant I could simply swap the letters of an
English word with the substitute letters and have something
that sounded like a whole new language, and it sorta was.
With this I can basically come up with any word by simply
spacing letters that don't sound natural with a vowel.
Drang-Mi-Laran usually uses an "e", but that can be changed
for different languages.
This would probably be pretty useful for DMs who wing it,
as you can pretty much work out the Drang-Mi-Laran word for
anything on the spot. Here are a few phrases so you can get
an idea of what the language sounds like:
That man is evil!
Aweta etev ou menema!
Shall we make a deal?
Cheta hem etedem teh kemta?
I will crush you like a bug!
Oh hoah bisaw jis aredem teh cesef!
I am your king!
Rih tehe jisi dovef!
You're a madman!
Jisim teh eteket!
It's pretty basic but it can either be the framework for
something more complex or just a simple language if you
really only need it for place names, NPC names etc.
It took me really only about an hour to devise it - and
thats pretty good considering it can create a Drang-Mi-Laran
word for any English one.
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- Photoshop Mapping Tip
From: Heather G.
Johnn,
If DMs want to reveal their campaign world bit by bit--as
the players travel through it--here's a tip for using
Photoshop (or another graphics program that allows the use
of layers) that lets DMs disguise unexplored regions while
revealing areas already known to the PCs.
Using a copy of your master file, create a new layer on top
of the one that includes the scanned or custom-made map and
use the new layer to "cover" portions of the map that
haven't been explored. If a town's location appears in black
over a color that indicates cleared land on the map (tan,
for example), select and copy a tan "patch" from the
original map layer and paste it onto the new layer directly
over the town--viola, the town has disappeared! When the
party travels to previously-blotted out locations, simply
erase the corresponding section on the new layer to reveal
it.
A certain amount of care is needed as the DM switches from
the map layer to the cover layer so that mistakes aren't
made, but DMs who like to dabble in Photoshop will probably
enjoy this technique. Save a copy of this file if you need
to collapse the layers before printing. Updated maps can
either be printed out or uploaded to a website to show the
group's progress over time (copyright permitting).
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