News as Campaign Glue, the Hill
Cantons Method
Seven of
the ten years of the Hill Cantons existence has been spent weekly
online. One of the biggest hurdles with running games online—or
hell even face to face with adult schedule--is social cohesion. There
is just something about the lack of direct human contact that
ratchets up the flake factor beyond the usual range of adult
scheduling issues: players drop out of games within minutes of
kickoff; gamemasters cancel sessions with wild abandon, campaigns
fizzle after a single game; the video hangout freezes/drops/freaks
the fuck out etc.
One coping
mechanism is that you have to be a lot more conscious and deliberate
about engaging players between sessions. Creating a
campaign rhythm and rapport because vital. At the low end of the
effort poll is creating a community page or other discussion and
information hub, but I have found that it helps for a gamemaster to
be proactive and create certain regular entry points for the players
to be able to plug into and feel the dynamism of a campaign.
Beyond the
weekly “take,” a combined After Action Report and loot/exp haul,
I have churned out with on again/off again regularity a weekly news
report as a “campaign cohesion linchpin.” Mirroring the exact
style of 50-word news briefs I had to churn out each and every day
for a while as a news editor, the reports invariably feature 3-4
points (that rarely go over three sentences) and an image. You can
see examples hereand here.
My campaign
news briefs come in at least several recognizable stripes (often
combining two or more):
Obvious
Adventure Hook. The incredibly not-subtle,
bang-you-over-the-head “here be adventure” hook. Usually
involving a discernible mission, macguffin and/or defined bounty.
This is always either an announcement that I have designed a new area
or to a tease a site they may have missed in their sandbox
explorations (hate wasting material).
Example: For
five long centuries the sleepy Kezmaroki-ruled island of Ptuj has
tolerated with a resigned shrug its sister isle, Tolmin,
lost to the Weird. Last year alas Smok, a youngish offspring of
the great wyrm Zirnitra herself, descended on great wings onto
the House of the Axe, a shunned temple of the cthonic goddess
called the Mistress of the Mountains. Terrified Ptujians, whose rural
residents have become the favored snack of the great beast, are
offering a substantive bounty for the slaying of the dragon:
gender-appropriate nubile concubines, a small mountain of the
island's vintage corn liquor, a local latifundia estate, and 10,000
suns of cold hard cash.
The
Subtle Hook. Perhaps only subtle relative to the above is a
mixed item (from the list below) that may contain a line signifying
that an actionable adventure or geographic place may be interesting
enough to warrant in-session exploration. The actual site or mission
will often be obscured.
Example: Vatek
son of Vatek, is claiming to have unearthed a 500-stone
beet from his tenant farmer's field in the hamlet of Ctyri
Ctvrt. Most strange of all is the twisted face-like blemish near
the giant beet's crown. A local shepherd claims to have heard a
booming voice emanate from the storage hut where it is currently
housed two nights ago.
Oblique
Background. The Hill Cantons has developed firmly in the
bottom-up worldbuilding camp, accreting levels of detail as the
campaign rolls on (really starting just as a wilderness map of a very
small bounded area). I have a strong preference for presenting small
interesting little bites than dumping large reams of setting info.
Example: The Blood
Rains have swept into Kezmarok leaving syrupy, sticky
puddles and residues throughout the city. The Patriarch has declared
the ritual sympathetic mourning period to commiserate with our most
holy Sun Lord as he suffers his silver-chained beating from
his spurned former wife, the Celestial Lady. On pain of a hefty
fine, all residents of the city must wear the customary mustard
yellow through this period.
The Big
Ticket Event. Most all long campaigns start to generate
dramatic large-scale events; the bloody wars and earth-shattering
cataclysms that make our world so lovable. Some of these truly huge
events sculpt the world the players have to negotiate, others are
significant and dramatic but may be actionable of the party (the
latter here).
Example: Two
weeks of inexplicable, furious flurry of activity in
the Turko-Fey siege camps have been followed by an even
more ominous development--a fusillade of shelling by the dreaded
dragonne-cannons. While bonders have braced pikes-awaiting for the
usual half-hearted sortie following the bombardment, the guns seem to
have not abated in their fury. In the first time in the five
centuries of the Kezmaroksiege the outer of the three massive
wall seems dangerously close to a breach.
The
Whimsy. Quite often the last news item is an example of “I
write whatever the fuck I want.” These on self-indulgent ocassion
run over long from my usual “keep it quick” format. Shockingly
also often these tend to morph into Subtle Adventure Hooks.
Example: Of
the many family-dominated usury guilds to escape the collapse of last
decade, the Frazas were among the most infamous in deftly
transferring their massive debts back to the public treasuries of the
cantonal councils. But long before this, they had accrued notoriety
far and wide for another feat: the weaving of the Tapestry of
Xvikz. A full two centuries ago, then Frazas family head, Franzoht
Fair-Breeched, called on his dark powers to summon and bind the
Xvikz, a demon from the darkest, deepest hell of high finance.
A great lover of petty humiliation Franzoht tormented the creature by refusing to put the dreaded demon's powers to appropriate use instead compelling him to weave a great commemorative tapestry from the velvety firmament of the domed heavens. That the required scene was both cloying and derivative only added to the sulk of the demon who plodded away needle point in hand. Years stretched into decades as the demon passively-aggressively refused to finish in a timely manner—and each successive generation of bull-headed Frazas refusing to release the demon in turn led to impasse.
Inexplicably fourteen years ago, Xvikz declared his last stitch sewn. Though the resulting tapestry was horrifically underwhelming, its unveiling was heralded as a major cultural achievement in Overkingdom aesthete circles and became a much-sought fixture of upper crust soirees in the borderlands.
A great lover of petty humiliation Franzoht tormented the creature by refusing to put the dreaded demon's powers to appropriate use instead compelling him to weave a great commemorative tapestry from the velvety firmament of the domed heavens. That the required scene was both cloying and derivative only added to the sulk of the demon who plodded away needle point in hand. Years stretched into decades as the demon passively-aggressively refused to finish in a timely manner—and each successive generation of bull-headed Frazas refusing to release the demon in turn led to impasse.
Inexplicably fourteen years ago, Xvikz declared his last stitch sewn. Though the resulting tapestry was horrifically underwhelming, its unveiling was heralded as a major cultural achievement in Overkingdom aesthete circles and became a much-sought fixture of upper crust soirees in the borderlands.
I do something similar (with less reliability of frequency, alas) and one extra "stripe" I include is the "missed opportunity" .. if in the last few missives there was news of an upcoming Great Goat Race at the halfling village of Cordes-sur-Ciel, then I follow that up with some scandalous gossip of the event. Perhaps the race day was interrupted by a Wyvern attack, which was ably fought off by some adventurous resident wizard and wandering ranger.
ReplyDeleteSometimes the alluded to adventure was within scale of the PCs, sometimes not. If the players continually fail to pick up dropped clues of potential adventure then the news starts featuring the continuing exploits of a (newly invented) rival adventuring group. Hooks and clues have a shelf life.
Which particular class and race and other detail involved is also carefully chosen so as to possibly be useful for the PCs. Maybe the group have a low level wizard of their own, and he hasn't yet located a sufficiently high wizard to seek training from.