|
4 years ago ::
Jan 12, 2009 - 4:36PM
#61
|
Date Joined:
May 28, 2005
|
Following the conversation here reminds me of a campaign that gave the players a strong sense of locality despite having far fewer published modules than Living Greyhawk. Xen'drik Expeditions did this by 1) limiting the scope of adventures to the Xen'drik continent rather than the entire world of Eberron and 2) providing players with a purpose through the use of factions. True, it wasn't technically a Living campaign, but it still allowed one to have a stake in what happened in the world.
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 12, 2009 - 4:44PM
#62
|
Date Joined:
Jun 18, 2003
|
Yeah, I was a big fan of that campaign! 
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 12, 2009 - 5:01PM
#63
|
- Senior Volunteer Community Lead
- Dragon Slayer
- D&DI News Guide
Date Joined:
Aug 31, 2005
|
The sad part is my two favorite factions (CoL, and CC) were the two that my players liked the least (favoring BWC and CoS).
Ahwell, was still a great campaign. Someday I might even get a chance to read the last year's worth of mods to see "what happened"
Wolf Star76 Community Advocate (SVCL) for D&D Organized Play, Avalon Hill, and the DCI/WPN LFR Community Manager DDi Guide  Created by MyFitnessPal - Free Calorie Counter
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 12, 2009 - 5:44PM
#64
|
Date Joined:
May 23, 2005
|
I almost think that I would have preferred that they put of starting LFR until Gencon this year instead of last year. That way they could have let each region get 3 or 4 modules in the 1-4 range written and ready to be published. And have them follow a small plot line to introduce players to the region etc.
This way there could have been some continuity from the start for LFR and its regions. This would have helped with peoples interest as well. Playing in East Rift this week and then next week in Waterdeep and then waiting 6 months to a year for a 2nd module from the region that may or may not have anything to do with the original module does not go a long way of helping the PC's get immersed in the region and its plots
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 12, 2009 - 5:56PM
#65
|
Date Joined:
Jun 18, 2003
|
The sad part is my two favorite factions (CoL, and CC) were the two that my players liked the least (favoring BWC and CoS).
You need to find a better class of player. :D
And you can tell them Brian Mackey said so!
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 12, 2009 - 9:41PM
#66
|
Date Joined:
Aug 22, 2007
|
I almost think that I would have preferred that they put of starting LFR until Gencon this year instead of last year. [...] This way there could have been some continuity from the start for LFR and its regions.
You're assuming that continuity and immersion is the goal.
My impression is that, from WOTC's point of view, the goal of LFR is primarily to give GMs frameworks of pre-written adventures they can adapt for use in their gaming groups (or use to create new gaming groups), as a means of promoting increased 4e play, especially amongst groups not comfortable with regularly coming up with campaigns and adventures from scratch.
The goal doesn't appear to be the creation of a campaign on its own with shared experiences, continuity and immersion, apart from whatever your particular GM creates for you.
Some campaign staff might indeed want to create such a campaign, and WOTC isn't necessarily opposed to any of that happening, but it's really not a priority for WOTC and doesn't guide their decisions.
-- Brian Gibbons.
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 13, 2009 - 1:54AM
#67
|
|
|
Ironically, yesterday I was reviewing some posts from the Keoland Yahoo list from LG, and 24 months into the campaign there were people complaining that they didn't feel connected to the region and that the Keoland regional campaign wasn't engaging them on a story level. I don't offer this as an excuse for what LFR currently is, but just as a matter of perspective on the nature of what we are dealing with, both as gamers and as a campaign staff.
Regards,
Shawn
LFR Global Admin
The problem in this respect for LFR is the number of regions within which players can expect to play compared to the number of modules per region in which they can possibly play.
There's no way for a player to get invested in 15 regions.
Likewise there's no way for a player to get invested in a single region with only 1 module per quarter.
If you can't change the total number of modules released per quarter/year/etc then slash the number of regions to increase regional module density.
Or frankly, do away with all regions and just have modules tied together in strings that are coordinated by authors.
Either way, but asking players to invest in a dozen regions simultaneously is not going to work.
Say it took the entire year 1 of a region's LG mods to invest their playerbase. You are talking there around a dozen modules, not counting adaptables, minimissions or interactives. In LFR terms you are talking 3 years worth of modules for that. Meanwhile in LG you only had the core modules to 'distract' the players from a given region.. in LFR you have a dozen other regions.
Its a problem.
Exacerbating the problem: very little module primers for the regions that they are set in. And even if done out, you are asking judges to learn how many different regions in order to run those modules?
You have too many regions for what you are delivering.
-James
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 13, 2009 - 4:48AM
#68
|
Date Joined:
Jun 18, 2003
|
Thanks to all for their very cogent analysis and heartfelt opinions. LFR is going to be different than what LC and LG were, as people are pointing out. Hopefully people can enjoy LFR for what it is, while the campaign staff does its best to mold the campaign to meet the players' realistic expectations and create a campaign that can offer fun adventures.
Thanks,
Shawn
LFR Global Admin
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 13, 2009 - 7:04AM
#69
|
|
|
Do people who complain about plot hooks, realize how hard it is to create one that: (a) works for the majority of PCs without becoming stale (which also means that we should never assume a PC played specific previous adventures), (b) doesn't take up too much time (after all, an adventure must be able to be finished in 4 hours) and (c) doesn't fill up a lot of pages?
There is a reason why even in published adventures plot-hooks rarely gain more attention then a paragraph or three. Each PC is unique and has its own motivations. Good plot-hooks tie-in to those motivations. Regardless of how hard we try, we cannot take all motivations in account. Instead of trying, we tend to use the most basic one that work almost all the time: the NPC hiring the PCs. It is up to the individual DM to modify this basic plot-hook to the group just as when running any other published adventure in their home game. Granted, designing personal plot-hooks quickly is not easy, especially not at a convention or when you lack good knowledge on FR lore, but luckily in a pinch hiring a PC always work. It certainly generates less problems then when we assume the PCs are heroic... (Nothing generated more complaints than the LG rule in year 1 and 2 where we were not allowed to use the hiring plot-hook at all.)
Personally I always ask my players a couple of questions before the start of game and use the answers to modify the plot-hook if it makes sense. The answers also tell me something about what the players want, since the more elaborate the answers are, the more important the story is to that player. If a player does not know the answer, but cares, I happy to give them advice by providing them with the appropriate FR lore. For example, a PC plays a cleric of Selûne, and they do not know why they would go to Cormyr, I point out that Cormyr is under constant threat from Netheril a country ruled by worshippers of Shar. Shar is the archnemesis of Selûne. Hence a good reason for a follower of Selûne would be to see if they can help the good people of Cormyr in their struggle against the insidious manipulations of Shar (which as it happens is also a very good plot-hook for most of the adventures currently set in Cormyr).
Pieter Sleijpen
RPGA LFR Global Administrator
|
|
|
|
4 years ago ::
Jan 13, 2009 - 7:09AM
#70
|
Date Joined:
Aug 18, 2007
|
Where would one go to suggest that WotC put the 1-2 page entries for all the LFR (mod) regions from the FRPG and/or FRCG on the RPGA site for download?
It would be a pure waste of pages to put the same regional info into all of the mods for a region, but making it freely available means interested players and DMs can access that information to better prepare a module in that region.
If WotC understandably doesn't want to put published material out there for free, perhaps they could allow the Regional directors to draft a regional overview which can be tailored more directly to the LFR plotlines that they're planning to develop. Maybe this simple reference type document could be updated every year to reflect the new year's plots as well as to summarize previous years' plots (while trying to avoid as many spoilers as you can.)
Also, I think tying in some threads from across a couple of regions is a great idea. One overlooked plus to the level banding and regional schedules is that 90+% of the time you will have played REGION1-1 before REGION1-2 (unless you deliberately try to play them in reverse.) By tying in multiple regions, you can have x, y, and z going on in the backgrounds of three different regional mods at level 1-4, and be pretty sure that players will have played all of those (that they're going to play) before moving on to the level 4-7 band where you can bring the backgrounds together or cross them over between regions. You don't make the different level 1-4 mods sequels of each other, but you can have alternate paths that the PCs might take if they know information from one of the other mods in that level band. Then later, hopefully using input from reported play, you put out level 4-7s as sequels and follow-ups to the previous mods.
|
|
|
