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WillTasker
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Joined: 25 Jan 2017
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 Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 11:44 am Post subject: You Meet In A Tavern... |
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Hey all, first time poster here but I played the WEG SW game from about 1994 to 2004 or so. I have some new friends that are interested in the game and want to start a play-by-mail, which I'm all for. However, I'm a bit rusty at GMing and am stuck on probably the most important part of storytelling...
How do I get them to all meet?
Admittedly, I'm waiting for them to get back to me the character classes they'll be playing, so I can't quite connect the dots just yet - but this one part of the story is where I'm stuck and I'd hate to use "Oh, you're all in a bar at the same time" trope.
Any suggestions how to get these people together? |
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Xain Arke
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Joined: 19 Sep 2010
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 12:55 pm Post subject: |
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Depends what era and setting of Star Wars you are going to be using.
If it's Rebellion era then a Rebel Cell, a group of privateers or Rebel Sympathisers on the run from Imperials, or even Imperials infiltrating Rebel groups could all work for pre-existing connections
If its a fringe game in any era then a crew of a smuggling ship is an easy in for a group of players
if it helps, look at the connections of the main characters from Star Wars; Chewie knows Han because of a life debt (Han saved Chewie). Luke knows 'Old Ben' from his local home area, Obi 'Old Ben' Kenobi has been secretly guarding Luke and keeping him safe since the fall of the Republic. Leia is looking For Obi-Wan Kenobi, a friend and ally of her father Bail Organa to get his help with the Death Star plans. Luke and Obi-Wan hire Han and Chewie. They all rescue Leia and go on the run from the Empire, Except Obi-Wan who is killed by Darth Vader.
So basically you have; Crew mate hirelings, guardian and ward, child of historical alliance. All good connections...
...Or you could let the players to decide how all the characters know each other...
Just my opinions though
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shootingwomprats
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 1:02 pm Post subject: Re: You Meet In A Tavern... |
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| WillTasker wrote: | | Any suggestions how to get these people together? |
I typically have a zero session where we as a group work out what I cold bonds between characters. This go around until at least one person is connect to one other person. Characters can have multiple bonds as well (more than one person in the group). The group works out how that bond was established.
This has the benefit of working out how they players met and why they are together or at the very least some background information. Once bonds are established you get along with your game. Make it easier on yourself, don't spend the first month of two essentially doing boring stuff and get into the action =)
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WillTasker
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Joined: 25 Jan 2017
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 1:22 pm Post subject: Re: You Meet In A Tavern... |
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| shootingwomprats wrote: | | WillTasker wrote: | | Any suggestions how to get these people together? |
I typically have a zero session where we as a group work out what I cold bonds between characters. This go around until at least one person is connect to one other person. |
I had considered doing something like that tbh but in a more obtuse way. I think I'll go with this - it may help even if only SOME of the characters are connected... |
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MrNexx
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 2:28 pm Post subject: |
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Another option is to give them a starting point and let them determine how they are related... so, you might say "Why does your character work for the Rebel Alliance", and let them know that, yes, their character does, and they need to come up with a reason why.
"What is the nature of your debt to Grella the Hutt?"
"Why is your character in an Imperial Prison Camp?"
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garhkal
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 4:35 pm Post subject: |
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Or just toss them into the thick of things from the start, and let THEM work out how they want to be 'working together'.
"As you are tossed too and fro in the cargo hold of this slaver ship, you can hear explosions off in the distance.. It seens not only are the Inertial dampners not working but the slavers are in a massive panic.. Then you hear "Abandon ship" squell over the internal comms... What are you all doing.?""
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WillTasker
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 4:43 pm Post subject: |
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| MrNexx wrote: | Another option is to give them a starting point and let them determine how they are related... so, you might say "Why does your character work for the Rebel Alliance", and let them know that, yes, their character does, and they need to come up with a reason why.
"What is the nature of your debt to Grella the Hutt?"
"Why is your character in an Imperial Prison Camp?" |
I gotta write that down. You're giving me some good ideas to work with...
| garhkal wrote: | Or just toss them into the thick of things from the start, and let THEM work out how they want to be 'working together'.
"As you are tossed too and fro in the cargo hold of this slaver ship, you can hear explosions off in the distance.. It seens not only are the Inertial dampners not working but the slavers are in a massive panic.. Then you hear "Abandon ship" squell over the internal comms... What are you all doing.?"" |
I won't lie: I thought of two openings - a slaver ship / jail cell and the old "you meet in a tavern" thing. Both of them are such big tropes from playing so many pen and paper / JRPGs / RPGs / etc, that I wanted to avoid them and try to come up with something "organic".
So far, all "organic" has gotten me is a headache. |
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Random_Axe
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Location: Toronto
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2017 11:50 pm Post subject: |
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Or, rather than all the PCs meet up in a tavern, they all meet up at a disaster.
Pick a town, any town. Maybe even an orbital space station, some place where you might reasonably expect a group of disparate characters to congregate -- a market, a travel hub, a casino, etc. -- which is exactly where an Imperial Strike is set to take place. For whatever reason, the Imperials set down at exactly that place where all the PCs happen to be, and they start blasting everything around. The PCs may decide to deal with fighting fires, rescuing victims from collapsed buildings or collapsing walkways, directing women or children to safety, all while the stormtroopers are gadding about blitzing the place.
This gives the party a place where they will get to know each other in a pinch, get to know each other's styles, and will be put to the test early on. And it has the added bonus of having them all get to hate the Empire immediately and for a common reason. |
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Whill
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| Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2017 1:06 am Post subject: Re: You Meet In A Tavern... |
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| shootingwomprats wrote: | I typically have a zero session where we as a group work out what I cold bonds between characters. This go around until at least one person is connect to one other person. Characters can have multiple bonds as well (more than one person in the group). The group works out how that bond was established.
This has the benefit of working out how they players met and why they are together or at the very least some background information. Once bonds are established you get along with your game. |
I highly recommend this. I have a full session zero where we make all the PCs, establish connections, design the PCs' ship and create some key NPC contacts.
I don't think there's anything wrong with the tropes of meeting in a bar or jail cell, but how the characters meet up really depends on what type of campaign you have. If it is a rebel campaign, then the characters could meet where they were each told to meet a contact to take them to the Alliance. If it is smugglers, they could each be responding to word of mouth that a captain is looking for a new crew. And there's always the possibility that the PCs already all know each other and have worked together before the campaign begins.
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garhkal
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| Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2017 1:13 am Post subject: |
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Also if they are rebel like characters, you could just start it off with them all sitting around in a briefing room, being cobbled together from other units to form a new one.. THEN get into the briefing of their mission, tell them "get your gear, "wheels up in 5"..
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Sutehp
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| Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2017 1:39 am Post subject: |
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| garhkal wrote: | | Also if they are rebel like characters, you could just start it off with them all sitting around in a briefing room, being cobbled together from other units to form a new one.. THEN get into the briefing of their mission, tell them "get your gear, "wheels up in 5".. |
Not to mention that alot of SpecialOps units get cobbled together this way, just because the PCs are so unconventional that they individually can't (or won't) be shoehorned into a regular military unit but the Rebel Alliance can't afford to waste their talents. Didn't WEG create SpecialOps in GG9 for precisely this reason?
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Error
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| Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2017 10:00 am Post subject: |
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Oh man, I feel like you're treading water until you can get your friends to commit to character types. Until you know what they're playing, you can't possibly think up a scenario that would explain the presence of all of them at the same time, and any attempt to do so now (and any plans you draw up) may be completely shattered once you find out what everyone wants to play.
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Urban Spaceman
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| Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2017 3:05 pm Post subject: |
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| Error wrote: | | Oh man, I feel like you're treading water until you can get your friends to commit to character types. Until you know what they're playing, you can't possibly think up a scenario that would explain the presence of all of them at the same time, and any attempt to do so now (and any plans you draw up) may be completely shattered once you find out what everyone wants to play. |
Not always true. If you have a specific scenario in mind you can let that inform the players decisions on their characters.
For example, my players were all told that the game is set a year after the Battle of Yavin. They will be playing people not currently in contact with either the Rebels or the Empire (although they may have been in the past), and that they have recently found themselves working for an criminal organisation (reluctantly or otherwise).
This was because I wanted to start on a slave ship (which crashed) and they were each going to have been set-up/sold by their former employer.
This lead to a enough flexibilty in backgrounds and character types that people had freedom, but also allowed me to plan at least the first story in my head before that.
We also created characters together, so that people could fill different roles for themselves (pilot, mechanic, muscle etc.) before we started.
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garhkal
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| Posted: Thu Feb 02, 2017 5:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Urban Spaceman wrote: | | Error wrote: | | Oh man, I feel like you're treading water until you can get your friends to commit to character types. Until you know what they're playing, you can't possibly think up a scenario that would explain the presence of all of them at the same time, and any attempt to do so now (and any plans you draw up) may be completely shattered once you find out what everyone wants to play. |
Not always true. If you have a specific scenario in mind you can let that inform the players decisions on their characters.
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Exactly US.. You can say "Ok guys, we are going to be doing a Heavy Rebellion focused game, mostly dealing with the military. So make characters accordingly. As we are in the Time of the Rise of he Empire, there's no jedi, so don't anybody even ask.
I have the following templates from book XYZ for selection from"..
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Whill
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| Posted: Fri Feb 03, 2017 1:46 am Post subject: |
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| Sutehp wrote: | | I'm a bit bummed that we never got more fluff about SpecOps than the short blurb we got in GG 9: Fragments from the Rim, as compared to the entire book of RoE. |
| Sutehp wrote: | | Not to mention that alot of SpecialOps units get cobbled together this way, just because the PCs are so unconventional that they individually can't (or won't) be shoehorned into a regular military unit but the Rebel Alliance can't afford to waste their talents. Didn't WEG create SpecialOps in GG9 for precisely this reason? |
Yes. The RL answer is that SpecOps was created to formalize the basis of the original RPG. A hodge-podge of PC-caliber adventurers go on a wide variety of mission types for the Rebellion. I think the authors of GG 9 were just looking at the Rebel Alliance Sourcebook and realized that a lot of the game wasn't covered there. I really can't imagine too much more fluff that could be written about it. Just read the bulk of the WEG books and insert "Special Operations" where appropriate. It's vague and open-ended by design (both RL and in-universe design).
For my SWU, I've added a very few details. I made a slightly revised Alliance Military Command Structure (which consists of four components: High Command, Alliance Forces, Sector Forces and Special Operations). SpecOps is outside of the others but I have SpecOps Command reporting to Alliance High Command's Chief of Staff. I've devised a simplified rank system for SpecOps. I feel it's still all within the spirit of the original fluff but makes a little more operational sense to me.
| garhkal wrote: | | Urban Spaceman wrote: | | Error wrote: | | Oh man, I feel like you're treading water until you can get your friends to commit to character types. Until you know what they're playing, you can't possibly think up a scenario that would explain the presence of all of them at the same time, and any attempt to do so now (and any plans you draw up) may be completely shattered once you find out what everyone wants to play. |
Not always true. If you have a specific scenario in mind you can let that inform the players decisions on their characters. |
Exactly US.. You can say "Ok guys, we are going to be doing a Heavy Rebellion focused game, mostly dealing with the military. So make characters accordingly. As we are in the Time of the Rise of he Empire, there's no jedi, so don't anybody even ask.
I have the following templates from book XYZ for selection from".. |
What garhkal and Urban said. Error, I think you're putting the cart before the horse. I always have a specific campaign type in mind. The character creation and how the campaign starts is based on that.
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