RPGaDay2024 Day 14 - Compelling Characters
Characters are the backbone of every campaign, and one of the biggest challenges is now to make those characters interesting, unique, and memorable. Today, I'm going to go through the most memorable table of PCs, most memorable NPC, and then what I do to make PCs more interesting.
Most Memorable Table
At GenCon this year, my first event was Evil Hat's Monster of the Week, which I was especially excited to play, because I kickstarted it, but hadn't had a chance to even read the rulebook yet. What I found was a game that was easy to play, but also made it easy to get into character. Through clearly defined archetypes, simple backgrounds and the rage/regret mechanic.
What this resulted in was lots of solo spotlighting and inter-party drama--all in good fun and with the best of intentions. People had to be "mad" at each other, resentful of specific events, actions or decisions, and despite being an 8am event, everybody played it to the hilt.
I've run and played a lot of games at GenCon, with a lot of good tables, but this one stands out as "best" because people really spent the time in character. Nobody ever said "My character does X, or my character says Y". It was all first person, and the dialogs were in character throughout--and everybody really enjoyed the (dysfunctional) chemistry between the players.
For "grab a sheet off the table", this was definitely most memorable.
Most Memorable NPC
This would have to be Val, a priest Shotan of Darkness, in a place where "House of Night" temples aren't allowed and their clerics are only tolerated. Val was incredibly charismatic, and kept showing up on the PCs doorstep, with plans and ideas which they could help with.
The reaction to his arrival was always a small groan that came with a "We know we're going to be screwed by this, but it's too interesting not to listen." and virtually every time, they went along with the plan, and every time, things went exactly as Val had said, but there was always a downside as well.
Ultimately, Val was (allegedly--never proven) responsible for assassinating the king, kidnaping the heirs, getting a puppet monarch put on the throne as regent, and ultimately having the "House of Night" recognized within the country, which allowed temples and even cathedrals to be built in all the major cities.
The characters absolutely knew that he was probably responsible. They knew that they had been sent on a mission that truly got them what they'd been after, but at a cost of all these events happening while they were gone. And yet, they had a "but he's so nice" attitude about going after justice.
Most Memorable Characters
I'm not going to say that my current 3.x campaign has the most memorable characters of any of my three multi-year campaigns, or of the ones my co-GM ran or is running. However, I think that many of the characters are more real to the players than in other games I've run.
This is because I am fully running it as a sandbox game. I talk about this technique elsewhere, but the short version is that every character has a defined relationship to at least one other character, and each character has at least one defined goal that they are pursuing. And every session is connected to what the players want to do, to advance their own stories.
What this means is that while there are surprises, dungeons, BBEGs, etc. none of it comes entirely from me. I put possible plot hooks and NPCs and events in their path, and they choose what they want to do about it, based on their own character's take. And there are no wrong answers, only consequences.
An example of this is a character who was trying to find out something sensitive about an NPCs business. They went to the trade bureaucrat, and asked for help. The "help" had a cost of maybe 50g for "research assistance." The party member was incredibly offended at someone demanding a bribe to do their job, and refused to pay it.
- It fit their character to refuse to pay it. Even with the favor-for-favor atmosphere that I call "Jadiran Lawful" those prices were extreme.
- They had to figure out a different way to get the information, which took more time and effort but gave them what they were after, with a slightly different theme.
- A different party member, who had no such qualms, paid the fee just before the trade bureaucrat and his staff "went to lunch" leaving the PC in the room by himself.
- Together, they got a really good view of what they were after, and each got to do so in line with what they felt their character should be doing in that situation.
- It also could have happened that refusing the bribe could have led to not getting the information at all, and having to solve their problems a completely different way--again, in line with the characters.
About the Art
The header art for today's article is a picture of Marvel's Loki, and I chose this because it fit my musings about Val.
In Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology there is a quote that I find particularly memorable, and which really has the same vibe. To paraphrase it "Whenever Thor had a problem, his first instinct was to blame Loki, because it was usually his fault. If it wasn't Loki's fault, Thor's next instinct was to ask Loki for help because Loki is so much smarter than Thor."
This image invokes the groan that players gave when Val showed up. Loki is exuding "I'm here, and have I got a deal for you." Whether it's an ancient artifact that will provide 1/3 of it's power to your group and 2/3 to his, or a used car that you'll somehow pay far more than it's worth...there are going to be tradeoffs and you're somehow going to come out on the wrong side of it. You know it, and it's easier just to accept it--and actually kind of worth the journey, to see how it plays out."
I'll second Val as an NPC, even though I didn't play that campaign. As a plot advisor, it was fun just thinking of things that *he* would think of. Of my recent characters, I really enjoyed Narsane, who in the final act of the final story arc ended up helping the evil sentient weapon and the being from the beyond that it summoned escape from the party's ill-conceived attempt to destroy it (without actually attacking his comrades -- he would never do that). But the knife had saved him and he felt he owed it a debt. The rest of the world? Not his problem.
ReplyDeleteIn the end, I think what makes a character great is having strengths and flaws and quirks that I enjoy and that make enough sense to other people that they can riff off them too.