One step in the right direction

I must admit, even though maybe I shouldn’t, that it went much better today. Complaining seems to work, even though I still suspect you have some way to go before really understanding how I mean for you to use the situations. But it was a good step in the right direction. You were awarded with one of the crucial points of Debian culture, The Thinning.

Now for some more constructive critique and examples on how you can and should improve yourselves!

We can begin with a quite lucid situation that happened twice and that I did even react on during the session. Daniel made a simple explanation on how he tried to sit still to get better and what he did while recuperating. But he soon resorted to “a few days pass” and then again a moment later he tried to “a few days pass”. That was not how I intended of you to use this free-roam timeline play.

It was more something like, say when Junior (Boy) said he gathered his troops to go hunting. Then he might have used what I intended by expressing; After a few days when Snorred feels better we head off into the forest to hunt for a whole day!
Well, then we might go into the details of the hunt but then again we might not. It’s not important and I might only add how it goes or not. Or think of something to counteract your actions with (not to withdraw it but maybe to add to it).

But that doesn’t mean that Ankan can laugh and erase his concussion, nononono, nothing even says that his concussion is gone just because he feels better. That might be one of my countermeasures when you go hunt. And then Snorred might ‘ignore’ or go hunting with the thought that he will be careful or something like that. Which might lead to Ankan rolling 20 and instead making it worse, but it might again not change anything. In any case, we still have a few days to return to afterwards so things can, and should happen in the mean time. If only to fill up space.

This brings me to the point of the loop. After a while you all started looping. Said the same things but only changed your wording of it slightly. Others tried to vary what they did but it was, essentially the same. You didn’t explore, you didn’t do anything different and you locked yourself in a quite confined area unnecessarily. Even if you’ve sprained your ankle, you are able to take walks, if it’s really bad, you might use crutches to move around, or maybe even stay in bed if you are that kind of person which Ragnar is not. But only confine yourself to the house? Not even a person with concussion would do that. That would be boring as hell.

They might take it easy but at least try to find some company or something to fill all the empty hours with. And move around in the fort and most likely try to be of any use for anyone. Or you might just relax; it’s the last summer so some slack is acceptable, but not too much, depending on your family that is. Even so, that wasn’t the biggest problem; it’s only that you could have broadened your area of play a little. The loop would have came anyway. What you need to think of is to vary the same situation or add small comments that is essentially different from what you’ve already included.

Take Ragnar again for example. He was “helping out” like never before in the home of the Styrks. His initial description was pretty good so he didn’t build on it much more. Now he only had to made it more vivid, and over a longer period to sustain Ragnar in his confined environment. He did take walks, and he did help Gedd quite a lot. If we only take these actions it could have been possible to in a moment of silence in the group fill it and help Ragnar with; One day when Ragnar is helping Gedd he suddenly asks, “How was your group when you were Boy Training?” ,he says curiously and looks up from his work at Gedd. Here I might counter it, or just reward it with a slice of new information or a new perspective from the culture or just your family’s background and how it came to be and all the depth I’ve given the characters around you.

But say that I’m a character that is lying much in bed and feeling sick (as you often might do with a concussion) there isn’t much to build upon or play with… or is it? In fact, there is a lot. You just need to be a little bit smother with it; While I’m laying in my bed looking restlessly at the ceiling, once again counting the stripes in the wood I think a little about my future and what I will do when I get up of this blasted bed.
I wouldn’t add a too long description here since that would risk to halt rather than to help the group in a situation like this. It’s mostly a “I’m alive!” shout that might give us a feeling for the character plus how he feels and who he is as a person… with personality and feelings you know(?).

Just adding small situations here and there where brief is the keyword for everything will give you an active part in the session as well as not just “passing the time” and waiting for something to happen. In this way I will also progress things more forward. We can skip days just as it is, but often there is at least something to say/do to make the period more fluent and vivid. This is your chance to experience and explore Debian culture so you understand it and thus just sitting waiting for something big to happen is not an option. Like I’ve said. I’ve prepared this and that to happen when you reach this and that point or doing this and that. But I also want personality and in-game bonds to strengthen between the characters and the players and the NPCs and the Fort in general. You need to know and feel it.

Well, express more feelings and thoughts of your characters to give you, me and the others a better picture of who your character are so we at least have some more depths in these characters. Because depth is what I reward, with depth and a good feel of the characters I want them to progress more. But also feelings, reality, and personality is something I want to see in your characters rather than these on/off behaviour with barely any character emotion in one moment and then too much emotion in another. That plus some more characterizing actions are what you need to have. The more real your characters are, the higher is the probability of you being able to do things that are above average or normal in Nianze.

Well, well… one step at a time.

Best regards,
Herid Fel