Strongly disagree. Nothing wrong with doing that, but nothing wrong with having them meet in session 1 too, as long as you have built characters who will be willing to go along with the GM’s hooks.
And even that part is flexible, depending on the nature of the hook. If the hook is “you see an ad look for rat exterminators”, then you better have a character who wants to be an adventurer and will cooperate with other would-be adventurers. If the hook is “you’re prisoners being ordered to go explore this dungeon by order of the vizier”, there’s room for slightly less cooperative PCs, as long as you PC is cooperative enough to go along with that order, even if (at first) reluctantly.
Yeah, I’m gonna back you up on that one. Sometimes assembling the group in session 0 is what’s right for the story, and sometimes it really, really isn’t. Think about how many movies literally have “Assembling the team” as almost their entire plot. The Avengers hangs two hours of non-stop action on “We need to put a party together.” Every heist movie is basically required to have an “I’m putting a team together…” sequence.
Session 0 is where you lay out the expectations of the game, and your players think about either how their characters have already interacted, or how they will interact when they eventually meet. You give people an idea of what they’re getting into, you pitch the tone and the style of the game, and you help people shape characters around that.
As an example a friend of mine always pitches his games by describing who they would be directed by. I remember vividly his “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Halflings” game, a Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay If It Was Directed By Guy Ritchie experience. Just setting that sense of tone up front meant that we all knew to make characters who would fit the vibe. I played “Blackhand Seth, The Scummiest Elf You’ve Ever Met,” one part Brad Pitt Pikey, one part Jack Sparrow, and I had a blast.
In my most recent campaign I’m running a Shadowrun game where the group would be assembled in session 1 by a down on his luck fixer. My pitch to the players was simple; make fuck-ups. I wanted characters who were at the end of their rope, lacking in options, either so green no one would trust them or so tainted by past failures that no one wanted them. The kind of people who would take a job from a fixer who had burned every other bridge. They rose to the assignment beautifully, and by four sessions in the group has already formed some absolutely fascinating relationship dynamics. A lot of that has been shaped by their first experiences together, figuring out how to work as a team, sometimes distrusting each other, and slowly discovering reasons to care about each other.
Sometimes assembling the group in session 0 is what’s right for the story, and sometimes it really, really isn’t. Think about how many movies literally have “Assembling the team” as almost their entire plot. The Avengers hangs two hours of non-stop action on “We need to put a party together.”
Oh, that reminds me of a 4th way campaigns can start (in addition to the 3 I said in a different reply) that I’ve been in before and quite enjoyed—though wouldn’t want to be overused. The MCU method. Where each player individually gets a 1 session (maybe 2 at most) solo session introducing them and getting them to the right place to start the campaign.
Doesn’t have to be a solo session. If you have the right group for it (big IF there) you can jump back and forth between the individual characters, essentially running four solo sessions in parallel. This relies heavily on your players being the kind of people who are invested in the action even when their character isn’t present, but it can be done.
That said, I think for the most part the “Solo movie” should really be a character’s backstory. This is why I don’t like D&D, or at least the D&D presumption of starting at level 1. It leaves no room for characters to have an interesting history if they’re basically at the level where the average house-cat is a threat. If I run D&D, I start people off at somewhere around level 5 - 10. Give them enough ability that they can actually have done some interesting things already. Get the solo movie out of the way before the game even starts.
Meeting people with the inclination and schedule that I enjoy the company of to make a party with is the worst part of d&d. Please don’t make me role play it, too.
It might be your least favorite part of DnD, but there are plenty of people (myself included) who enjoy meeting a new group of characters and finding out about their particular ticks and specialties.
The friction of people rubbing off of each other for the first time creates so many wonderful opportunities for storytelling, and forming bonds naturally through play, instead of prescribing them in a clinical session 0 context, tends to make the players much more invested in those bonds, in my experience.
I learn about the characters, myself included, throughout the campaign through their actions. Otherwise session one is like that time I asked a coworker about one of his tattoos and had to hear about his sister’s murder. That’s more of a session two+ thing to me.
For me, the tired trope of “strangers meet in a tavern” approach is the inevitable round of introductions that feels like that time at the start of school when everyone had to stand up to say their name and one interesting fact about them. It’s just awkward and everyone wants it to be over quickly.
Much better to just create characters together in session 0. Everyone already knows each other, their motivations, prior relationships established, etc… and just begin the campaign as if everyone is already on mission.
There are options besides “strangers meet in a tavern and awkwardly introduce themselves” and pre-made perfectly-tailored party. I’m a fan of starting in media res, with the characters all in a location for their own reasons, when shit happens that forces them to act as a group. I’ve just recently started the video game Baldur’s Gate 3, and it’s not a bad example of what I mean.
“Strangers meet in a tavern and awkwardly introduce themselves” is just an example of “random group forced to team up”. Whether they start in a tavern and are all hired by the same benefactor or were all captives being held on an Ithillid nautilus that crashed landed and discovered they all had brain worms, it’s the same thing, effectively.
I’ve tried the whole “use McGuffin to literally force the party to work together” and still get roadblocked by that one inevitable player who insists on being the “edgy loner who has to be dragged into everything”. Yes, even with the threat of death, they usually just waste time trying to argue how “that’s what [their] character would do! [I’m] just punishing [them] for playing [their] character! Reee!”
Still, on another point, players will still have to do the whole rigamarole of character introductions that always feels like the first day at school unless the characters were made together during session 0 anyway. I just nip all of that in the bud by just eliminating that from my table through the previously stated method: starting in media res with a party that has been pre-established, together with each other to ensure party cohesion, during session 0.
BG3 works because the cast of characters are all pre-written, specifically designed to work with that story, being that it is a video game. Real players, unfortunately unless you find a unicorn, do not roleplay on the level of professionally hand-crafted characters.
I strongly disagree. The first two are substantively the same, I agree. But the third is a wholly separate category. I see 3 basic categories we’re talking about here: you choose to work together at the start; you know each other already; you’re forced into working together by circumstances. The key difference between the 1st and the 3rd is that choice. “We have the same patron” is still a choice to work for that patron, and gives room for someone to say “nah, I’m not working with these people”. When the circumstances themselves directly force you to work together, there’s no ability to turn around and say “I’m going my own way”. Being kidnapped and having brain slugs put in your head is one way. Everyone arriving in the same town at the time the town is unexpectedly invaded is another one I’ve been in as a player.
The other key thing about in media res is that you don’t have that “inevitable round of introductions that feels like that time at the start of school when everyone had to stand up to say their name and one interesting fact about them”. You’re thrown into doing things before there’s any chance for that. You get to know each other not beforehand, as in case 2, but as the adventure is going.
To be clear, I’m pointing to BG3 as an example that I’ve only very recently (the last two–four weeks) started, and which serves as a good well-known example of something that demonstrates a good example of something I already know works well. It’s not a game that made me realise I completely new way of doing things. In media res will require players be cooperative enough to care to act, but it doesn’t require they trust each other or know each other immediately. It definitely doesn’t require pre-written specifically-designed characters.
You’re missing the entire point by what I mean by “effectively the same” and the point of my argument.
There are only ever two choices: your characters know each other beforehand, or the don’t. Being forced to work together or working together by choice is irrelevant to what I’m talking about.
if the party is not planned together to be a cohesive group that are all guaranteed to have a motivation to play the written campaign AND have at least a reason to trust the party members, regardless of if they have personal history or not, is my method for avoiding the inevitable player who wants to bitch about not belong allowed to play their “edgy loner”.
As I said before, even with literally using the threat of death forcing the character to work with the party, there is ALWAYS that one dipshit who wants to bitch and moan about how I’m “railroading them/preventing them from roleplaying their character” by doing so. Or, they waste time trying to argue for some loophole to go off and do their own thing, separate from the party yet somehow still “technically” doing the job. I am speaking from personal experience of over 10 years as a DM.
The other key thing about in media res is that you don’t have that “inevitable round of introductions that feels like that time at the start of school when everyone had to stand up to say their name and one interesting fact about them”. You’re thrown into doing things before there’s any chance for that. You get to know each other not beforehand, as in case 2, but as the adventure is going.
Yes, the characters are. The players, on the other hand, are all just sitting around a table rolling dice with no sense of urgency. They roll their dice, the encounter is over, and then the customary introductions start cause everyone is wondering what the other players have created for their character. Like, either you have been incredibly lucky with groups or have let Critical Roll give you rosey glasses about the role-play capabilities of the average player if you think doing things in media res makes a difference here.
I avoid all of this by just doing it in Session 0 with the afformentioned rules about character creation. It works. Ever since, I’ve never had to deal with it or any of the annoyances I have talked about.
Also, no, BG3 is not a good example. It is a video game that doesn’t have to deal with fumbling IRL people who all have differing expectations and preferences. See, the biggest thing about the BG3 cast, is that the characters were all built in such a way so that they work together. Which is exactly what I have done with my method of character creation.
In media res will require players be cooperative enough to care to act, but it doesn’t require they trust each other or know each other immediately. It definitely doesn’t require pre-written specifically-designed characters.
See, the problem I have been talking about is that my method guarantees that players are cooperative enough to care to act that’s the entire point of why I do it how I do it. Again, I am speaking from direct personal experience across 10+ years as a DM. Problem players will find a way to be a problem. So I nip it in the bud with a method that doesn’t have to rely on the good-faith of the player, cause I’ve been burned by it more times than I can count.
Strongly disagree. Nothing wrong with doing that, but nothing wrong with having them meet in session 1 too, as long as you have built characters who will be willing to go along with the GM’s hooks.
And even that part is flexible, depending on the nature of the hook. If the hook is “you see an ad look for rat exterminators”, then you better have a character who wants to be an adventurer and will cooperate with other would-be adventurers. If the hook is “you’re prisoners being ordered to go explore this dungeon by order of the vizier”, there’s room for slightly less cooperative PCs, as long as you PC is cooperative enough to go along with that order, even if (at first) reluctantly.
Yeah, I’m gonna back you up on that one. Sometimes assembling the group in session 0 is what’s right for the story, and sometimes it really, really isn’t. Think about how many movies literally have “Assembling the team” as almost their entire plot. The Avengers hangs two hours of non-stop action on “We need to put a party together.” Every heist movie is basically required to have an “I’m putting a team together…” sequence.
Session 0 is where you lay out the expectations of the game, and your players think about either how their characters have already interacted, or how they will interact when they eventually meet. You give people an idea of what they’re getting into, you pitch the tone and the style of the game, and you help people shape characters around that.
As an example a friend of mine always pitches his games by describing who they would be directed by. I remember vividly his “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Halflings” game, a Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay If It Was Directed By Guy Ritchie experience. Just setting that sense of tone up front meant that we all knew to make characters who would fit the vibe. I played “Blackhand Seth, The Scummiest Elf You’ve Ever Met,” one part Brad Pitt Pikey, one part Jack Sparrow, and I had a blast.
In my most recent campaign I’m running a Shadowrun game where the group would be assembled in session 1 by a down on his luck fixer. My pitch to the players was simple; make fuck-ups. I wanted characters who were at the end of their rope, lacking in options, either so green no one would trust them or so tainted by past failures that no one wanted them. The kind of people who would take a job from a fixer who had burned every other bridge. They rose to the assignment beautifully, and by four sessions in the group has already formed some absolutely fascinating relationship dynamics. A lot of that has been shaped by their first experiences together, figuring out how to work as a team, sometimes distrusting each other, and slowly discovering reasons to care about each other.
Oh, that reminds me of a 4th way campaigns can start (in addition to the 3 I said in a different reply) that I’ve been in before and quite enjoyed—though wouldn’t want to be overused. The MCU method. Where each player individually gets a 1 session (maybe 2 at most) solo session introducing them and getting them to the right place to start the campaign.
Doesn’t have to be a solo session. If you have the right group for it (big IF there) you can jump back and forth between the individual characters, essentially running four solo sessions in parallel. This relies heavily on your players being the kind of people who are invested in the action even when their character isn’t present, but it can be done.
That said, I think for the most part the “Solo movie” should really be a character’s backstory. This is why I don’t like D&D, or at least the D&D presumption of starting at level 1. It leaves no room for characters to have an interesting history if they’re basically at the level where the average house-cat is a threat. If I run D&D, I start people off at somewhere around level 5 - 10. Give them enough ability that they can actually have done some interesting things already. Get the solo movie out of the way before the game even starts.
Meeting people with the inclination and schedule that I enjoy the company of to make a party with is the worst part of d&d. Please don’t make me role play it, too.
It might be your least favorite part of DnD, but there are plenty of people (myself included) who enjoy meeting a new group of characters and finding out about their particular ticks and specialties.
The friction of people rubbing off of each other for the first time creates so many wonderful opportunities for storytelling, and forming bonds naturally through play, instead of prescribing them in a clinical session 0 context, tends to make the players much more invested in those bonds, in my experience.
I learn about the characters, myself included, throughout the campaign through their actions. Otherwise session one is like that time I asked a coworker about one of his tattoos and had to hear about his sister’s murder. That’s more of a session two+ thing to me.
For me, the tired trope of “strangers meet in a tavern” approach is the inevitable round of introductions that feels like that time at the start of school when everyone had to stand up to say their name and one interesting fact about them. It’s just awkward and everyone wants it to be over quickly.
Much better to just create characters together in session 0. Everyone already knows each other, their motivations, prior relationships established, etc… and just begin the campaign as if everyone is already on mission.
There are options besides “strangers meet in a tavern and awkwardly introduce themselves” and pre-made perfectly-tailored party. I’m a fan of starting in media res, with the characters all in a location for their own reasons, when shit happens that forces them to act as a group. I’ve just recently started the video game Baldur’s Gate 3, and it’s not a bad example of what I mean.
“Strangers meet in a tavern and awkwardly introduce themselves” is just an example of “random group forced to team up”. Whether they start in a tavern and are all hired by the same benefactor or were all captives being held on an Ithillid nautilus that crashed landed and discovered they all had brain worms, it’s the same thing, effectively.
I’ve tried the whole “use McGuffin to literally force the party to work together” and still get roadblocked by that one inevitable player who insists on being the “edgy loner who has to be dragged into everything”. Yes, even with the threat of death, they usually just waste time trying to argue how “that’s what [their] character would do! [I’m] just punishing [them] for playing [their] character! Reee!”
Still, on another point, players will still have to do the whole rigamarole of character introductions that always feels like the first day at school unless the characters were made together during session 0 anyway. I just nip all of that in the bud by just eliminating that from my table through the previously stated method: starting in media res with a party that has been pre-established, together with each other to ensure party cohesion, during session 0.
BG3 works because the cast of characters are all pre-written, specifically designed to work with that story, being that it is a video game. Real players, unfortunately unless you find a unicorn, do not roleplay on the level of professionally hand-crafted characters.
I strongly disagree. The first two are substantively the same, I agree. But the third is a wholly separate category. I see 3 basic categories we’re talking about here: you choose to work together at the start; you know each other already; you’re forced into working together by circumstances. The key difference between the 1st and the 3rd is that choice. “We have the same patron” is still a choice to work for that patron, and gives room for someone to say “nah, I’m not working with these people”. When the circumstances themselves directly force you to work together, there’s no ability to turn around and say “I’m going my own way”. Being kidnapped and having brain slugs put in your head is one way. Everyone arriving in the same town at the time the town is unexpectedly invaded is another one I’ve been in as a player.
The other key thing about in media res is that you don’t have that “inevitable round of introductions that feels like that time at the start of school when everyone had to stand up to say their name and one interesting fact about them”. You’re thrown into doing things before there’s any chance for that. You get to know each other not beforehand, as in case 2, but as the adventure is going.
To be clear, I’m pointing to BG3 as an example that I’ve only very recently (the last two–four weeks) started, and which serves as a good well-known example of something that demonstrates a good example of something I already know works well. It’s not a game that made me realise I completely new way of doing things. In media res will require players be cooperative enough to care to act, but it doesn’t require they trust each other or know each other immediately. It definitely doesn’t require pre-written specifically-designed characters.
You’re missing the entire point by what I mean by “effectively the same” and the point of my argument.
There are only ever two choices: your characters know each other beforehand, or the don’t. Being forced to work together or working together by choice is irrelevant to what I’m talking about.
if the party is not planned together to be a cohesive group that are all guaranteed to have a motivation to play the written campaign AND have at least a reason to trust the party members, regardless of if they have personal history or not, is my method for avoiding the inevitable player who wants to bitch about not belong allowed to play their “edgy loner”.
As I said before, even with literally using the threat of death forcing the character to work with the party, there is ALWAYS that one dipshit who wants to bitch and moan about how I’m “railroading them/preventing them from roleplaying their character” by doing so. Or, they waste time trying to argue for some loophole to go off and do their own thing, separate from the party yet somehow still “technically” doing the job. I am speaking from personal experience of over 10 years as a DM.
Yes, the characters are. The players, on the other hand, are all just sitting around a table rolling dice with no sense of urgency. They roll their dice, the encounter is over, and then the customary introductions start cause everyone is wondering what the other players have created for their character. Like, either you have been incredibly lucky with groups or have let Critical Roll give you rosey glasses about the role-play capabilities of the average player if you think doing things in media res makes a difference here.
I avoid all of this by just doing it in Session 0 with the afformentioned rules about character creation. It works. Ever since, I’ve never had to deal with it or any of the annoyances I have talked about.
Also, no, BG3 is not a good example. It is a video game that doesn’t have to deal with fumbling IRL people who all have differing expectations and preferences. See, the biggest thing about the BG3 cast, is that the characters were all built in such a way so that they work together. Which is exactly what I have done with my method of character creation.
See, the problem I have been talking about is that my method guarantees that players are cooperative enough to care to act that’s the entire point of why I do it how I do it. Again, I am speaking from direct personal experience across 10+ years as a DM. Problem players will find a way to be a problem. So I nip it in the bud with a method that doesn’t have to rely on the good-faith of the player, cause I’ve been burned by it more times than I can count.