User blog:Eli Cameron/The Depth of Realism

The Depth of Realism

How far do I predict, create and fill the Players world with Narracters?

Becasue of the very nature of the social and political influences of this game style, I envision, plan, dread and am amassing a large 'cast of characters' that will be available to the players early on.

It is my intent, that each NC be given Goals, Motivations, Virtues and Vices as defined in the Character Creation, so that each and every person in the game world can be introduced and provide an element to the players story.

With a simple list of these qualities and a general physical narrative (and hopefully if I get enough artist involvement, a character sketch as well) will provide players with the feel of a dynamic, swirling and never ending menagerie to fill their world with.

The difficulty of something on such a large scale will be many, specifically,

a) keeping them all organized,

b) tracking their machinations and loyalties, and lastly,

c) who they have been in contact with to pursue their agendas, and what is it that they want and get in return.

I am trying to avoid the easy way out which is to identify only the 'power players' as this some what limits the players perspective of what and who they can contact. And, lastly, discounts the role that every person plays in the shaping of their lives. To this end, I will need a quick list of qualities, names, occupations, and descriptions to be ready to give life to any Narracter that interacts with the Players, so they are unsure if I was able to create all these amazing and (hopefully) unique people into their world, as I had planned on it all along, or was it merely a coincidence? That will be my challenge! How far do I go? When is enough, enough? And, how far depth of field do I dare go?

A balance between game play, and player response will become the telling signs. My concern however, is that newer players to this style of game play may not take full advantage of the resources that I am exposing to them. Do I 'reinforce' a specific NC's role or capabilities, so they learn of possible avenues to choose from, but at the same time, not have the players feel like the options I am revealing are limiting or steering them into a path not of their choosing?

Time will tell, as they say, 'like any good shit, it will all come out in the end...'

Nov 9th, 2016

Eli Cameron.