I’ve been in the pelt-mines working on Skinner this weekend. It’s running on some audacious ambitions, I think. I want it to be up to my personal standard of a story in that it needs to be adaptable. I’m a huge believer that a story’s plot should never be a script, and therefore the scenes you lay out are always meant to be a loose suggestion of potential events. At their most strict, they become like a flowchart, but even then you have to account for unanticipated branches. Not everything can be run through with “yes/no” or “A/B” decision points.
But there still needs to be a logical series of connections. So one of the things I use, that I’m working into the SAS structure, is essentially a reminder chart of the motives and goals of the various NPCs that are driving the story. I’d place it here, but oh man, the spoilers. Instead, consider how it would look for Romeo & Juliet, assuming that Romeo and Mercutio are player characters. (Admittedly this is also spoilery, but I think you’ve had enough time to catch this particular plot.)
Juliet: Wants to be with Romeo. Will abandon her family if need be, but has no real plans. Suggestible; will readily attach to a decent plan suggested by someone she trusts.
Tybalt: Hates the Montagues and wants to hurt them, bad. Hates Romeo in particular, but his uncle has forbidden him to kill the bastard. Wouldn’t pass up the opportunity to do so if it arose, or to injure someone close to Romeo.
Paris: Wants to marry Juliet. Won’t take violent action to get his way; instead is continuing to work on the senior Capulet. Planning to woo Juliet with the reasonable motivation of how advantageous their match would be.
Friar Laurence: Wants the feuding between the Montagues and Capulets to stop. Plans to marry Romeo & Juliet to force the two to make peace.
And so on. The basic idea is that whenever the story starts to veer away from a clean linkage between one scene and the one that theoretically follows it, the motives and goals of the Storyteller characters is the primary resource for figuring out what comes next. It makes a story flow more naturally than trying to stick to a planned order of events. If Romeo’s player suddenly decides that he’s more interested in the unattainable Rosaline than Juliet, then you don’t force the balcony scene to take place: instead, you might decide that Friar Laurence will start taking a more active hand in events, and of course Tybalt will be just as happy to kill Romeo over Rosaline if he can pull it off.
Another trick that I tend to use in anticipation of players being players is prepping lightly for things that are not strictly necessary. For example, I think it’s always useful to have abbreviated stat blocks at hand for possible antagonists. There’s nothing shameful in not statting out every last character that may appear in the course of a game. Let’s be honest, fully statting out a Storyteller character by the book takes time. If using an abbreviated stat block allows you to advance the story more quickly than taking time to put together a more detailed one, everyone will probably be happier.
Now, naturally an SAS is meant to spend that time for you: but I have a certain tendency to maybe put more characters in than is efficient. Werewolves, damn their furry hides, have this tendency to run in packs, so if there’s more than one pack you might encounter in a story, those stat blocks can eat up word count and space fast.
So frequently what I do is stat out the more relevant characters, and then use abbreviated stat blocks for the rest. Here’s an example of such a stat block, the sort I’m prone to set up for myself. As you can see, it doesn’t track Abilities meticulously, but rather skips ahead and lists the dice pools relevant to the character.
Veteran Werewolf
This abbreviated stat block can be used to flesh out the [SPOILERS REDACTED], or for the [THIS BLOG SHOULD BE PLAYER-SAFE]. Some suggested Gifts are offered; feel free to swap these around.
Attributes: Strength 3 (5/7/6/4), Dexterity 3 (3/4/5/5), Stamina 3 (5/6/6/5), Charisma 2, Manipulation 3 (2/0/0/0), Appearance 2 (1/0/2/2), Perception 3, Intelligence 2, Wits 3
Initiative: 6 dice
Brawl: 7 dice (8 in Crinos, 9 in Hispo/Lupus)
Dodge: 6 dice (7 in Crinos, 8 in Hispo/Lupus)
Gifts: (1) City Running or Primal Anger, Resist Pain or Spur Claws, Mindspeak, Razor Claws, Shroud; (2) Staredown or Curse of Hatred, Howls in the Night or Spirit of the Fray, Wyrm Hide or Horns of the Impaler; (3) Disquiet or Eyes of the Cat, Foaming Fury or Laugh of the Hyena
Rank: 3
Rage 6, Gnosis 5, Willpower 6
Weapons/Attacks
Type Difficulty Dice Pool Damage Pool
Bite 5 9 (Hispo) 7 (Hispo)
Claw 6 8 (Crinos) 8 (Crinos)
Fetish Knife 4 8 (Crinos) 8 (Crinos)
So what do you think, Storytellers: are these inclusions worth it to you? Obviously, they don’t preclude more details: the main characters will still receive detailed character sheets, and their motives will be spelled out in greater detail than they are in the summary cheat-sheet. Is this particular bit of additional organization something you’d be likely to use?
Comments
13 responses to “Skin and Bones”
I like it, I really do.
What I tend to do is something similar to that for even the main characters. Also sometimes looking for the stats for so-and-so NPC really eats up time that could be better spent moving the story along. This should help with that as far as SAS are concerned. Maybe we don’t need to know exactly how many dice in empathy Bob-at-the-Gas-Station counter has. Just make a reasonable guess based on his summary and roll the dice already.
That and some characters are just not important enough for full stat lists. I imagine in werewolf your gonna be talking and interacting with Mr(s). Alpha more then anyone else, so really he’s probably the only one who needs a full list of stats (If even Mr(s). Alpha does, but that’s a whole other thing) .
I use similar stat blocks but for what it’s worth I tend trim it a little more. For example the “weapons/attacks” isn’t really necessary unless there are special rules (or weapons) that would differ from the normal rules. In the example listed, well that’s nothing that isn’t already printed inside a Storyteller screen and that’s assuming that the storyteller doesn’t just know that information.
That said I love this motive chart you’re talking about. Not only will it be a helpful reminder for more experienced players I can see it being invaluable for new tellers.
The stat block is good but what’s missing are “role-play hints, general appearance and breed”
I’ve always considered those to be the most important parts of any character, You only ever really need the mechanical stats if this character is likely to be involved in combat situations. Half the time when I think that an NPC “suddenly” needs a specific skill that isn’t listed I just roll a dice to see if he has the needed skill and if yes, then how good he is with it.
Forgot to add:
What the player characters don’t know, they players shouldn’t either I.E they’ve no reason to know what skills or attributes the particular alpha/elder actually has. Its the ST’s job to make sure the stats and other mechanical sides of an npc are legal and proper.
I also write down any stat I make on the fly to my npc’s to preserve consistency.
Something that I didn’t do a good job of getting across is that you could use this stat block for multiple characters (for example, an entire pack with one stat block), just adding variants. It might be down to Gift selection, but also just notes like giving one an extra die of Brawl, etc.
So, for instance, if using one stat block to represent an entire pack or some walk-on personalities, there would be a separate section that has a few entries something like this:
Eurghak’ll: Lupus Ahroun. Has a nasty cough and spits up blood, but is still quite hale and strong. Venerates and emulates the Beast-of-War; -1 difficulty to frenzy, but +1 to Strength when frenzying.
Ah okay, thanks for the clarification.
The current stat block is sufficient when its intended to be “recycled” when ever needed.
I originally thought that this was an example of an unique npc instead of just some Joe-random mook/other support guy.
Attributes: 3/3/3,2/3/2,3/2/3.
Initiative: 6 dice
Brawl: 4
Dodge: 3
Gifts: (1) City Running or Primal Anger, Resist Pain or Spur Claws, Mindspeak, Razor Claws, Shroud; (2) Staredown or Curse of Hatred, Howls in the Night or Spirit of the Fray, Wyrm Hide or Horns of the Impaler; (3) Disquiet or Eyes of the Cat, Foaming Fury or Laugh of the Hyena
Rank: 3
Rage 6, Gnosis 5, Willpower 6
Weapons/Attacks
Type Difficulty Dice Pool Damage Pool
Fetish Knife 4 8 (Crinos) 8 (Crinos)
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I think that with that we have enough information. Not sure if help with the word count or space, but I believe we have enough info for that, as storytellers are usual more experienced.
Yes. I tended to use generic/simplified stat blocks for all but the most important NPCs in my games. I think something like this in the SAS structure would be very beneficial for storytellers. I’m also going to agree with Blue Fox and say that some “roleplay hints” are sometimes even more useful than stat blocks, even in a Werewolf game.
I was just recently reading over my old first edition Forgotten Realms grey box material and I really loved how they summarized the major npcs with roleplay/background bullet points instead of full write ups. So elegant in its simplicity. You get a great guideline for roleplaying and tons of inspiration for story ideas. Basically, I’m saying less is more. Provide the most necessary mechanical information paired with focused inspiration and you have storyteller gold.
I think it may also come down to the players and the game style too.
I know that there are folks in my gaming circles who don’t care what the ST is rolling because it’s about the story and going with the flow–they trust the ST to make the game fun in a reactionary way. If they intent is to have an NPC be a massive challenge, or fall at an appropriate time, or not be an issue for the intent of the story, then the ST can make those calls and doesn’t have to have hard facts and stats, other than something to base the original rulings from.
Then I also have friends who believe that the stats and mechanics give a grounded foundation to the world that they can stand sturdy on–the world does not move beneath them unless it’s written to do so. They explore the story, but they rely on the STs using the same firm mechanics that they do. If an enemy falls too quickly for the story, that’s just too bad because they’ve out-witted the ST/Game and feel that is their accomplishment too, or if they are beating their heads against a brick wall to get in, they know there’s a particular thing they must do and work to find a way around the problem… the way the game designed it for them.
And I guess that’s the two different styles of interactivity that Ethan is trying to figure out… how do you create an SAS that will be fun for both the Story-players and the Game-players, and everyone in between? It’s not really a task I envy him for. ^.^
Like I said, it’s not particularly easy, but in the end I’m going to write what I’m comfortable with. That’s why I’m going to use a chunk of the available word count to bolster ad-libbing techniques instead of providing fewer but denser stat blocks; I figure ad-libbing covers more possible answers, whereas if you only provide fully fleshed out responses to a few likely outcomes, you kind of increase the odds that players will utterly break your scenario just because you’re covering fewer things.
Its pretty good for a generic basis. However, for me anyway, i just list ability scores i’ll add ’em together if needed. Also, the gifts should be more specific. I usually use a type of Garou template like: city wolves have these gifts, bayou wolves have these gifts,etc. Otherwise strong work yo.
I love these. I have similar templates lying around for my Vampire game, and this Werewolf one seems excellent. I’m excited for this SAS!
So how about a release date?
This wait is killing me!