Guide to Player Plotting

[Anonymous]

Thanks, psionikangel, for putting this together. Note that this guide is simply advice on how to engage of one form of plotting, and not an official statement from the DM team on the "right" way to play here. It's a solid way to create a good story, and to entertain yourself and others.

@psionikangel:

Player plots
Introduction

First and foremost, I’d like to start this little guide by one sentence, that I think will give each and everyone of you, my dear readers, a fair idea of what this guide is all about.
“In the City of Arabel, every single player is a DM”
DM note: this means that ever single player is a DM in the sense that they are expected to create a story and enrich the experience of CoA for themselves and others.
I strongly believe that on this server, everyone gets the chance to tell its own story, and bring enjoyment to others. We all have different ways of doing so, but in the end, we are all DMs, who contributes to bring City of Arabel to life.

This guide is about player plots, and furthering a character’s goals, something many players have admitted to have problems with in the past. Although, every time this topic is brought up in the forums, I didn’t see once an answer that satisfied me. Some short advices, yes, they were present. A guide on how to effectively go on with your plots and goals while keeping in mind the mentality and way of working of this server, no, that wasn’t there. So, that is what I am going to try to do, within the best of my ability and understanding of this server inner mechanics.

Before I begin onto the core of this guide, a short word of encouragement to those who do not feel they are particularly good at roleplaying and storytelling, or who sometimes get the feeling they are not in their place on this server: “It took me a whole bunch of time to realize what the essence of this server really was and to become good at story telling”. I do not believe that becoming good at roleplaying is easy, it is hard work and will take many hours of sitting in front of your computer, typing what your character would say to people around him, and I do hope for you that there will be someone who is more at ease than you with roleplaying to show you the ropes, because in my case, there wasn’t anyone, and I think that’s why it took me so long.

About now, I am sure you want to know what I have to say about player plots, and goals, and how to fulfill them. If you have read this far through my lengthy, yes too lengthy introduction, you are worthy of my little piece of advice, which you are free to accept or decline, that will be yours to decide. I am for a practical approach, and because I do not have the time to get in-game and explain to you all one by one my ideas, I will put them on digital paper here, and describe it the best I can with believable examples and situations to which players can refer to, when in-game. Let’s start.

Designing your plots

This guide’s star will be Sam Kilt, a roguish type of person, a thug, probably a fighter/rogue or something of that nature. You, the reader, are the person behind Sam Kilt. It is your character, its whole concept and background came right out of your head, and now is the time for you to find him goals to pursue. His goals usually are tied with his background, so choose carefully when defining the traits and personality of Sam, for it will impact on his goals and the success of the character in the end. For the sake of this example, let’s say you chose to give Sam a fairly simple background, like he’s an escaped slave from Thay, and is headed west to flee from its former masters.

(Note: I suppose and hope every one of you will give more thought than that when you will be defining your next character’s background, I kept it simple because defining background isn’t something that cause problems to players in general, and if it was the case, it would probably best be handled in a guide of its own.)

Now, you are at the point where you want to define Sam’s goals, pay attention, it is the reasoning behind the actions he will do in the next weeks/months. To keep it simple, let’s assume that you also gave Sam simple goals, which is not at all a bad idea, since the most simple the goals, the easier it is for you to achieve them, or at least, work towards them. Sam enters Arabel wishing for protection from its former masters (See how clever it is, there is a Thayan enclave in Arabel, which will probably bring some conflict with thayan players, whom Sam will hate and have a prejudice against) and wishing for a good fight, earning enough money to continue to a new city, westward. Even if that is fairly simple, I suggest you write it down in a list format, because it is bound to change over the life of your character.

(I want to put an emphasis on not expanding your goals too much at the start of your character’s life. Things will happen and will affect your character, and what affects your character will affects its goals. What we, humans, don’t like to do is to have to start over some previously work because it is now obsolete. So to prevent this, when defining goals, you should not go too much into details, because it could work against you in the end.)

Taking this last piece of advice in consideration, you dress up a list of goals for Sam. It looks like this.

• Find protection into an organization.
• Find a way to make some cash, and probably engage in a few good fights.

That was simple, and this is where you character will starts his career on CoA. Log in, play a few sessions, learn about the factions in-game, see who’s hiring, get a few contacts, and then you are set to change your goals, a bit, because after a week, or even a few days, you have a more precise idea of where’s Sam is actually going, as a character. You take back your goals list, and modify it after one week, to reflect the changes that happened in Sam’s life.
So you take the old list, and update it. It gives you this.

• Find protection into an organization.
  – Bhaliir Mercenaries
  -- Various Non-lawful groups
  -- Some merchant organization you’ve bought from several times
• Find a way to make some cash, and probably engage in a few good fights.
  -- Body guarding

Revisiting your plots after a few playing sessions

Now, let’s take a look on what we did in the last week. Sam met some shady characters in the sewers, and they asked Sam to join their groups, because let’s face it, he’s a thug, and he’s good at it. He met with a Bhaliir retainer, and asked if he could join the mercenary company of the house and asked information. (The good point about it is that they accept everyone without asking too much questions in this company.). Sam also bought various supplies from other player’s merchants, which whom he is now acquainted, and he could go further that path and strengthen alliances that could help him in the future. On the other hand, he offered various people to be their bodyguard, to give him some kind of income, other than adventuring.

(Note: Of course, your character is not working towards its goals all the time, sometime, you’ll just go adventuring for whatever reason and do scripted quest, and also get engaged into other players’ story, because you, as the player, need a break sometime. It is very hard work to advance goals, and I don’t think it’s easy to do it all the time, or else, you’ll probably loose interest and stop playing the character. That is what happened to me while I was playing Salik, my werewolf. All the time, I was working on his goals. Unfortunately, I was discovered as a werewolf early in my character’s life, so I couldn’t quest much without being identified as a murderous beast. Since I was caught off guard early and had not secured many allies at this stage, I was always furthering his goals, the only thing I could do. At some point, I tried to do one scripted quest, for a change (I had not quested in some time), a DM was present, spiced it a little, I died, and stopped the character. A DM offered to raise my character, has he had plots running and the like, but I was already disappointed at my character’s death on the only scripted quest I had done in a while, and decided to stop him. That was an error on my part, as I should have continued the character, and that is why I am saying that furthering your goals all the time is not necessarily the best way to go.)

Now, Sam has to make a choice, go into a direction, choose an organization and stick with it. Let’s assume he chooses the Bhaliir Mercenaries. He gets in touch with the retainers, asks seriously about joining them, and explains why he wants to, etc. He learns about the Bhaliir family, a bit of history, and how Thond and Bhaliir hate each other. He is making new friends that he will soon be able to call allies, and with whom he will interact on a deeper level. Some of you might now ask yourself, “This is not about plots, all Sam did was come to Arabel and find allies, I don’t need a guide in order to do this.” And you would be right, what I just detailed in the last paragraphs might be a little basic for the more experienced players, but for someone who is new to the server, this kind of procedure is not that basic and easy to do. Some of you are accustomed to make friends and allies, and find groups to get involved with. You shall be more concerned with the next part of the guide. I decided to start from the base to reach a greater audience, and help the most people possible with my guide. If you did not show too much interest up to now, be sure I apologize for that.

Now Sam has some allies, a little income here and there, he’s involved in organization, now is time to get his goals further, develop them and work towards them. It is now time to get back out this list that you worked on previously and update it again, to reflect the new changes in Sam’s life. Now Sam knows what to do if he really wants to get richer and get some renown. He wants to take the wealth from Thond, and give it to Bhaliir, because he firmly believes that Thond is the villain in all of this. Is it true or not? It doesn’t care, what Sam’s believe is the truth, and you, as a player, should not be afraid to go against what most of the server think. (Most of the server thinks Bhaliir is the bad guy and that Thond is the good guy). So you will engage in plots to bring Thond down, because everyone fights for something at one point, and Sam wants to fight for Bhaliir, who supports people of the lower-class, which Sam belongs to. It is now that the scheming begins, and that the plans get worked out.

Working in-game to further your plots

At this point, you need your imagination. The first stages were not that hard to think of, gathering allies, getting to know people, etc. Now, you have to demonstrate originality, think of plans and get others to follow you through them, that, my dear readers, is not an easy task. First, you make changes, to the list, and look at it updated, to get some inspiration.

-Find protection into an organization. (done)
– Bhaliir Mercenaries
-Find a way to make some cash, and probably engage in a few good fights.
-- Body guarding
-Bring Thond’s wealth down.
-- …

Now, you have to think, and it’s not Sam thinking, it’s you, the player. It is at this point that you must get some knowledge of the server setting, how things work, how the DMs have thought certain parts of the story, etc. Do not be afraid to ask DM for help and insight on how the setting is really supposed to work. As a player, you can not know everything. But first, there is always the forums that are plentiful in information that you can read and learn so give that a try before asking help from a DM. In this example, you want to know how Thond gets all his cash. This time, you probably won’t need a DM because that information is easily available on the forums, Thond gets his cash from caravans, and from selling various stuff around the town. With that, you decide that you want Sam to try to wreck Thond’s caravans, and if you mess up, you know that you have now an organization that has some interest in keeping you alive, because your goals are good for them (Bhaliir). So you change your goals, which make the list goes like this.

-Find protection into an organization. (done)
-- Bhaliir Mercenaries
-Find a way to make some cash, and probably engage in a few good fights.
-- Body guarding
-Bring Thond’s wealth down.
-- Attack Thond’s caravans.

That single line “Attack Thond’s caravans” is the beginning of your story, the moment in your character’s story where he truly begins to get to life, because he now has a goal, something to strive for, something to work for. It is good that your first sub-goal (Attack Thond’s caravans) is doable without a DM. It is very important, because you want to do this as often as possible, without having the need of a DM all the time. You can easily take a group to do a caravan, lead the gnomes and the oxen somewhere, and slaughter them all, making Thond loose some money. You want to involve other players on your own, and get them into your story, and for that, you need two things, time and dedication. Finding players that will be willing to help is crucial, because a DM will probably not spend some time helping with a plot with only two persons involved. As cool as it gets, you are not going to be able to do all that by yourself, you’ll need people to help you into your endeavor, and to find these people, you don’t need a DM. What do you think DMs do when they start a plot? They give a lot of players plot hooks, small things to get them interested, in hope that they will pursue and get the plot going. You, as a player, must do the exact same thing. Attract others to help you in your goals. Now that you have your first sub-goal, you want to find why other people would want to come with you and attack Thond’s caravan, you want a Plot Hook of your own.

(Note: Plot hooks can be done in numerous ways, it could be running a scripted quest several times for an alternate purpose than the quest’s initial motive, or a walk into the wilds searching for something or someone in particular ((finding it or not doesn’t matter, what matters is that you bring people with you and make them interested in your story)), or anything that your crazy imagination can com up with.)

So you think about it, and decides of something that you will organize, you will run your own little event, and make people interested or disinterested (Having people fight against you is also a good idea, not all people will be interested in your plot, so it is only normal that at some point, people will want to fight you for the sole purpose of preventing you from fulfilling your goals.) in your plot.

The event will be simple, but efficient, as would be any plot hook. The event goes like this:

Sam forges a false note from a fictive Thond retainer that tells something along the lines of: “The goods will be hidden with the gnomes on a certain caravan, make sure you send a messenger when you will receive the goods. It is crucial that no-one gets to intercept them.” With this false note, Sam makes a sending throughout the city to ask for people for a small job. When people come, Sam tells a story about how he heard of an organization trading some goods secretly, using a cache deep inside the city’s sewers. With that, they all head out into the sewers, the condemned parts where monsters lurk. The party kills the monsters if there is any while going deeper into the sewers.(See, the clever part is that even if players will not be interested in your plot at the end of the event, they will still have had the chance to kill a few monsters, maybe earn some experience, and most important of all, they will remember you for trying to involve other in something different, and will probably come back, should you organize other things in the future, because they know you make things interesting). At some point, Sam tells he found the cache. (If there is some kind of container he can use, all the better, if not, just stating he found the cache would be enough.). Along with a few trinkets same bought in advance (A few potions, tanglefoot bags, perhaps a vial of poison), Sam slides the false note, and show it to other persons in the party. They all read it, and then, bingo, you have your hook.

This is not far from what a DM would do, running a mini-quest for a group to get them in a plot. The key, I believe, is make the event not too long (The time it would take completing a scripted quest or less) and do it often, so you get the most people involved, be it on the good or the bad side of your plot. Not all people will be interested, some will already be working on too much plots, and some will be outright disinterested, so it’s up to you to run your plot hook often and with various people. (It may be good to not bring back the same people two times, if they show up again, sending them a tell saying that they already have participated in this same plot hook could open their eyes, yes, sometimes, people will not realize your event was part of a plot, and that is perfectly normal.)

Getting other players and DMs interested in your plots

After that, hopefully, people will get interested into your plot, maybe not as many people as you would have wished, though, but that is normal and you should not be upset with that. Now, you get some people who will be interested to go with you on a caravan, and slaughter the oxen and the gnomes. Once you did that a couple of time, involved a good number of players and factions into your plot and made some more enemies, perhaps it would be good to contact a DM and get a little help, to get your plot a little more impact, and run an event on a slightly larger scale event, because, want it or not, some people will outright ignore your two first events (the hook and the caravan) because
a)It’s not a real scripted quest
b)There is no DM involved.
c)There is not much loot and xp involved.
But do not let that stop you, yes, it is sad, but those who will take part will probably enjoy it and that is what it’s all about.

_(Note: I can’t stress it enough, tell the DMs what you are doing. Yes, I suggest you involve people without the DMs’ help, but please, do not forget to tell them what you are doing, this will help immensely in the DMs noticing about your plot, and bettering the chance for the plot to succeed in the end. The DMs have said it numerous times, a small tell to the DM Channel saying:

“I am bringing people down into the sewers to further a plot against Thond”
Or
“We are going on a Thond Caravan, but we are going to kill the gnomes and oxen and torture them for information”
Or
“We have slaughtered all the oxen and the gnomes, we want to lie to the caravan master and tell him a story about a band of half-orcs attacking us. Could you come and portray the NPC.”

NOTE : Never kill any NPCs without DM supervision, if you do want to do it, make sure to warn a DM through the DM channel and that he agrees to supervise the killing/salughter/blackmail/whatever else of the NPC(s).

Will have tons more chance to get noticed than just doing the event and not telling anyone. Perhaps even a DM will have some time to spare and spice things up a little, interact with you with a NPC or something of that nature, but if you don’t tell them, it is sure nothing will happen. This is also one of the reasons to run that kind of events more than once, because DMs will not always be online to catch all of these things, so doing it more than once increase your chances. If there is never a DM online, send them an email explaining what you did. Communication is the key._

After that, all there is to do is repeat the process with any other plots Sam would undertake, always modifying his list of goals, and try to come up with other ideas to get the story going. Obviously, after the initial plan of getting some players involved by the hook and then doing the caravan event, there is little control you have on how the story will turn out in the end, and that, is the marvelous thing about roleplaying and storytelling, you do not know how it will end.

I hope that this guide helped you get a better understanding of how to set goals and works towards achieving them. This was but a simple example, which I think everyone can profit from, even if its level complexity is low. I encourage everyone to think of original goals, both complex and simple, and try to achieve them through in-game actions. The results will be rewarding and astonishing, I promise. I am also always open to give advice on goals and plots and anything of the like, on IRC or through the forums, or even through emails.

~Yours Truly,
PsionikAngel