On Chronicling
"No one man is superior to the game."
- A. Bartlett Giamatti
"I am a mere chronicler of events."
- Phil Pike
Okay, I'll admit one thing right here at the beginning. My oft-repeated saying, "I am a mere chronicler of events" is a touch disingenuous. It implies that I have no influence over what happens over the course of a D&D session, which is of course not true. I have a great deal of influence on the events that occur. What I do not control, however, is the outcome all these events produce. This article will examine that distinction, and the ways in which I do and do not exert control of the adventures and events that occur in the campaign.
When I ran my first adventures as a DM, during the summer of 1979, I was pretty inflexible. I not only had an outcome in mind, but I had all of the intermediate steps I wanted the players to take planned as well. This applied to individual puzzles and rooms as well as to the overall course of the adventure. I set up a problem, and there was one correct way to solve it. It did not take me long to discover that the players would usually come up with solutions I had not thought of. The first couple of times this happened I actually fought the solution, coming up with roadblocks that hadn't existed before. After all, I figured, if the players were going outside of the script then why shouldn't I? The problem with this was that it actually made the players angry. This was the first lesson I learned as a DM, and one of the best: good DMing encourages player creativity, it doesn't thwart it.
There are still puzzles and situations that, strictly speaking, have only one solution. I might have an enchanted door in a dungeon, for example, that asks a riddle. The riddle has only one right answer. That is right and proper, and the players accept this as inherent in the situation. It does not necessarily mean, however, that solving the riddle is the only way through the door. A character might decide that this is the perfect time to use her Haversack of Explosions and blast the door down (to cries of "Nooo!" from the door), or someone could tunnel around the door. There might be a dozen ways to get past the door that don't involve solving the riddle. If the chamber beyond turns out to be filled with acid fumes that are neutralized only if the riddle is solved, however, I would argue that that is good design, not an effort to thwart the players. Any being smart and powerful enough to enchant a magic door is smart enough to anticipate some of the ways that clever adventurers might try to get around or through it.
So I began allowing players to flex and test their imagination and wits as their characters explored. It took a while longer for me to extend this principle to the adventure as a whole, however. In essence, my initial view was that I was presenting a story to the players. As time went on, though, I saw that the players and I were creating stories together, and that the adventures that were proving the most satisfying to the players were those where the players had the most control over their own destinies. As my players got used to a certain amount of autonomy they began to chafe more and more at any effort to force them into one particular path or another. "We're being channeled!" became their cry whenever they detected the hand of the Dungeon Master forcing them into a certain course of action. The hell of it was, they were usually right. At some point during the course of the California campaign (the "Heroes of Telemarch" adventures) I re-examined my methods and made a conscious decision to give control over what happened almost entirely to the players.
The results of this surprised me. The players would yank my adventures down courses I had never foreseen, or take off on adventures that I didn't know existed until they started to happen. The events of the campaign began to intrigue and surprise me as much as they did the players. It was then that I began saying "I am a mere chronicler of events". I think the players initially thought I was just trying to distance myself from responsibility for what was going on, but I really meant it (and still mean it, for that matter). I have almost no idea what is going to happen next in the campaign. I just write it down after it does.
This is a long way from saying that I don't have any control or influence. The analogy I use in my own mind is that of creating stew. I choose ingredients based on what looks good on the shelf, and toss them into the pot, following no recipe at all. "Ah," I might think, "let's take one crazed hunchback, a band of fanatical dervishes bent on recovering a sacred relic, a desperate woman with a Secret, and the Emu of Doom, and see what happens!". I have no idea what the final result will taste like, but if the ingredients work well together almost anything is possible. My main job, then, is choosing the ingredients.
There are even times when the ingredients don't turn out to be what I think they are. Sometimes important plot hooks, clues are intended to lead the characters into a new adventure, are ignored by the players. At other times, a random bit of background or dungeon dressing will be seized on by the players as something signifigant. Every now and then their ideas about what something might be or might mean are so appealing to me that I begin to develop things that way. At those times the players, though they don't know it, are creating the adventure and I'm just sitting there, trying to keep up with them.
Of course, in some ways I am much more than a mere chronicler of events. I am also the "player" of the entire world outside of player characters. The characters do not exist in a vacuum. They not only exert an influence on the world around them, the world around them exerts many influences on them. Having to react on occasion, rather than act, does not seem to frustrate players. In fact, it seems to enhance the game experience for them. I think this is because it reinforces the illusion that their adventures are taking place in a real world. The characters are adventuring against a dynamic backdrop, not a static one. The events that I choose to introduce in this regard have a big impact on what happens next, of course. In the larger context, though, this is just another example of my selecting ingredients and tossing them into the pot.
Let me analyze a recent example to show how my thought process usually runs in a case like this; Wennith's kidnapping of Ozub. For those that gamed it the events need no introduction, of course. Others may wish to read the Bloodhawk's game notes for the following dates to see how the adventure actually played out: At first glance, it is hard to imagine a more direct way for a DM to interfere than to launch an attack against the PCs. I heard no grumbling from the players, though (and believe me, this is not a group that is shy about complaining about my methods if they think I deserve it). For one thing, the event flowed naturally out of what had gone before. Wennith threatened revenge on the Bloodhawks after their first meeting, two years before. Her method of attack was consistent with what the group knew about her. And the group was left with control over how they responded to this threat.
They were of course being channeled...by Wennith. Her plot involved luring the group into a death trap that she knew they couldn't resist. The distinction between Wennith channeling the group and my channeling the group may seem specious, but I think it is a quite real distinction. Wennith is of course a creature entirely under my control, but that does not mean I can have her do anything I want. If I am faithful to my role as a world-builder, the actions I can choose for her are really quite constrained. She has to act within her capabilities, and she has to act consistently with what has already been established about her. If I have done a good job in establishing her character, I don't really have to think about what she will do. It just seems to pop into my head, more like I am discovering it than creating it. This sense of having a character operate almost independently of his or her creator is one that will be familiar, I think, to a lot of players.
Okay, so I decide the time has come for Wennith to strike back. Her course of action, for reasons described above, seems immediately clear to me. I wait for the appropriate time, and then spring the events on the players. Ozub has been kidnapped, Leenar is dead and Tiny is gravely wounded. The group has a really nasty (especially nasty because it is so polite, and gloating) letter from Wennith inviting them to come and die trying to rescue him. What happens next?
I have absolutely no idea. I've tossed this ingredient into the pot, but I don't know what it will produce.I think that the players will accept the invitation and try to rescue Ozub. I've even manipulated them a little to encourage this, through the brutal death of Leenar and the tone of the letter. Still, I've been surprised so often by my player's reactions to a given situation that I no longer really try and predict what they will do. They could let Ozub die. More likely, they could try to rescue him through some devious means that I haven't even thought of (or tried to think of...it is much easier on me, I've found, if I don't even try to outguess the players). As it happens, they choose the likely course of action and mount a rescue expedition. This is the last thing that happens in the course of the adventure that goes the way I expect it to.
The PCs immediately put out the call for aid to everyone they have ever worked with or helped in the past. This is an inspired move, one that hasn't even occurred to me, and turns the expedition from a suicide charge into one with a reasonable chance of success. Getting in touch with the dragon Coptinarius is especially clever. Soon the PCs have a small army assembled. They also stock up on powerful magic items, which I had thought they might do.
Because the group is so much more powerful than I had expected, their march to and through the dungeon is much easier than I anticipated. I don't boost the strength of the monsters in front of them, though; they've earned this advantage and I let them keep it. The group gets through Rampart Caves and reaches the lair of the red dragon, Pyromaulius Rendus. Here things take another unexpected turn.
This time, the players surprise me by taking a course of action that is, shall we say, much less optimal than I had expected. They no sooner reach the lair than they launch a frontal assault against the dragon's position. I had prepared carefully for several contingencies; reconnaissance, negotiation, stealth, and open combat among them, but I had put much less time into the open combat option because I judged it the least likely to occur of the possible scenarios. It was a mistake on my part to anticipate this, of course, but an unavoidable one. I rarely have time to completely prepare an adventure the way I would like, so at times I am forced to fall back on trying to guess what will happen. The resulting combat is a swirling, chaotic, exciting mess. I quickly improvise tactics for Wennith, the dragon, and their allies; experience is a good substitute for preparation, fortunately. To my surprise, the players actually win and drive the dragon away, though the PCs and their allies take casualties. Their tactics are inspired, whatever one may say about their strategy. Ozub is rescued, Wennith is captured, and some truly memorable moments occur. The outcome of the adventure seems both appropriate and satisfying.
Is it the overall outcome I had expected? I can't answer that, because I no longer even try to guess at outcomes. It leads me to try and force events a certain way, even subconsciously, and I'm usually wrong anyway. I simply try to set up interesting and challenging situations and let the players and their characters decide what happens next. In this sense I am truly a "mere chronicler" of the events that unfold. There are still certain times, however, when I step beyond the role of chronicler and try to exert an influence on events, when I "channel" a group, if you will. This usually happens for one of two reasons; deliberately, when I detect a disturbance in the Force (in other words, things have gotten out of whack for some reason), or accidentally, because I just can't help myself.
The first scenario can occur in a lot of different ways. One fairly common way is when the players go careening off in some completely unexpected direction, and are headed for certain doom. Here is a general example: the PCs encounter several dire warnings, which I have designed to keep them from blundering accidentally into the Sphere of Annihilation that sits at the bottom of a dungeon. The players, for whatever reason, have misinterpreted the warnings, and are heading straight towards the sphere confident that a great treasure awaits. I have no interest at all in spending the next playing session watching most of the players roll up new characters, so I intervene in some overt way to let the group know just what they are up against. I hate doing this; the players usually recognize this kind of intervention, either for or against them, as exactly what it is, and it is kind of like letting them see the zipper on the monster costume. It spoils the illusion. In this case, though, it is better than the alternative.
This kind of example is one way in which the unpredictability of the players works against me. Even after all of the thousands of hours I have spent DMing, I can't say for certain what a given character or group will do in a given situation. Sure, this is a good thing in that it keeps me as interested in the outcome as the players, and justifies my title as Mere Chronicler, but it can make things difficult for a hard-working DM. The reason for a lot of this unpredictability is the yawning gulf between my perspective, which is literally god-like, and the limited perspective of the players. I see all and know all. The players see a little and have to guess or figure out the rest. Conclusions that seem obvious to me are much less so to them. After many years I have gotten better at trying to see what things look like from the player's perspective, but I have never closed that gap all the way.
A good illustration of this might be the old Avalon Hill board game "France 1940". This game, which featured the German invasion of France early in WWII, had to be completely overhauled after the initial playtesting. In real life, the invasion was an easy, one-sided German victory. In the first version of the game, the Germans kept getting their butts kicked. This was because no player, no matter how inept, would make the mistakes that the French and British commanders made in real life, because the perspective given by the game was much greater than the limited viewpoint the real-life leaders had. The game designers had to introduce a set of "stupidity rules" to enforce some of the mistakes the French and British really made in order to balance the game.
Please note, I am not by any means calling any of the players in my campaigns stupid. The decisions they make are usually reasonable, given what they have to go on. Sure, on occasion just about every group will make a really bone-headed decision or two, but most of the time the fault is mine, for failing to see how things are going to look from their end of the table. When things get tilted too far that way, I have to "reach in" and straighten things out.
The most common way for things to become unbalanced is when the players come up with some clever strategy or plan that threatens to undo an entire adventure. They will see some weakness in a situation that I have not noticed and exploit it to the fullest. These days, I am a lot better at just shrugging and taking my lumps like a manly DM. There are still times, though, when I say to myself "I'll be damned if I'll let these guys flush 10 hours of design work down the toilet just because I made one little mistake. It's time to interfere!" And I do.
The second kind of scenario where I will step out of the role of Mere Chronicler is the impulsive, I-just-can't-help-it sort of thing. This usually happens when I have set up something that I really want the players to do, or to find. Instead they miss it, or decide to go the other way, or something. These usually aren't items or events that are crucial to the plot, because, as I've explained, these days I deal in elements, not whole plots. Instead, they are things that I think are just plain fun, or cool, or interesting. My train of thought in situations like this is usually something like "They missed it! Damn! Well, so be it. I'm not going to interfere. I'm not going to interfere. I'm not going to...hey, you guys! Look over here!"
What can I say? Sometimes even my famous willpower gives way.
There are advantages to players in being "channeled". For one thing, the farther ahead I know what the PCs are going to do, the better I can prepare. This produces a better adventure and a better gaming experience for everybody. I have gotten much, much better at "winging" situations over the years, and I like to flatter myself that the difference in quality between a carefully staged adventure and one that I am ad-libbing is small, maybe even invisible to the players. Making things up as I go is very tiring, though. After awhile I start to get brain-cramp. In an adventure where I already have everything set I am much more focussed, much more able to pay attention to the details, and have a much better gaming experience than in an adventure I'm making up as we go. I think my players understand this, though, and are usually willing to channel themselves to some degree in order to make things easier on me, and thus more fun for themselves.
Players, in fact, often seem to be a little bewildered by too many choices. On a strategic level, my sense is that they dislike having too many options, though not as much as having too few. When an adventure wraps up and they start looking around for their next one, they seem to be happiest with three or four choices. Two doesn't provide enough choice, and leaving them with only one viable option is the same as posting a big sign saying "You are now being channeled" on my DM screen. More than three or four options, though, makes it difficult for a group to agree and decide on their next course of action.
Elcea is a large and well-developed campaign world, though. Both of the major settings, the Kingdom of Xenthus and the Notar Republic, are dynamic, growing realms surrounded by the remains of older, larger civilizations. This was done deliberately, and it means that if a group of PCs just decides to pick up and travel, they won't go too far in whatever direction they go before they stumble across something interesting. Based on what I've written, one might think that that sort of thing would drive me nuts, but it doesn't. I really enjoy expeditions like that, provided I have even a little time to prepare. It forces me to expand my own knowledge of the campaign world, and the adventures that arise from such travels are often, for some reason, more interesting to me than the ones that I sit down and think up.
The PCs have the freedom to do that. They could choose from the adventure ideas that I will dangle in front of them. They could also retire and set up a bakery, or they could dig through volumes of forgotten lore and come up with their own adventures. I'll decide what they see along the way, and who and what they will meet, but what happens next is up to the players. They make their decisions based on my input, but in the end the decision are theirs, and the results are often so far what what I had expected or intended that I can only throw my hands into the air and claim "I am a mere chronicler of events!"
Do you have any comments, questions, or responses to this article? Send them in! I'd like to hear them, and if there are enough interesting ones I'll add them to this page.
Ideas and contributions to future editions of "Mere Chronicles" are also being accepted.
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