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Do you have a personal life?


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So I'm reading the review for the Supergirl season premier. The author talks about what people think will be happening at Catco for the season, and a question occurred to me. Superhero games are about flying through the air, and using strange powers to blast colorfully garbed crooks. As it;'s an rpg we make backstories for charecters, and with disads like secret id and in love with we make npcs in our personal lives. But the gm is dealing with ideally 4-6 players some of whom aren't really interested in not blasting crooks, making a soap opera of heroes personal lives. So how much do you focus on your non heroing activities in your games?

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Roughly 75% of my current campaign's table time is devoted to non-combat (aka 'downtime') activities.  i.e. The game is RP intense and combat light -- but when there's combat, it's usually quick, brutal, and fatal (for someone -- not necessarily a PC, but it happens).  This is a gritty, Powerful Heroic level game.  Rough and tumble combat that can kill helps drive/reinforce the RP heavy nature of this game, because it promotes an atmosphere with actual consquences that results in players avoiding combat rather than seeking it.  (i.e.  The players are much more likely to have their characters seek non-combat solutions to problems  [often entwined with their characters' personal lives and actions!] since combat could result in permanent character death.)

 

Occasionally the GM and a single player will take asides in order to RP something that isn't appropriate for the entire troupe, but that happens once/twice per session and never for very long.  My GM chooses to bluebook nothing -- which I consider a good thing as I've observed that bluebookers commonly feel they deserve something extra XP- or story-wise for their effort ... since they're doing more than those around them ... and that's somewhat unfair to the non-writers in the group. I should note that feeling this way, while observed to be common, didn't necessarily equate to griping at the GM about it; most just kind of complained to others in the group about the added writing effort with no added reward (as if the GM's written responses and table time incorporation of bluebook-spawned ideas weren't enough).

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I, on the other hand, frequently have personal life stuff in the game, though it seemed to work better when it was just 5 players than it now does with 7.  The players generally seem to enjoy it, and there were even cases of PCs getting involved socially with other PC's NPCs.  Note that this takes place with NPCs who are not DNPCs.

 

Examples:

  • Serendipity (female), in secret ID, was dating real estate mogul Adrian Beck (NPC), who had a personal assistant, Margaret (also NPC).  At one point, Serendipity and her teammate Sentinel (both in secret IDs) took Margaret out for a spa day. 
  • When Tempest was dating a PRIMUS agent who lost several teammates in battle, several of Tempest's male teammates took him out to the bar to commiserate.
  • Pops (teleporting scientist PC) was having problems with a scientist colleague (NPC) whose experiments were interfering with Pops' teleportation powers.  Circe (mentalist PC) took the scientist NPC aside and "convinced" him to instead work on an extradimensional travel problem that Maker (gadgeteer PC) was having trouble with.  

In my experience, there are combat players and non-combat players.  The former set enjoy the big battles / power use stuff, while the latter set enjoy the interpersonal role-playing stuff.  If you build a set of interesting NPCs (or the players provide some interesting NPCs, which is something I now have the players do during character creation), you can briefly touch on personal stuff in-game, making the non-combat players happy without turning off the combat players.  Just one quick thing per PC, which can occasionally tie into the current adventure but are more for fleshing out the PCs' world.

 

I even put together a set of very general "random subplot" tables (attached) to help me come up with ideas, and sometimes roll on that for each PC.  So Honey Badger may have Interpersonal:  Family member, Relationship begins, Potentially bad, which prompts me to have HB's sister begin dating a new guy who is a bit of a loser / user type.  So HB feels protective, checks out the guy, maybe asks Circe to peek in the guy's head to see what his deal is.  And Shadowboxer could have Activities:  Media / Legal / Organization, Complication introduced, Fairly good.  So his PI secret ID gets involved in a high-profile missing persons case.

RandomSubplots.pdf

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It has depended on the campaign and the Player taste. Most comics tend to be most successful when they are a mix of Personal interaction with other characters and with the character's secret IDs. Doing that makes the character more relatable to the reader. Some players really just want to battle villains and for those I emphasize the out of combat stuff less.

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It's usually Medium to low "at table" I like to run that stuff as "Blue booking".

 

Yeah, my relatively new Champions game (I'm playing with a new set of players and a GM) is fairly combat-heavy during the sessions, but we still get some role-playing in. I also do a lot of, well, not blue-booking because I'm doing it solo--I write a lot of fic about my character and post it to the Google group we use to communicate. I'd like a little more role-playing in session, personally, but the game is enjoyable as is.

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Generally, I am not big on it.  I do prefer the action part of things.  I think being a numbers oriented person might play into that.  I don't think I particular mind the downtime, other players who like can have their moments, and I can sit back for a few minutes, at least if my characters aren't particularly great socially.

 

Maybe or not related, I have come to realize in the past,  I have tended towards creating less social characters, and I wonder if it is a subconcious thing since I am not exactly competent or comfortable in some social situations.  Something to ponder at least.

 

 

Of course, as a GM, I couldn't really do it.  My few GM experiences, I tend trust too much in the numbers dictating the game. 

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My Champions sessions tend to revolve around a big combat.  There is usually some RP in the beginning to figure out what is going on and then a big fight.    We (gaming group) use Champions as our filler game between other campaign sessions.  It is very episodic and action oriented.  As my wife says when we get ready to play Champions "Property Damage that's what we like."

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I do occasionally, mostly in my Star Hero and Fantasy games. In Star Hero, We usually spend some time on the ship(s) and have interactions on the ship(s) games. Tournaments, 3-D Chess, etc. Also, in my Fantasy Hero games, people can stop at the town to buy from shops and such. Maybe one of these towns has a jousting tournament for the Knight? A spell competition for the Wizard? Something like that.

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The Champions games my group runs usually manage to work at least a little interpersonal/outside life stuff into every session, though I am not the best in the group at working this in.

 

Our best GM consistently manages to begin adventures with solo vignettes for each character in which they can have small adventures of their own (possibly leading into the main adventure), interaction with NPCs, and generally having a life outside the team. These solo bits often develop into ongoing subplots. Fortunately, this GM is also good at pacing, skipping quickly from solo vignette to solo vignette around the game table so nobody monopolizes time for more than a few minutes while everyone else twiddles their thumbs.

 

Dean Shomshak

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Personal life is difficult to integrate into Champions, simply because it usually spotlights one PC and leaves almost everybody else out in the shadows - and then it is usually Secret ID stuff, so the character cannot or must not 'shine' with his special powers, e.g. a fight bewteen Captain Nuclear and his spouse/ girlfriend about him being out all night fighting crime instead of spending more time with her and the kids can't be solved by his 14D6 Nuclear Blast. Yes, that's why we call it roleplaying but the other players have nothing to do for what - 10 to 20 minutes?

And maybe they also want to have some "private life issues" to roleplay - then, with 4 people you kill 40 minute to 1,5 hours for basically 1-on-1 roleplaying (out of your typical 4 hour session).

 

Hey, I always thought superheroes fight villains, do good and prevent catastropes and don't do stuff that any ordinary bloke has to deal with!

 

With other campaigns and genres it's a little easier because you usually don't have to deal with different identities of the characters and nobody thinks twice if Magus the Magician does a little sorcery at his step-daughters wedding.

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The Specials a year 2000 movie gives an insight to the personal lives of superheroes.  According to one member they only get called on a mission eight or ten times a year.  The rest of the time is spent on personal relationships and trying to get toy companies to make actions figures of the group's members.

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I don't run nor play in a Superhero game, but if I did run one, I'd imagine the ratio of combat to personal stories would depend entirely on the players. I tend towards spontaneity over scripted events and once the campaign gets kicked off, it develops a sort of alchemy all of its own. Sometimes it turns out great. Sometimes not. Point is, if the players drove the story to the personal relationships and secret ID side of the coin, then I would adapt my style to that. Just as long as I got to throw in Slamm the Destroyer* to interrupt an important and sappy scene once in a while.

 

 

 

*Name picked out of the blue. Don't know of any character named Slamm the Destroyer nor have I ever written one up. Just popped out, probably because I was reading the 90's comics genre conventions thread recently.

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  • 11 months later...

A 'personal life' would be considerably harder in a group as the GM can't dedicate enough time to give each character an appropriate amount of attention or character building, and I think taking out the baddie is more interesting than deciding to go bowling with co-workers and having a beer.

 

For a 'personal life' portion of the game it would have to be likely one-on-one. Depending on the detail the types of activities during this down time could bet weird, erotic or other...

 

So maybe the character's downtime would be better suited outside of the game altogether. When playing in a group and playing herosystem you are playing the fantasy of being heroes. You can later swap it where you're secretly a hero but you're having downtime, or you have your daily grind or family to deal with or other. Finding a willing partner for small RPing daily slice of life isn't too hard to do, with or without an end goal and with or without having to even mention the character is actually a superhero at all.

 

Not to mention playing out intimate or romantic encounters...

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A little personal life. Not lots. The last Champions game I got to play and run in had rotating GMs, me and another guy.

 

Every time we started a new arc and took over GMing we would come up with reasons for why our character was not going to be able to join in. This was usually a personal reason of some sort.

 

The other players would sometimes indulge in some personal story time too.

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My players don't like to develop their own stories, and paradoxally want to have "something of their own".

 

After a dozen of occurence and try, I abandooned the idea of casual living for PCs, as they aren't able to manage it by themselves, or be patient enough for other PCs Secret ID. :/

 

Might be a cultural thing again

 

Opale, often putting too much work and hope in Pcs commitment to the game

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Probably not as much as I should have.

 

In the old group I was a player of in the mid-late 80's and early 90's, a lot of the personal soap opera revolved around one character (Crakajack) who was pretty much Batman/Bruce Wayne without the grimdark or Bat stuff. Think MCU Tony Stark billionaire playboy with a brightly coloured costume and swingline. Crackajack's player (Sam) and the GM (Brett) were best mates and both enjoyed the drama of  Brett dumping Crackajack (and theoretically the rest of Super-Force, but he was paying the bills and repairs) in the deep end and generally complicating his life. The rest of us were pretty much co-stars, but Brett was such a good GM we never felt left out. Now and then we fought stuff.

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My game is probably half and half.  I try to structure a session in three acts.  The first act is predominantly roleplaying (advancing active plot threads and planting new ones), although there might be a brief skirmish for one or two of the PCs.  The second act sets up the Big Fight that comprises Act Three.  The fight usually consumes about half of our gaming time.

 

I have the luxury of a long-term, stable gaming group (10+ years now), and players who really enjoy roleplaying.  They all like the fact that each one gets some camera time during each session, and I rotate from session to session which hero's plot is the focus of the Big Fight. There are villains they've taken on as a group, but each PC also has at least one arch-villain who has some kind of personal connection to them, and most of them are NPCs that were introduced early on that either became mixed up with villains, or turned into villains themselves.  Without having roleplayed them as friendly NPCs for awhile, a lot of the drama and fun of those relationships would be missing. 

 

But again, I'm very lucky that I have great players and that we've been able to keep it going for this long.  We really have built up a rich history.

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Roleplaying ability/comfort zone/preference and session time play a big role in determining how much personal and interpersonal roleplay, subplots, etc happen in a gaming group. If you only have 3-4 hours per session, it's mostly just enough story to lead to the next combat. If you have 5 hours or more, there's more time to set up the story and fill out the PCs lives a bit.

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