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Message no. 1
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Dan Turek)
Subject: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles
Date: Wed Oct 3 12:45:01 2001
From: Gurth <Gurth@******.nl>
Subject: Adventure Competition
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2001 12:45:42 +0200

>I know not to overestimate the efforts typical ShadowRN listmembers put
into net.projects, but still, I had expected a bit more...

>Two and a half months ago, I started a little adventure competition
>http://plastic.dumpshock.com/adventurecompetition.html) with a deadline 31
>August, 2001. Since that was during my vacation, I extended it by a week,
>thinking this should give everyone who'd expressed an interest inentering enough time
to complete their adventure and send it to me.

>When I got back home, I had exactly _one_ entry waiting for me.

Well, that person deserves to win!

>So here's the deal: the deadline has been extended until 10 October
>2001.That's exactly one week from now; I think that should give anyone
>who's started writing an adventure but not finished it (a syndrome I know
>all too well, but still) time to complete it and send it to me. We might
>still have a competition after all...

Most adventures my friends or I run are from 8x11 papers with notes
scribbled all over. Translating that into an adventure someone else could
read would take anywhere from hours to a month, depending on complexity. If
you give some parameters for adventures, it might help inspire someone to
submit an entry. Personally I love the short, 4 hour runs that Sprawl Sites
inspires. I always need short gang interaction scenarios.

Since I tailor my adventures to the players and their area its hard to make
them more generic, yet if I use an adventure someone else made I need it to
be as generic as possible so I can easily put their personal hooks in. Right
now my group is rather magic heavy (1 Mage, 1 Aspected Sorcerer, 2 PhysAds,
a Razor and a Decker) so the campaign leans slightly to the mystical and
slightly mythic side.

I am curious what other peoples' campaign styles are like. I like to run 3
or 4 easy runs and then have a meat-grinder or mythic one to put them back
on edge. Old cyberpunk adventures are great at this (reminds me of Paranoia
when it says "the fight should last until at least one character dies")
though I'm more merciful than the authors. We play Shadowrun because it can
be a dark and gritty game, and I have half thinkers and half doers. Only the
2 newer players are power-hungry munchkin-wannabes, and we're all hoping
they grow out of it.

P.S. Why do some posts have the at the end of every line?

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Message no. 2
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Jonathan)
Subject: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles
Date: Wed Oct 3 13:00:01 2001
> Most adventures my friends or I run are from 8x11 papers with notes
> scribbled all over. Translating that into an adventure someone else could
> read would take anywhere from hours to a month, depending on complexity.
If
> you give some parameters for adventures, it might help inspire someone to
> submit an entry. Personally I love the short, 4 hour runs that Sprawl
Sites
> inspires. I always need short gang interaction scenarios.
>
> I am curious what other peoples' campaign styles are like. I like to run 3
> or 4 easy runs and then have a meat-grinder or mythic one to put them back
> on edge. Old cyberpunk adventures are great at this (reminds me of
Paranoia
> when it says "the fight should last until at least one character dies")
> though I'm more merciful than the authors. We play Shadowrun because it
can
> be a dark and gritty game, and I have half thinkers and half doers. Only
the
> 2 newer players are power-hungry munchkin-wannabes, and we're all hoping
> they grow out of it.
>

Ok the adventure guidelines is at that site he gave. It's a pretty
interesting concept but it would be nicer if a format for adventures were
provided in some format other than referencing released adventures and
hoping anyone has them. Most I'd say are in your boat, jot note adventures
with no standardized method of laying the adventure out :)

As for my campaign style I enjoy giving my players a seemingly impossible
task that forces them to take a wild or seriously underconsidered mode of
resolving the conflict. For example in my AD&D GM days I pitted a band of
level 1 adventurers against TWO lichs (undead mages of great power). The
first reaction most give is that it's impossible to kill one let alone two
when you hardly have any life or magic weapons.

The thing was one of the lichs was in rivalry with the other and provided
tips on how to deal with the second. And most would still complain you can't
kill a lich at level 1. Which indeed is nearly impossible...unless you DON'T
go for the lich but rather hunt down his soul jar and smash it which in turn
would smuck the lich :)

In my current SR session its much the same only the situation is extremely
easy....the resolvement will be the bastard to complete ;)

"Simple" find and retrieve runs....the tool of evil GMs everywhere...
Message no. 3
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles
Date: Wed Oct 3 13:20:01 2001
According to Dan Turek, on Wed, 03 Oct 2001 the word on the street was...

> >When I got back home, I had exactly _one_ entry waiting for me.
>
> Well, that person deserves to win!

Part of me agrees; another part of me (from personal experience) says
there's not a lot of point in winning a competition in which you're the
only entrant.

> Most adventures my friends or I run are from 8x11 papers with notes
> scribbled all over. Translating that into an adventure someone else could
> read would take anywhere from hours to a month, depending on complexity.

Note that this competition is not for _any_ adventure, so you can't just
write up an adventure you ran for your group from the notes you kept. It's
supposed to be an adventure that fits an existing description -- the one at
http://plastic.dumpshock.com/adventurecompetition.html to be precise.

> P.S. Why do some posts have the =20 at the end of every line?

For some reason I've never understood either, this is when a trailing space
gets converted into the ASCII code for it by your mailer, with the =-sign
as a prefix. (20 in hex is 32 in decimal, which is the ASCII number for the
space "symbol".)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
If only it were almost easy.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

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PS+ PE(-)(+) Y PGP- t@ 5++ X(+) R+++(-)>$ tv+ b++@ DI- D+ G+ e h! !r y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 4
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles
Date: Thu Oct 4 03:45:01 2001
Dan Turek writes:

> I am curious what other peoples' campaign styles are like. I like to run 3
> or 4 easy runs and then have a meat-grinder or mythic one to put them back
> on edge.

I'm lazy and tend to run two different runs:

1) FASA published modules. Often I adjust these a little so that
they fit the capabilities of my team, or so that they actually make
sense.
2) Runs that are initiated by the PCs themselves.

Occasionally I actually plan and run a proper scenario. More frequently, but
still not commonly, I run an off the cuff, spur of the moment adventure.
Actually, due to their PC focussed style and infinite unrestricted playing
field, these off the cuff runs have very often worked out to be some of the
most memorable and fun runs we've ever had. They are a little taxing on GM
creativity, though :-(.

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
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Message no. 5
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Ahrain Drigar)
Subject: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles
Date: Thu Oct 4 09:30:01 2001
----- Original Message -----
From: Damion Milliken <dam01@***.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles


> Dan Turek writes:
>
> > I am curious what other peoples' campaign styles are like. I like to run
3
> > or 4 easy runs and then have a meat-grinder or mythic one to put them
back
> > on edge.
>
> I'm lazy and tend to run two different runs:
>
> 1) FASA published modules. Often I adjust these a little so that
> they fit the capabilities of my team, or so that they actually make
> sense.

Myself, I have tried this approach, but it usually fails miserably. The
best I can do is go with the basic premice and basic info given.

> 2) Runs that are initiated by the PCs themselves.
>
> Occasionally I actually plan and run a proper scenario. More frequently,
but
> still not commonly, I run an off the cuff, spur of the moment adventure.

In truth, this is about the only way I can run. Every adventure I have
"planned" out has completely sucked. Some to the point I didn't even feel
like finishing the adventure.

I find it works better (for me anyway) to just sit down, start with about
5-40 minutes of downtime and go from there. Albiet there have been some
occasions my games went a little over the top, but as far as I know,
everyone has enjoyed them.

> Actually, due to their PC focussed style and infinite unrestricted playing
> field, these off the cuff runs have very often worked out to be some of
the
> most memorable and fun runs we've ever had. They are a little taxing on GM
> creativity, though :-(.

That I can agree with. I've been gaming for about 16 years and have been GM
for a good part of that. I think my brains are tapioca now (very little
originality left) due to the fact that is how I've run pretty much from the
beginning. : (

Ahrain
Message no. 6
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Holly Feray)
Subject: Adventure Competition & Campaign Styles
Date: Thu Oct 4 16:50:04 2001
On Thu, 4 Oct 2001 17:40:56 +1000 (EST) Damion Milliken
<dam01@***.edu.au> writes:
> Dan Turek writes:
>
> > I am curious what other peoples' campaign styles are like. I like
> to run 3
> > or 4 easy runs and then have a meat-grinder or mythic one to put
> them back
> > on edge.
>
>

I run published adventures when I do not have prep time or it is sprung
upon me to run. Most of the time runs are woven in via the back grounds
and interactions of the party. ex. Lets see one of Dragon Hunt's
objectives was solved in a most unusual fashion. Chester Cheetah (the
SPEED cyber catesque human) calls up a friend from a party he met
previously, Nadia Daviar, and asks. "Could you see if your boss knows
this dragon we are working for. We need a name. He has lost his memory.
Thanks" She hangs up, goes and asks and calls him back. They also
showed Nadia pictures of the datajack implant on the dragon which leads
to an entirely separate run.

Holly
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