What do you look for in a narrative campaign?

[VarianceHammer]

Posting this in a couple places because I'm curious.

Basically, the question is what the subject line says: What makes a good 3-5 game narrative campaign for you? The kind you might play over a long weekend in the garage, or in a marathon club event. Lots of mission variety, or a series of 1500-2000 point games? Asymmetrical objectives? Do you prefer there to be a known plot arc and then a winner at the end, or for the missions and plot to respond to each game's result? Somewhat generic, or very specifically "Joe's Eldar vs. Amy's Orks"?

[Filthy Casual]

First for me is background, a reason why the battle is taking place really adds to it, a setting, a campaign, a world, something that grounds the armies into a location rather than the nebulous "some ruined cityscape in the 41st millenium" it doesn't have to be a full on background with a world history or detailed maps but can be as simple as: "J'oleth, farseer of the Craftworld Examplisia, has forseen the calamity to befall the Exodite World of Placeholdion should the rampaging Warlord Ammrak be allowed to gather a mighty Waaagh! on the former Imperial world of Ie III. This must be stopped and the Warlord assassinated, leading to in-fighting amongst the remaining Orks that will keep them busy until the Imperials return to try and claim their world once more."

Then you have a reason to fight and it suggests objectives for the missions, the first one could be the Eldar establishing a location of the warboss using a lot of fast units to check for weak points in the enemy lines while the Orks are having a competition amongst themselves to see who is the shootiest and best at hitting those zoomy point fings. Next game the Eldar have to blow up an important Mek Factory that the Warboss needs to build his Stompa that will unite all the Orks on the planet to him, the Orks have to defend it, depends on who wins determines if the Orks get to use a Stompa in the next battle.

A narrative should flow through so that each battle tells some part of the story and there is an end out come. If the eldar fail, they will have to defend the world of Plotholdia in the next campaign weekend, otherwise, if they succeed, the Imperials could join in the next set of fights with the eldar trying to keep the war going on for long enough to keep both sides busy killing each other.

[daboarder]

A compelling but organic story. You cant just ignore the results to tell a story, and you should be set in stone for how that story is going to end, otherwise you will have players that end up feeling like their actions are futile (and not in a stand against the endless horde type way)

take the 13th black crusade for example.

They had wonderful organic segments (the death of saint jsomanes hope was cool and the write up for it even cooler)

But at the same time the company meddled with the "game" to prevent a complete rout by the forces of chaos, because the chaos players had gotten organized and were tearing the loyalist gamers a new one by stacking their wins and playing towards strategic goals. Conversely the Imperial players and allies were far too fractured and more focused on holding their own small corners than making coherent strategic decisions.

Funnily enough the whole thing was a wonderful example of why the imperium will eventually fall to the forces of chaos.

http://redelf.narod.ru/w40k/eyeofterror/death_by_thousand_cuts.html

[Filthy Casual]

Yeah, they were organised in inventing battle results to upload to stack the results in their favour.

[Mr Mystery]

Player co-operation is a big part.

You can write a narrative campaign, but if you're players aren't that interested in the narrative of said campaign, it's not gonna work that well.

You can write a tree campaign with a clear victor with the intention of finding a tournament style winner, but if you're players lose interest because of a lack of narrative, it's not gonna work well.

So clearly, you have to pitch it to the tune of the local gaming community.

But equally, the players themselves have to play in the spirit the campaign was written in. No point complaining that you don't get the personal glory because it's done on team points, and no point complaining that someone else played to win if the campaign is designed to lead a single eventual winner.

[Captain Bubonicus]

I look at it as an excuse to build cool themed terrain. "Strategic promethium refinery, eh? Yay, now I can finally get rid of these old coffee cans and plastic tubing I've been hoarding!"

[daboarder]

Yeah, they were organised in inventing battle results to upload to stack the results in their favour.

typical, definitely what I expected of you, maybe you should read up the actual reports? GW knew what was going on which is why the released the game mechanic to the loyalists.

[Wolfshade]

But at the same time the company meddled with the "game" to prevent a complete rout by the forces of chaos, because the chaos players had gotten organized and were tearing the loyalist gamers a new one by stacking their wins and playing towards strategic goals. Conversely the Imperial players and allies were far too fractured and more focused on holding their own small corners than making coherent strategic decisions.

Funnily enough the whole thing was a wonderful example of why the imperium will eventually fall to the forces of chaos.



Very much so, it amused me how orderly chaos were and how chaotic the imperium was :)

[daboarder]

Very much so, it amused me how orderly chaos were and how chaotic the imperium was :)

It made amazing sort of warped sense though, the Chaos faction was generally ordered in its goal as the faction itself is in a sense. While the imperial players were an accurate reflection of the imperium itself, each operating towards its own goals and only managing to hold out largely due to pure weight of numbers.

Take the Dark angels for example, the majority of them just bailed on the cadian gate and concentrated entirely on the ruins of caliban, thats a VERY dark angel thing to do. the Salamanders ended up throwing their might against the Green Krewsade and the various other sub "factions" that made up the imperium and its allies all operated towards their or priorities.

whereas, the chaos players had their eye on the Long war, recognizing the imperium as a whole as the greater foe and its destruction a goal worth at least some level of co operation.

EDIT: I do recommend people go and read what they can about the eye of terror, it really did a contribute a HUGE amount in shaping the direction of the game and the background in the years since, even if it has been now retconned the player attitudes have molded the direction the factions have taken since moreso in some ways that the factions have molded the players.

[Arkhan Land]

Eye of terror was a definetly a real jam

[Cactus]

In narrative campaigns, I like things like character advancement/wounds, maps with little flags or markers to show progress, weekly updates on the progress of the story, and special rules and mission types that reflect that narrative.

Necromunda was one of my first games and to this day I still love the character advancement system and the weather/environment rules.