Spliting the party

Not to disagree with K (deliberate joke) but... I've found that PCs that do not have well defined long term goals drift to the point where either they, their GMs, their fellow players, or some combination of the three have their experience and enjoyment worsened. Just from past experience.

Do let me know if it gets that way. I'm not indifferent.

Archengeia wrote:Not to disagree with K (deliberate joke) but... I've found that PCs that do not have well defined long term goals drift to the point where either they, their GMs, their fellow players, or some combination of the three have their experience and enjoyment worsened.  Just from past experience.

Yes, thank you for bringing that up Arch. That is exactly why we are talking about player goals.

I'm sorry for the theatrics everyone but if your guy's Ultimate Goal wasn't "Defeat the Vyeotians" and only "Defeat the Vyeotians," we already have a problem. Writing for a roleplaying game is kind of like a rubber band--it needs to be able to stretch to accommodate what the players want to do but if you end up stretching it too much, something will end up giving and the whole game will break under the weight of aimless, and unending, slog. Not a perfect analogy but I hope you guys get what I mean.

So let's try player goals one more time along with some hard truths.

Each of the three Primus campaigns has or will have a specific Ultimate Goal. There is no other way to do it. Any more, and the party is going every which way and accomplishing nothing (Sound familiar, anyone?). Any less, and the party is going nowhere and accomplishing, you guessed it, nothing. While Primus is a sandbox setting, there are clear and present dangers that require whole campaigns worth of heroes working in their own semi-contained teams to take down their own personal big bads for this setting to even have a chance in hell of being saved. That's how complex Arch's world is. And every time we are not on the same page this one man over here is pulling his figurative hair out wondering where he went wrong and why the party isn't picking up his plot hooks.

So please, help a fella out and let's get this locked down.

K Goals:

Rory Goals:

So how about you Essoje? Anything you want to add or any questions you have? How does the idea of being leader in the third campaign sound?

Not much to add, really, and I doubt I will have questions until later on. Not only I agree with the points you wrote down as being things I need to work on, I also think that since I started with the idea of going my own way with Javan, might as well man up and take responsibility for it all (delegations included).

Now that we got some basics started, we just need to see how the next weeks in the current campaign fare first and then move things along.

Sidekick. Defeat Vyeotians. Got it.

Ultimate goal

Scions:

This Vyeotians thing is very huge and very personal, so going after them is something I can get behind 100%. And it's going to go a long way with ending the war and restoring economic balance to the continent, so okay, that will do it for me. Just give it a little flair.

Party Role

Spoiler:

While we're there, was there ever going to be a way for us to make the Gaerlan coins "safe"? I feel like it's just clutter now. Just say that the other group has them. I have a feeling it's related to Scions, and we can't go there.

The Gaerlan coins are... unlikely to be made 'safe' but could be used carefully and strategically if one so desired. The same could have been said for the Tusker Mines too really.

Before I forget again, I'll respond to you Rory. Sorry it has taken me so long.

Rory wrote:1. I loved your word choice, this is what made me laugh. I don't know how many players statistically enjoy playing utility characters or supporting playstyle, but I do make an exception for Vahrran. As much as I want to bring him into an offensive combat role with the Force, I'm actually enjoying this 'mind over matter' style with him, using his(not mine) mental acumen to benefit the party and outsmart the enemy.

Whenever I think of Rory the character, I always think of Minsc from the Baldur's Gate games. They share some traits in common though Rory is very much not the comic relief half the time. If you ever play those games be sure to recruit Minsc into your party. I think you'll get a kick out of his dialogue.

As for Vahrran, I see him as fighting on the battlefield of the mind, a description I think is apt for you. When we level up again in Star Wars I'll help you out with some mechanics suggestions along those lines. That's very much an archetype supported by the game.

Rory wrote:2. Alright, we'll address this now, for this campaign at least. At first, I wanted to stop the bad guys, and that was it. But when Fierneceal got involved, it intrigued me that instead I should let her be the star. She was more tied to the plot involving the man we were set on stopping than all of us combined, and being a human, and being what she was on Vesayen, it only made sense that Rory would see this as an opportunity to help her cross the finish line first and do everything he could to help her out, but I still wanted to be pretty damn heroic in my involvement, and/or possibly in my death. Now she's gone, but she's been his inspiration and a wake-up call. He believes he's done all he can for humanity, but he can still stop what the Vyeotians have planned and maybe put an end to the Scions' plotting, for her sake.

Thanks for sharing that insight into Rory's thinking. I'll add it to my impression.

Rory wrote:3. I think I see what you mean. If it helps, the huge drama for Rory's drinking was supposed to be a fear of dying. The situation, the possible takeover in Holtburg, seemed so small and stupid to him compared to the Exchange's ultimate goal, and as much as he liked the idea of helping make things better for people there, he didn't want that to be his death. What we have in the thread for that is a little botched by comparison, although our enemies are the Aristocrats and we still have some sort of conflict on our hands, so we could probably still use that in the thread. He believes that if he has to die for any current issue, it should be for something worthwhile. We could make that a weakness, it seems pretty clear that he doesn't feel like he matters or has much of worth. I want to stress that this isn't how I feel. Maybe sometimes, but I make a habit of reminding myself that what I have a role to play that I fit very well, and that's certainly true for for my presence in the Exchange. This is really how Rory feels. I didn't really think about how his want to do something that matters might be inverted on his own self-worth, but we can take that and run with it.

I think that's a great idea. I felt a little lost in the conversation because the only experience I have with trying to get a drunk off the booze was some tough love, but I didn't feel like that would work for Rory, so I went in without a plan basically. That's why I started trying to prompt you to talk more, so I could have something to jump on. And then you never posted back.

Wait what? C'mon forum, where were you on that notification?

It seems to be doing whatever it wants these days. It's very annoying having to manually check all the threads we are active in.

So after watching Arch's Primus video on the forum players and see him losing it when reading Rory's 3 goals (save humanity, crush Vyeotians, crush Pinnacle) and saying they are contradictory in camera, plus various previous conversations that made little sense at the time makes me wonder if going after the Vyeotians is really to the best interest of the folk leaving, both player and character-wise.

Arch suggested having a sort of Q&A thing about Primus itself with the forum players once he's back, so we might want to consider some alternatives before jumping into the Vyeotian train. I want to, for one.

Personally, i don't think it's a good idea to act on the gut reactions or OOC commentary on the GM's part that aren't specifically directed at the players in the interest of Role/Gameplay. At least not to the point that it'll override your own judgement as a PC.

Besides, an organization's ultimate goal, while important, does not excuse all the crap the Vyeotians pull to get to it. Granted, this is the opinion of a guy who makes little distinction - if any, between ends and means, so you may take that with a grain of salt; and by no means am i trying to discourage you - especially now that i seem to have found something i can do within the Exchange (thank you Rory), but just saying that Arch should feel free to express that kind of amusement without having to worry about us being swayed, and we should be able to judge things objectively based on what we get from the game itself before we consider what the GM said, practically off the record. If nothing else, if Arch were of a less honest disposition, he might well engineer reactions like that to throw us off balance. Not that i believe he would for a second, just trying to put it in perspective.

In-character, we don't know anything about the Vyeotians, except that they murdered every Undermarket's middle managers, that they were ready to attack one entire town to get rid of one managers who did escape and "enslaved" people through technological means to do their bidding. They are also the prime suspects in the assassination attempts of Rory's and Kolson's families. So from what I know about the Vyeotians, they're our enemy and I highly doubt any discussion could change my opinion on the matter. I just want them dead.

But whether you decide to leave the party or not is another matter which ultimately doesn't concern me. You, Rory and Higaide can discuss the issue and I won't interfere.

K, I think you misunderstood my post, which is probably my fault. Let me try to be more clear about it. It wasn't as much of a gut reaction as it was the last piece of a puzzle being set in place. And the result of that puzzle tells me one thing: I know almost nothing about the setting, and haven't tried to learn more.

My reasoning for going after the Vyeotians before was mainly because of what I now see as a lack of options: the Vyeotians are, as by their actions, clearly evil from our character's past experiences. We don't really have anything like that besides the Scions stuff and the Pinnacle, which the live party and the Exchange have bids on already. The Vyeotians were my prime choice because I lacked another clear target to go after, so I didn't even think about it when Zeiss named-dropped them and just accepted it.

I reluctantly tried to play my part in the Exchange before, but it was never what I wanted for Javan, and just assumed I had to be part of it to continue playing in the campaign at all. Now that Arch showed that was not the case (or at least this changed between then and now) and it dawned on me that I am quite ignorant to be making a real decision here, could you really say that wishing to learn more is a bad idea?

Just to specify something: Rory's third goal to foil the Pinnacle's plans isn't contradictory to the first two. Xahn and Arch only thought it would be funnier if it was the case.

As for other villains we know about except the Vyeotians: the Supremacy, which the Eleven told us about. They seem to be in charge of the Tumeroks, or just control them. That's pretty much all we know about them. We have no knowledge of any other name dropped villain in this setting, except maybe the Aristocrats, which is recent.

Really, this game is an open sandbox. You can choose your own villain or work on your personal project if you want. But whatever you choose to do, you and the other party members will have to form a consensus on what your long-term goal is. Except the destruction of the Vyeotians, I have no idea what else could convince the three of you to work together towards a common goal.

*give the mic to Rory, Higaide and Javan*

I'll go fly with my butterflies right now.

*flap flap*

My objectives have been updated since I originally pointed my finger at the Pinnacle(since we've decided to take assigned villains). He hasn't said we can't go after the Vyeotians, so that's what we're going to do. First step is finding Whizzle of Cogspanner and getting him to help us. With science!

I'd really want to take a look at the other options Rory. I know that it makes sense for your character, but for me, as I explained, it's more complicated than that.

Back from GenCon. Sorry for the OOC reaction. All will be clear soon... maybe.

Thanks to how things got stumbled over the 4th week thread for so long, I'm going to ask anyone other than Zeiss (where I know his final post) to re-post any 5th week actions they'd like to take. I'd also like to know if splitting the party is officially, formally a thing, and when you plan to do this.

Finally, I AM going to set up that Q&A thread. Ask anything, you will get in-character answers.

Welcome back.

I'm all for it, and I think it would be appropriate for it to happen during or after Zeiss decides makes his move against the Aristocrats.

Welcome back Arch. How was GenCon? Did you see any new cool RPGs?

Editing together the video for it now but we mostly tried out board-game stuff. That being said we had a lot of fun with a D&D board game, Castle Ravenloft.

Can't wait to watch it. I'll go one day, GenCon! *shakes fist for some reason*

Heard Spoony talk about Ravenloft, kinda curious.

Will deal with Week 5 tomorrow, my bed looks very very comfortable right now...

You people going through some RL biz?