So says Lowell Francis in this recent post on the always-outstanding Age of Ravens blog (and if you're not reading that blog, why the hell not?); I couldn't agree more with the sentiment. NPCs are my Achilles Heel when it comes to running games. They're nigh essential to most any good game, but they present an endless source of headaches (many of which are elucidated in Mr. Francis's post, so I won't repeat them here).
To that end, I've been thinking about a nearly-forgotten (it seems) section in the old GURPS 3rd Edition Basic Set. On page 180, under the heading "Playing the Adversary", we read:
When the GM plays an NPC who is an enemy of the player characters, he should try to limit his knowledge to those things that the NPCs would really be aware of. The GM knows all about the party's strengths and weaknesses - but the enemies don't. One good way to solve this problem is to have another person play the adversary characters.
The GM should tell the Adversary as much as possible about the characters he is to play. But the Adversary should know no more than is "realistic" about the overall situation. In particular, he should know very little about the PCs and their abilities - especially at the beginning of an adventure! For total realism, you might even want two Adversary players - one for the knowledgeable enemies who are familiar with the party, and one for stupid cannon fodder.
The Adversary is like an "assistant GM." His job is to roleplay the foes as well as possible.The Basic Set was literally the second gaming book I ever bought and read, and I remember that section well. It kind of blew my mind, the idea of this para-GM helping to run the game and constituting a separate brain behind the screen. As I was still very new to gaming, I wasn't sure just how "normal" this Adversary idea was. In the two decades since, however, I've only seen a similar idea expressed in one other place, and that was simply in notes detailing a "deluxe" Cthulhu convention scenario (No Man's Land) that utilized sound effects, mood lighting, and kabuki-esque assistants dressed in black. The Basic Set presented the idea of the Adversary as if it were a perfectly normal aspect of the RPG gaming experience, but I have yet to see that reflected either in real life or in other rulebooks.
Yet the simple idea expressed in the Basic Set has merit, I think. It would certainly take much of the burden of running games off my shoulders. I'd be very interested to hear from any readers who have tried employing an Adversary-style co-GM to play the NPCs or villains of their campaigns. Does anyone do it as a matter of course or is it strictly for deluxe scenarios like No Man's Land?
I brought in a player as an Adversary player (without knowing of this terminology) for the opening run of my Legacy of the Bieth campaign. He wound up running the town's nefarious ruler and his troops; I gave him carte blanche on how he wanted to distribute his forces, what he wanted in his war camp, and so forth. My job was simply to adjudicate the (very much) brewing confrontation between him and the PCs.
ReplyDeleteIt worked excellently. Bringing him in let him work on presenting the NPCs in a consistent and interesting manner, while letting me focus on considering the ramifications of their actions on others and the world around them. I didn't give my assistant DM much info on the players, but on the world and his NPC's primary motivations and goals.
No dressing in black and kabuki theatre style art, though. Next time.
I've only done this by email, with remote players. I assigned out major NPCs to each of a few interested friends, and I'd email them a quick summary of what they knew and ask them what to have their NPC do. They didn't run the NPC at the table, but they'd give me if-then statements to use in play. "If the PCs fail at their mission, I (yadda yadda). If the PCs succeed, I reward them with (yadda yadda)."
ReplyDeleteIt led to fun when the PCs would do something crazy that *I* might think the NPC would react negatively to, but the adversary player thought was awesome.
It's a good way to inject interesting NPCs without resorting to random rolls.
We had a guest player in one session of Dungeons and Dragons who turned out to be an Adversary. It worked pretty well, but I don't know if we could have sustained it in the long run. Thanks for introducing me to Age of Ravens, by the way!
ReplyDeleteWraith: the Oblivion suggested a couple things like that. But then, Wraith: the Oblivion tried a lot of wild things...
ReplyDeleteI've seen something like this once in a LARP. The shut-in head of a faction was played by an out of town PC, but it was trouble and more work than it was worth. To keep up with the plot, his underlings in the faction had to give extensive descriptions of what was going on in the game, which meant a lot of extra work for the players.
ReplyDeleteWith a villain, it's likely to mean a lot of work for the GM. He has to explain his campaign to someone who isn't directly involved, and then spend a lot of time updating the Adversary player. If you have enough time to make these arrangements, it could prove fruitful, but I suspect it would be a headache.
Another concern that springs to mind is that the players who enjoy the villain role may want to regularly contribute, which means the rest of the party could become frustrated when they see, 'Oh, it's him again.' If you decide to go this route, I'd suggest making it clear that there's a bit of 'cool off' time before the villain makes their next move. I'd also be a bit concerned that the villain player would get miffed if you had to run 'his' character when the party decides to track down the baddie and put him to bed for good.
Mira's suggestion above for a 'Sixth Ranger' is a great idea, though. I'd be tempted to keep them around for a few sessions before springing that sort of surprise.
Although I've raised a lot of concerns here, I do think the idea does have serious merit. I hope you can make it work for you!
@robertjparker - I wound up meeting once with my Adversary player before the game, giving him a quick sketch of his villain, his forces available, and the personality of the historical figure I had based the NPC on originally (Baron Ungern). After that, the Adversary player showed up to the sessions and took on the roles of NPCs as needed (the Baron's guards, his son, and ultimately the Baron himself).
ReplyDeleteThe players knew that my Adversary player was in fact taking on those roles, and were able to interact with him appropriately. I'm not sure about the utility of sneaking a mole into the party - that just sounds like a recipe for awkwardness when ANY player has to introduce a new character going forward, as the once-burned group is going to go to extreme measures to make sure that the new character is trustworthy, delaying actual gameplay.
(If that's what you want out of gameplay, though, then rock on and don't listen to my objections!)
This can be a great way to deal with groups splitting up into lots of little parties too, so long as you avoid one obvious feature; don't give the adversary relationship to the players who get on the least, or the player who's characters are most likely to disagre give it to a player who gets on really well.
ReplyDeleteWhy? Because that encourages the player to do it all in character, because they don't really want to stop the guy, but they do want to give them proper backup with a good nasty foe to defeat. Less reality, more
And there's another important reason. When you've got lots of player groups running around, it's pretty much gaurenteed that you'll cross the streams at some point, so you don't want the player having his normal character and his adversary character on the same side, and have to try to roleplay conversation between them!
Damn, post comment instead of preview. You get the idea though.
ReplyDelete@Allandaros,
ReplyDeleteThat's true. I imagine if you were to pull off an 'Adversary' character, you'd then have to promise the party that it was a one-time deal so that it doesn't give them license to hassle new players.
That said, I can imagine the horrified look on the party's faces as they realize that they've been 'had', preferably in the middle of the fight with the 'level boss.'