[UA] Re: Story-Centered or Player-Centered

[Mattias Östklint]

This is a good question. One of my better GM sucesses revolved around 
(this was werewolf) a small caern, near a small ex coal-mining town in 
wales. I based it in equal parts on murder mysteries TV shows (Morse is a 
good example, but also agatha christie) and Trainspotting. I had the Caern 
and its three elder members well figured out, and some of the more 
frequent "regular people" by name and demeanor, and I have a mission 
statement for the characters: make this caern flourish again. After that 
they were on their own. They had people to ask and plot-dispenser aplenty, 
but pretty much anyyhing was ok, I asked them to give me some advance 
warning if the wanted to do something very different, but other than that 
just went with it.

This campaign had two things going for it. 

First, it was situated (with shorter detours) in one small area that I had 
figures out. Made improvising a LOT easier and consistent.
Two, the players (and the characters in this case, but that's not strictly 
necessary) had a larger mission. That ment that they didn't do too crazy 
things, and also meant that they pretty much wrote the adventures 
themselves.

It made for quite relaxed GM-ing, and they had a lot of fun and freedom. 
And you know what - it turned into a pretty good story after all, with 
slower periods, frantic action, great drama, love, visionquests, social 
realism and an original theme song. (kidding about the song)

Mattias


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