Running multiple characters?, Running multiple characters? Options

[grantsmilitary]

Hello. I'm Grant.

I was wondering what you all think about running multiple characters? I don't want to run multiple full characters. I was thinking use the Beck's system and if I can make multiple characters in the same amount of Karma as everyone else has I shoulod be allowed to run them. Would that be correct? Thanks for any responses.

Grant

[arcady]

Beck's system?


I never allow players to play multiple characters.

The role of the player is to be the actor behind a given persona, bringing it to life within the game. When you have more than one your focus will be split. Bits of 'characterization' from one will spill into the next and they will invariably all show as being agents of the same larger personality. Each character is thus weaker for every additional character added.

[Jrayjoker]

Do whatever your GM will allow. If you can keep several characters' stats, abilities, and personalities separate and have fun doing it, then rock on! I personally feel it would lead to a rather flat game, but if you need more characters to play effectively then go ahead.

You did mean play simultaneously, right? If that is the case, then give them all battletac computers and small unit tactics to account for the fact that one person is directing all their actions without the necessary lapses in communication.

[wagnern]

Part of roleplaying is dealing with situations that are not your specalty

if you have Mr Combat and Mr Talk, then you would just jump into whom ever is best at the moment and the other would become a cardboard cutout on a skateboard with a rope to pull him along.

[hyzmarca]

[Wounded Ronin]

Yeah, I'd say that multiple PCs results in a powerful hive-mind effect that is too powerful.

[L.D]

I have played in campaigns where we had two characters each and it worked just fine.

[SL James]

I've run multiple PCs for years, and then playing GM it's a given. However, I rarely if ever had multiple PCs ongoing at the same time or same run.

[arcady]

[SL James]

[arcady]

After insulting me, you show you're failure to understand me by in part of your post agreeing with me in your attempt to disagree when you note focus on story.

That's the GM's job - focusing on the story. Not on individual NPCs.

However NPCs do not hold the same weight as PCs. A GM focuses on the story, and the setting, and NPCs are toold to convey that. The PCs however, are the protagonists - the central characters in the drama. The story -must- revolve around what they do.

The amount of attention placed on any one NPC should ideally be at least equal to the amount of attention placed on every NPC combined. Provided you have good players who are active players and you don't just sit there and grandstand your own characters in the guise of pretending to GM, PCs will hold greater weight.

That is the nature of a protagonist.

NPCs are -not- main characters. They might be major characters, but never main characters. They will develop in terms of how they are important to the story and to the PCs, but not on their own individual merits for the sake of their own stories unless a GM is doing something wrong.

The role of the GM is to convey the setting and stage the story so that the PCs can then 'tell' that story through their actions - not observe it through watching the actions of GM-PCs.

[mfb]

meh. s'why i like SL. the distinction between PC and NPC gets severely blurred. it makes the game more believable to me, because my characters aren't the center of every story.

[Cain]

While a GM has to develop some of the NPCs to a greater degree, this does not hold true for all NPCs. The old lady at the counter of the Stuffer Shack, for example, isn't anything but an automaton unless the story dictates otherwise. Corpsec goons don't need an extensive backstory, either.

Even critical NPC's shouldn't be developed to the same degree as the PC's. The PC's take center stage in just about every adventure, and so have more game time to develop. Central NPC's should only take the spotlight occasionally-- otherwise, you run the risk of turning them into GMPC's, which is universally a bad idea.

[SL James]

[lollerskates]

if i didn't know better, i would think that debating about GMing style is a road that goes nowhere.

[Critias]

The story doesn't always revolve around the PCs, the PCs generally revolve around the story. Events aren't always under their control. NPCs (even contacts) have their own agendas. NPCs (even contacts) should also, as such, have their own personalities, backgrounds, etc.

If you're a GM (or player) that prefers to always have the group of PCs be in the spotlight with the 2060+ world reacting to them (instead of them reacting to the world), more power to ya, and have fun. But that play style's a lot more like Ryan Mercury than it is Dirk Montgomery, I'd say.

[SL James]

[Glyph]

The players may not be the center of every plot, but the game revolves around them. If they are only peripherally involved in the big plot to upset the upcoming municipal elections, fine - but the game should involve that peripheral involvement, and the other things that the players are doing, and they can catch the rest of it on the news and say "Hey, that's the guy they had us frame, when they hired us to put troll porn into his laptop!"

There's absolutely nothing wrong with the PCs being bit players - it's just that they should rarely be mere spectators.

[SL James]

You don't think I play every NPC, do you?

I GM a bunch of people who also GM, and run multiple PC shadowrunners and NPC non-runners (mostly non-runners). This isn't my will imposed on my players who resent me every time I do it. It's a massive storytelling exercise.

The distinction rests in the fact that NPCs are allowed a certain amount of fiat that PCs are not (specifically with regard to numerical values).

This post has been edited by SL James: Aug 9 2005, 07:09 AM

[hyzmarca]

The story always revolves around the PCs even when the plot does not.
SHadowrun PCs generally suffer from David Banner Syndrome.
The plots of the Incredible Hulk never revolved around Banner. He was always caught up in other people's problems. However, the Incredable Hulk was his story. When he left town the camera followed him. It was his devolpment and his feelings that mattered.



The NPCs are important because they make the world that the PCs play in.
Generic NPC syndrome is a terrible thing. We've all experienced it at one time, usually on computer and console RPGs. All of the guards have the same uniform, the same face, the same weapon, the same voice, and they all say the exact same thing. In every town you meet the exact same people who just happen to go by different names.


A player who controls two PCs can let his personality bleed through or slip up and mix the two characters up. However, a GM who controls dozens of NPCs is just as susceptible to this, if not more so.

The grizzled old war veteran should not have the same personality as the :nuyen:30,000 per hour joygirl.

The real problem with generic NPCs arises when the players put them on certerstage. It is okay for old lady at the Stuffer Shack to be a mindless drone, untill I overreact when a Star officer comes in for coffee and I take her hostage. Then how will she react? How will she react when I take her with me insted of lettering her go or killing her? What will she say when I apologize for taking her hostage and try to make some smalltalk? Or will she just clobber me with her 36 unarmed combat dice the second I make a move against her?

[SL James]

[Cain]

[Cain]

[lollerskates]

[Wounded Ronin]