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Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants
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We’re getting close to being able to launch our new game (a Lords & Ladies style with a grounded fantasy environment), but as we’re approaching that we’ve had some debate back and forth about one of the central ideas that I had when I concocted the idea in the first place, and I wanted to get some feedback from the masses. I realize that BMD isn’t the end all be all, and the cross-section of players here doesn’t even necessarily mesh with the population, but it’s enough of a microcosm and I want to get some additional feedback.
How would you, personally, feel about a game where there are planned time jumps, and so you know going in that your character will age out (or die) within X period of time?
The inspiration of the idea was in games like Crusader Kings where you are making strategic alliances, marriages, etc, forming blood lines, and so on and so forth. And a lot of MUSHes have that as part of the RP, but you never actually see the results.
By using time jumps and generations, as a player you can see and enjoy the fruits of your labor. You work to secure a great strategic marriage for yourself, put your child in a place to be a significant heir, and then with a time jump to the next generation, that child can actually achieve what you set them up for. And you can retire your character (or have them die a heroic death!) and then take on the role of that child, now an adult.
Of course, you don’t HAVE to play your own progeny, you could just take on an entirely different character. Or age your character up and have another player take on the role of your child, and play out that relationship ICly.
It will prevent stagnation - instead of the same Duke Duke of Earle sitting in the role for three years, after a year he dies and a new Duke of Earle takes over. Or all of that political scheming comes to roost and two rivals vie for the seat.
But it also means of course that you have a limit to how long you can play your character, and that’s what I am trying to get at - would knowing that your character will “expire” (literally or metaphorically), does that reduce your interest?
For the sake of the poll, the planned time jumps will be 18 years of IC, so in theory if you started your character as a 20 year old, you could play them through one or two jumps (38, 56) before you’re reaching the point of “old” in fantasy-terms. We’re undecided at the moment about how long of a period we would play OOCly between time jumps - six months, or a year, etc. So curious also to hear if there is a threshold on that - a year between jumps means 2-3 years of viable play time for the PC, six months means 1-1.5 years, etc.
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To clarify, it wouldn’t matter very much to me how long each character exists in between time-jumps to move forward to new arcs and generations. The part that would be make or break for me is how much time and advanced notice there would be prior to those time-jumps happening. As long as characters have time and warning to wrap up their stories in satisfying ways, I think that’s what would be the most impactful piece of enjoyment for me in such a theme.
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@Alveraxus I love the idea of watching my stupid friends bring characters to life, and then playing the children/next gen of those characters as an homage to my stupid friends.
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HELL YEA FOR THE LOVE OF GOD SOMEONE FKN DO THIS
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Having stayed at a game long enough TO play the children of my idiotic PCs kids, yes and please. I enjoyed a lot exploring how their parenting inflicted damage and/or strength onto the child.
I prefer characters with weakness/flaws though, so tend to play them as well meaning but not always good parents.
(Except Norwood. He came written as a good father and gdi, I wasn’t going to change that.)
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@Jenn said in Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants:
To clarify, it wouldn’t matter very much to me how long each character exists in between time-jumps to move forward to new arcs and generations. The part that would be make or break for me is how much time and advanced notice there would be prior to those time-jumps happening. As long as characters have time and warning to wrap up their stories in satisfying ways, I think that’s what would be the most impactful piece of enjoyment for me in such a theme.
It would be fully articulated, and this is a great point that I should have mentioned in the original post.
The time jumps would be on a set IC and OOC schedule (I drew some inspiration from the BSG episode 33 on this), so literally the CHARACTERS know that “every 18 years” something happens, and the PLAYERS know that the generation they are playing will timejump on April 1st every year, for example.
So the characters are building up to THE IC THING and the players have full time to prep.
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I like the idea of pre-planned jumps to retire one generation of characters and start another (one of my favorite old school console RPGs, Phantasy Star III, does this to really cool effect, including story changes depending on what the previous generation did). That said, I’ve never been able to take off with a character in an LnL game as I think that genre specifically isn’t for me. No gripe or anything, just an observation on genre preference.
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The structure appeals to me in terms of preventing stagnation and allowing for bigger kinds of dynastic stories. I voted for ‘at least a year’ because six months feels too short for the kind of Crusader Kings story described, you barely have time to get into the character and their relationships before it’s time for the story to turn over.
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I guess no real reason to be cagey about the theme. Although some details may be shifting before we fully open:
The Kingdoms spend 18 years preparing for an invasion that history has shown happens every 18 years (for Reasons
that will be researchable ICly as part of the meta-plot), and each “generation” of the MUSH would play out the final 6 months or so leading up to that invasion, the immediate aftermath (it’s generally devastating so great opportunity for characters to go out with heroic death) and then picking up the pieces to sort out who is replacing nobles and leaders who die in the struggle.And then we would fast forward 18 years in the future to the final preparations for the invasion again.
Players whose characters didn’t die would have a choice of whether to age them up or write up what happens to them in the intervening 18 years, and so on and so forth.
Another inspiration is Raymond Feist’s Riftwar saga, where seemingly at the end of every book various people get promoted, heirs take over, etc.
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I hope this will be clear and not taken as simple negativity. I am not saying this is a bad idea. However, I wonder if it will have the effects you expect.
While given ‘names’ will age out and die and be replaced by their progeny, I believe all you will do is replace the definition of ‘character.’ Rather than having them represent individuals, they will represent families and bloodlines.
An excellent example of the flaw in this thinking is:
It will prevent stagnation - instead of the same Duke Duke of Earle sitting in the role for three years, after a year he dies and a new Duke of Earle takes over. Or all of that political scheming comes to roost and two rivals vie for the seat.
Mechanically, aside from a name change, how is that different from most other Lords & Ladies games? Sure, we’ve gone from Duke Baron I of Earl to Duke Baron III of Earl. However, it is still the same player in charge of the dukedom (unless another player has overthrown the old family, but that seems about as likely as a non-generational overthrow in your average Lords & Ladies game).
And given that players will gravitate to other players whose RP they enjoy, I doubt the time skip will do much to break up existing cliques. I strongly suspect that most players will simply make new personas that continue the relationship of the previous personas (our families have stood beside one another for generations).
After a time skip, I can’t see myself searching out a player whose RP I don’t enjoy and trying to lay down some groundwork between our new personas. That seems to be a masochistic exercise so that I can claim to be a better role player, and I don’t have the time to undertake unpleasant RP to make some sort of strange claim of superiority.
To be clear, I’m not saying this is a terrible idea or anything like that. The periodic resets allow people to try something new, especially if the new experiment doesn’t work out; the player can move on to something else in 18 months. I’m simply offering my perception that this concept probably won’t be some earth-shaking end-all-be-all transformation of the genre.
And the reason I’m saying that is not to be harmful. Indeed, as I said, it definitely does have the potential to enhance the game if done well. I bring these issues up because if the setting overly focuses on this concept, especially with unrealistic expectations, then there is a genuine danger of the idea moving from ‘enhancement’ to ‘gimmick.’
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@Sage said in Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants:
I hope this will be clear and not taken as simple negativity. I am not saying this is a bad idea. However, I wonder if it will have the effects you expect.
This is exactly why I’m soliciting feedback, so I appreciate it!
While given ‘names’ will age out and die and be replaced by their progeny, I believe all you will do is replace the definition of ‘character.’ Rather than having them represent individuals, they will represent families and bloodlines.
In some cases, yes. In some cases, no.
Mechanically, aside from a name change, how is that different from most other Lords & Ladies games?
In most L&L games that I am familiar with, the same player will play the same character in the same role for the duration of the game.
In this game, the player will at most play a different character (possibly with the same name) in the same role, but there are also mechanics in place to have succession be a bit more fluid and risky. So there is a much higher chance (at least compared to more status quo based L&L games) for it NOT to be Duke Duke II taking over.
(unless another player has overthrown the old family, but that seems about as likely as a non-generational overthrow in your average Lords & Ladies game).
Our goal is to make this very feasible, actually. In fact, one of the Kingdoms specifically has a rotation as part of its succession mechanic by IC tradition (although a PC can always try to usurp that to retain power if they want the same way a PC can try to usurp a declared heir).
And given that players will gravitate to other players whose RP they enjoy, I doubt the time skip will do much to break up existing cliques. I strongly suspect that most players will simply make new personas that continue the relationship of the previous personas (our families have stood beside one another for generations).
We’re really only concerned about cliques where gatekeeping is involved. We fully expect players who want to keep playing with each other to continue to inhabit similar roles/similar families/similar dynamics.
After a time skip, I can’t see myself searching out a player whose RP I don’t enjoy and trying to lay down some groundwork between our new personas. That seems to be a masochistic exercise so that I can claim to be a better role player, and I don’t have the time to undertake unpleasant RP to make some sort of strange claim of superiority.
I do admit that this comment confuses me. Where do you see this happening in what I’ve said so far?
To be clear, I’m not saying this is a terrible idea or anything like that. The periodic resets allow people to try something new, especially if the new experiment doesn’t work out; the player can move on to something else in 18 months. I’m simply offering my perception that this concept probably won’t be some earth-shaking end-all-be-all transformation of the genre.
For sure. That’s one of the goals, is to allow people to try something new, be daring, be different, and not feel that they are sacrificing a character that they could otherwise hold onto for five years.
We’re also not looking to change anything in the genre. We’re looking at offering an alternative to the existing options, and anticipate that demand for our game will be somewhat less than demand for most of the other games as a result. We’re doing something atypical, that we expect will remain atypical.
But something that we think will hold enough appeal among those who would be interested that we can get a hopefully smaller, but passionate player base. We don’t necessarily want to be the largest, we just want people who want to try something new and are excited by what we bring to the table.
We know it’s not going to be for everyone - we just wanted to see if it was for ANYONE.
And the reason I’m saying that is not to be harmful. Indeed, as I said, it definitely does have the potential to enhance the game if done well. I bring these issues up because if the setting overly focuses on this concept, especially with unrealistic expectations, then there is a genuine danger of the idea moving from ‘enhancement’ to ‘gimmick.’
Sure. And I appreciate your comments and callouts for what they are. These are exactly the sorts of ideas that we are looking at, and the feedback and thoughts we are looking for.
Thanks!
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Absolutely. I sometimes think about a supers game I want to run,* where each character will eventually be retired and replaced by a legacy inheritor of the mantle.
*“want to run” in the sense that I don’t care nearly enough to learn the necessary coding skills, to acquire a domain, or to build a staff to support it
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I can see the time jump approach being really beneficial for faction leadership fatigue. When it stops being fun (which it always does) there’s a built in out that doesn’t involve letting some total stranger play your beloved character.
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The main thought running through my head with this idea is prohibiting people from playing part of the same lineage in a row. So if you’re the head of the Chesterton house in the year 1000, you can’t be the Chestertons in 1018; you would have to be a descendant of someone else’s character.
But that’d take a lot of trust and probably too much admin oversight.
He/Him. Opinions and views are solely my own unless specifically stated otherwise.
BE AN ADULT -
As a small sort of potential alternate path for this, I am also for a game with a stated RL end date that forces the retirement of all characters via a terminal plot point.
Meteor strikes the planet and kills everyone. Old god rises and devours the planet… whatever. Just as long as the game has a hard RL end date.
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@Pavel said in Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants:
The main thought running through my head with this idea is prohibiting people from playing part of the same lineage in a row. So if you’re the head of the Chesterton house in the year 1000, you can’t be the Chestertons in 1018; you would have to be a descendant of someone else’s character.
But that’d take a lot of trust and probably too much admin oversight.
I don’t see a problem with someone investing in a single family line multiple times, over the course of multiple characters (probably from different angles, since you could conceivably a fighter, social character, healer, etc. in any new incarnation). If that’s what interests them and they aren’t a problem player in other ways, making it against the rules reads to me as a kind of arbitrary bureaucracy. If anything, it might help staff maintain thematic continuity since you’d have players around who know the history and IC culture of a faction.
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@helvetica I never said it was a problem, it was just an idea.
He/Him. Opinions and views are solely my own unless specifically stated otherwise.
BE AN ADULT -
I love this so fkn much. It is so cool to see one generation effect the world (solve a major problem/big bad/disaster/whatever) and then skip forward to play in the fallout. I was on one IRC game that did this, and it was so neat. Sometimes the skips would be 4-5 years, sometimes 10+.
I think it works especially well in a Mu* situation, with requests and whatnot, since you CAN give advance notice of a skip, and maybe let your players +req one or two things they’d love to see resolved, or set in motion for the future. …Personal things, I mean, since most Family/House/Metaplot things will be taken care of.
It’s a lot of work, but Arx’s rapid fire crises-to-the-end is honestly pretty satisfying, and it could definitely make sure everyone’s satisfied before a timeskip. Wayyy smaller scale, though. What Arx is doing is not sustainable. ‘please +req up to two (2) things you would like to see resolved across any/all characters before/during the timeskip’. Something like that.
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@devu said in Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants:
I love this so fkn much. It is so cool to see one generation effect the world (solve a major problem/big bad/disaster/whatever) and then skip forward to play in the fallout. I was on one IRC game that did this, and it was so neat. Sometimes the skips would be 4-5 years, sometimes 10+.
It’s a lot of work, but Arx’s rapid fire crises-to-the-end is honestly pretty satisfying, and it could definitely make sure everyone’s satisfied before a timeskip. Wayyy smaller scale, though. What Arx is doing is not sustainable. ‘please +req up to two (2) things you would like to see resolved across any/all characters before/during the timeskip’. Something like that.
I was thinking about that, too. And about like, okay… did this player not finish their character’s life work before the skip? Would I, as their child, feel the need to finish that work somehow? That could be cool, provided the former player isn’t too disappointed if something like that were to occur.
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@helvetica said in Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants:
@devu said in Thoughts on pre-planned Time Jumps to Retire Characters and Play Their Descendants:
I love this so fkn much. It is so cool to see one generation effect the world (solve a major problem/big bad/disaster/whatever) and then skip forward to play in the fallout. I was on one IRC game that did this, and it was so neat. Sometimes the skips would be 4-5 years, sometimes 10+.
It’s a lot of work, but Arx’s rapid fire crises-to-the-end is honestly pretty satisfying, and it could definitely make sure everyone’s satisfied before a timeskip. Wayyy smaller scale, though. What Arx is doing is not sustainable. ‘please +req up to two (2) things you would like to see resolved across any/all characters before/during the timeskip’. Something like that.
I was thinking about that, too. And about like, okay… did this player not finish their character’s life work before the skip? Would I, as their child, feel the need to finish that work somehow? That could be cool, provided the former player isn’t too disappointed if something like that were to occur.
Hell yeah, unfinished business could be an AMAZING plot hook/backstory! Not everything needs to be tied in a neat bow, and some things are better left unfinished? But sometimes there’s also one or two things you really want to see through on a character, and it’d be nice to find a way to accomodate that while still keeping to a reasonable workload for staff, and not just… dragging things out so a handful of people can finish up?
