Grand Experiments: West Marches (part 4), Death & Danger
As I’ve said before (and any of the players will tell you) West Marches was dangerous by design. Danger encourages teamwork because you have to work together to survive. It also forces players to think: if they make bad decisions they get wiped out, or at least “chased into the swamp like little sissy girls” (one of Karen’s best lines, back in the first days in the kobold caves, and a recurring game quote).
It’s an open secret that every GM fudges sometimes, or glosses over closely checking rolls and just hand waves things. It’s part of the art to do it well and gracefully. No such thing in West Marches: I rolled all dice in the open, not behind the screen. If the dice said you sucked a critical, a critical you did suck.
Did this lead to looming specter of sudden death? Yes, but having strong and fairly unyielding consequences combined with a consistent, logical environment meant the players really could make intelligent decisions that determined their fate — they really did hold their own lives in their hands.
Of course for that to work the sandbox had to be built with internal logic and consistency that the players could decipher…
Danger Gradients: Paths of Exploration
West Marches was intended to be a campaign environment, where characters would start at low level (1st actually) and then push farther and farther out into the wilds as they advanced. When I was creating the game map I marked each region with a specific encounter level (EL) to gauge the kind of threats that were normal there. The logical pattern was a rising gradient of danger: the farther you get from the safety of town, the more dangerous the land became.
In most cases there were no steep changes in encounter level as you moved from region to region: if you were in an EL 3 area, an adjacent region would probably be EL 4 or 5 at most. This makes good game play, but also matches game world logic: the goblins in the mountains don’t magically stay on their side of the fence, some wander into Cradle Wood (the adjacent region) and some even go as far as the Battle Moors (the region beyond that). Distance was generally walking distance not “as the stirge flies”, so the far side of a mountain range might be quite a bit more dangerous since it was effectively “farther” from town.
Mountains, rivers, valleys and similar terrain features divided up the West Marches, creating separate paths of exploration. Players were free to jump around and explore where ever they liked, but there was a tendency to return to previously explored areas just to see what the next region out looked like. So if a party started exploring west into Wil Wood, they would probably push into the Frog Marshes, then the Dwarven Caves, then the Notch Fells, each region harder than the last. But if they explored north into the Moors, they would push into Cradle Wood, Ghost Wood, then the Goblin’s Teeth and so on. Each region also held tidbits that revealed details about the farther regions. By the time you reach the ruins in Harbor Wood you’ve hit lots of clues pointing at their druidic origins.
Multiple exploration paths also meant that a player could level up exploring one direction, die horribly somewhere high level (sorry Mike, two hydras was cruel), and then start a new 1st level character and explore completely different areas. You didn’t have to go back to the same low level areas because there were multiple low level areas (and multiple medium level areas, and multiple high level areas, and so on).
The players never knew I had these potential exploration paths planned out, they just pushed farther and farther into the wilds in whatever direction they started going.
Danger Pockets: Barrow Mounds & Treasure Rooms
Not everything in a region obeyed the overall encounter level — how exciting would that be? Some regions had sharp pockets of danger, like the barrow mounds in the middle of the otherwise pleasant Wil Wood.
By logic those pocket encounter areas had to be either sealed away or isolated somehow, otherwise they would change the EL of the region around them. If the wights stay in their mounds, the rest of the wood is still relatively safe. If the wights go roaming through the forest, Wil Wood should just have a higher EL.
Usually these pockets were either easy to find and well known or hard to find and completely unknown. This kept players from just bumping into extreme danger with no warning — they either knew about the danger spot and could avoid it if they wanted, or didn’t know about it and would only find it with searching, in which case they knew they were unearthing something unusual. If they were smart that would be enough to get them to proceed with caution.
Dungeon design was also a little different than normal. In a traditional game the adventurers sweep through a dungeon and never look back, but as I covered in part 3 the ongoing environment meant every dungeon was a permanent feature. Dungeons generally had the same or near EL as the region they were in (for all the obvious reasons), but to make things interesting I designed many of the dungeons with “treasure rooms” that were harder than the standard EL, well hidden, or just plain impossible to crack. So even when a party could slog through and slaughter everything they met, there was a spot or two they couldn’t clear, whether it was the fearsome Black Door, the ghoul-infested crypts of the ruined monastery, or the perilous Hall of Swords. They usually had to give up and make a strong mental note to come back later when they were higher level.
Lots of times they _never_ came back. They really wanted to, they talked about it all the time, but they never got around to it because they were busy exploring new territory. Rather than being frustrating each new “incomplete” seemed to make players even more interested in the game world.
Was there actually good treasure in the treasure rooms? Yes, really good treasure. Every time the players cracked one it just made them more certain that all those other sealed or well-guarded rooms they couldn’t beat were chock full of goodness.
Postscript
In Gamist-Narrativist-Simulationist (GNS) terms, West Marches was gamist (make bad decisions and you die, roll bad and you die) and heavily simulationist (if you’re in the woods in winter and you have no food you’re in trouble).
An interesting side effect was that West Marches put me (the GM) in a more neutral position. I wasn’t playing any scheming NPCs or clever plots, so I wasn’t portraying intelligent opposition and didn’t have any ulterior motives. The environment was already set, so instead of making up challenges that matched the party I just dutifully reported what they found wherever they went. When I rolled I would freely tell the players what bonuses or target numbers they were up against, so the players looked at the dice to see the result, not me.
In many of the West Marches games it really felt like the PCs versus the world with me as an impartial observer. The players didn’t “see” my hand just the game world, which is about the most any GM can hope for.
Big kudos to Mike, Gavin, Karen, Chris, Dan, Ping, Seth, Jem, Jen, Rob, Russell, Paul, Trey, Zach, Roy, Tommy, Mike M, Charissa, John, and Paul G. I kept trying to kill them and they kept coming back. What more can you ask for in players?
postscript: Running your own West Marches
Leave a reply to Geoff
Thanks for answering! I meant how do they get to know the location of other dungeons? Do they only find them by exploring or do you give them detailed info of where they could find them?
@Francisco: I’ve got an answer for you! West Marches: Finding the Dungeons
Hi! I’ve reading a lot your blog and I was wondering if you have some examples of how you present info about other places to players in a natural way?
@Francisco: Sorry, not sure I understand the question.
[…] Every location should have the option for the players to return. This might be in the form of a treasure room or monsters that return or a location that […]
[…] along the periphery and no “areas of civilization”. The regions were inspired by the West Marches campaign idea of increasing difficulty as one gets further from settlements though it’s not […]
[…] Spikes of Danger were Ben’s approach — he didn’t call them that. He called them danger gradients and Danger Pockets. […]
You certainly could play a style of west marches where you summarized weeks of travel in a few minutes and only had encounters that often, but otherwise yeah that seems like a long time if you’re going to have the party return to the town at the end of each session.
Most original west marches environments would take a few days to cross, depending on whether you were meandering and exploring or just cutting straight through. Some you could cross in a few hours.
To clarify, I am also concerned that my ‘zones’ are too large. I just did some measurements, and one of my zones would take close to a month to pass all the way through if going the long way across it. I’m curious to know from either you, Ben, or any of the players, how transitioning to different zones felt. Were they days apart, weeks?
Thank you,
Vale
Frost:
Thank you! It’s lovely to see some of the player perspective. Cracked up at the Pike bit.
Ben & Frost:
Sorry, by ‘story’ I meant the ongoing activities entirely agnostic of players unless players harassed them, exactly what you described. Thank you!
Ben:
Great point about making variable size zones. I’ll keep that in mind.
I’m mostly just trying to figure out how many Points of Interest to pack into a zone, and how to come up with the ideas. I’m doing the Layering and I’ve made random monster tables. (I’m playing AD&D 1e)
And while you may not have had hexes (I’m using squares), you certainly had a system for length of time to travel, I imagine?
Thank you both!!!
Vale
re size of wilderness “zones”, there’s no standard size. A big forest can be right next to a tiny forest, just like in nature. Whatever seems right.
I’d argue that varying sizes is actually much better than cookie cutter consistency. And again, West Marches did not use hex maps.
Moments later? It was at least, uh, two solid minutes before the centaur killed you.
http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/704/dear-west-marches/
I’ll admit I’m a little leery of the word “story” in this context. Yes, things are happening. Goblins are scouting the Moors, spiders are spreading in Wil Wood, smugglers are setting up a base in the Sunken Fort, and cultists are exhuming an old temple. But if you start to think in terms of story, you start to *want* players to get involved in particular ways, which is not the West Marches mode.
These things are just happening, whether the players ever know about them or not.
Eventually the players’ actions may set up the dominos so that they really are embroiled in story (Hextorites at the Stockade, I’m looking at you) but that’s not something you should try to create. It emerges organically, or it doesn’t.
_but if I call it Centaur Grove they immediately have ideas. Centaur-related ideas. _
What do you mean “of course there’s Centaurs here”?! We walked through Pike Hollow and I didn’t see any pikes!
— barbarian, learning how place names work in West Marches
(slain by Centaurs moments later)
Vale:
_Did you ever have an overarching ‘story’ to your zones? e.g., “Bog Hill is presently being filled by eager goblins, driving out much of the wildlife from safe hiding places.”_
Yes, yes he did.
I think it really helps with the perceived “realism” of the ecosystem. Having some big things going on, like a tribe of goblins slowly (over the course of many game sessions) moving down from the hills taking new territory, can make the environment seem as real & dynamic to the players as the small details like how the creatures in one area interact. And it might take less work overall.
Ben:
Thanks so much for the response. I learned from realizing how Warcraft does its names the same idea. Ended up with pretty simple names for mine.
How big were your zones, then? What I’m particularly having trouble with is how I want to fill these zones (making subzones/points of interest). I’m worried that if I theme a zone around, for example, centaurs, that it can be a bit boring to players once they realize it’s just centaur and centaur related activities. But maybe your experience proves otherwise.
Did you ever have an overarching ‘story’ to your zones? e.g., “Bog Hill is presently being filled by eager goblins, driving out much of the wildlife from safe hiding places.”
Thank you again,
Vale.
Vale: I always tried to keep the wilderness natural and therefore predictable to the players. If it’s predictable players can make logical decisions. I particularly paid attention to elevation and topography, since that tells you how water would flow, where you’ll find rivers, lakes and swamps, etc. Everything else follows from that.
For naming, I intentionally used very few “proper” names, like Minol Valley, and stuck to descriptive names like the Golden Hills or Cradle Wood. When someone hears a proper name like Minol Valley, it doesn’t prompt any thoughts, but if I call it Centaur Grove they immediate have ideas. Centaur-related ideas. I think those simple names really make landmarks more memorable and relatable. It’s also easier for players to talk to each other about place names that are not a mouthful.
Hey Ben,
I’m blown away like many others by the West Marches articles. I was incredibly curious if you had any methods you employed to create your regions/subregions, and particularly the ‘landmarks’. You made them memorable, and I was curious if you had any tips to follow on creating them, even randomization tables that helped spur your creative process if you’re that kind of person.
Thank you,
Vale
I’m very curious about this:
“An interesting side effect was that West Marches put me (the GM) in a more neutral position. I wasn’t playing any scheming NPCs or clever plots, so I wasn’t portraying intelligent opposition and didn’t have any ulterior motives. The environment was already set, so instead of making up challenges that matched the party I just dutifully reported what they found wherever they went.”
What is the purpose of this campaign style? Just explore and kill things?
Frank: You could do a West Marches game with hex maps and still follow all the core principles.
“The maps would just look like typical maps, and the dungeons would just look like fairly ordinary dungeons.”
One reason to share the map, a lot of folks equate “West Marches” with “Hex Crawl”.
[…] http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/81/grand-experiments-west-marches-part-4-death-danger/ […]
Belatedly can I say what a superb series of articles this is. The West Marches campaign, for me, is easily one of the most inspirational and innovative concepts in fantasy roleplaying.
Many thanks for sharing it.
How did you handle varying PC levels — if some people played more often (or just survived better) and ended up higher level, were they segregated from other people due to level discrepancies?
I’m working on background and details to begin my own “West Marches” style campaign, all the players I’ve told about it are very excited. The only difference is we will be doing it entirely online w/ Skype and MapTools, It should be a blast!
Personally I’d love to see an example or 2 of the tables you used for the encounters, also if the camp is ended the picture of the “real” map vs the “table map” would be really cool as well.
Thanks for an awesome idea
@Gumby: When I pitched a similar campaign to my players they got so excited they went out, talked to their friends, and were recruiting in more people. I haven’t even finished prepping the minimal material we need to get started.
I actually have difficulty imagining why a player WOULDN’T find this concept incredibly cool. But if your players aren’t excited by the idea, then it’s quite possible that it’s just not up their alley.
But if you think they would like it — even though they’re not really embracing the pitch — then try easing them into it. There’s no reason the start of a campaign like this can’t look a lot like a standard campaign. (Or, rather, the start of several normal campaigns.) Encourage information swapping and then ease them into the idea of spontaneous “pick-up groups”.
What was your original “pitch” to sell them on this idea? It seems hard to believe that many people would be interested in gaming with different people on different days in different areas of the marches all the time. I just don’t see how you can sell something like this without basically saying “This is going to take you way, way out of your comfort zones, but I swear that’s a good thing and you’ll have fun. Please, please show up and risk your time and effort on this ludicrous idea! Really… please… don’t ignore this idea!”
Not that I don’t love the idea; I love it, but that’s from a GM perspective and I can’t see it from a player perspective.
“what state was your west marches in for beginning play? Complete, or fleshed out just to the points where the PC’s couldn’t conceivably pass? Or, alternatively, what would you suggest doing?”
Unless you hermit-up and prep for 3 years before playing (not recommended) it’s unavoidable that you’ll start out incomplete. That’s part of the reason why planners are required to specify a flight plan when scheduling a game — you know where they are going and whether you need to flesh out details for that area (which in turn saddles you with deadlines, also part of the design).
The trick is to not change details based on who is going. Build as though you had no idea who was playing. If you planned on the barrow mounds being EL 5, make them EL 5 regardless of whether the first group to go there is 1st or 10th level.
Building “blindly” requires a little mental discipline but gets easier with practice.
A question from a stripling DM: what state was your west marches in for beginning play? Complete, or fleshed out just to the points where the PC’s couldn’t conceivably pass? Or, alternatively, what would you suggest doing?
Pure genius!
At first we had people restart at 1st level, but about half way through the game we started letting people make new characters at half their old level (rounding down). When the game was very low level it was less of an issue, but eventually it meant that when you died you couldn’t really go back and explore the area you had been interested in or adventure with the same characters as before, at least not until you gained some levels. Restarting at half didn’t absolutely change that, but it made it easier to catch up. On the other hand that forced mix was part of the charm.
Ben, one more question about death. If I was say, 15th level and got (irretrievably) killed, is my next character automatically 1st level, or can I make say, a 10th level character?
“Thanks for your West Marches writeup; excellent work, very insightful. Any chance for more on this project, i.e. some example campaign notes, or session writeups?”
All that stuff would actually look rather mundane — the interesting part about the game was how it was run, how the players participated, not the notes that made it. The maps would just look like typical maps, and the dungeons would just look like fairly ordinary dungeons.
That’s also part of the beauty — building your own West Marches is actually quite easy. You just have to _refrain_ from adding in tricksy plot stuff and mysterious NPCs, and then dump game control on the players. The players may have a hard time adjusting at first (seriously) but once they get comfortable it runs itself.
Amazing concept and great articles, Ben! Some vaguely similar ideas have been roaming in my mind for a few years… I’m joining the popular request: Is there any chance to see your maps or campaign notes?
Great articles! I love this kind of premise for a campaign, although I’ve always been too lazy to actually do it myself. Any chance to see your maps for this?
Ben, it just occurred to me that I have repeatedly praised and linked to this series of posts on other forums without ever letting you know directly how much I enjoyed them. So there:
Thanks for your West Marches writeup; excellent work, very insightful. Any chance for more on this project, i.e. some example campaign notes, or session writeups?
@ cr0m
“Also, I stumbled across the Wanted Posters. Were those side-quests or PCs who ended up on the wrong side of the law?”
The wanted posters were part of the rumor mill. They were posted by the Duke’s soldiers (aka the law) because the criminals were thought to be hiding in the region, but some were total red herrings and weren’t even in the area. If PCs decided to go bounty hunting they might turn up more info about where to find the culprits (“Soder Black-eye’s ship was seen down by the Sunken Fort”) or they might get nothing. Sometimes PCs would stumble across or run afoul of bandits they had heard about without really looking for them.
There were other kinds of bounties that cropped up in town: the local priesthood is paying gold for water collected from the Opal Caves to treat a spreading fever, or an apothecary who pays for certain herbs growing in the Frog Marches. These weren’t plots, just simple excuses to go out and maybe earn some guaranteed money if you found what you were looking for and made it back.
There was one PC who wound up on a wanted poster after he very rashly and publicly cut down a guardsman in town. It was part of the premise that the town was safe and law-abiding, and the Duke’s men did not tolerate any public troublemaking — the adventure was outside the town, not inside it. Conveniently the character got killed by an ogre that same game, so we never had to sort out the whole issue of how could he stay based in town when he wanted by the law, etc.
Thanks for that Ping. What was a typical adventure like?
Also, I stumbled across the Wanted Posters. :) Were those side-quests or PCs who ended up on the wrong side of the law?
For some player perspective, I played in West Marches (joining in the middle, see: flexible roster), and I have to say that it took a long while for me to adjust to the “no clever plots” aspect of the game. There was definitely some major denial in the beginning as I sniffed around like a bloodhound for plots that weren’t there and was sort of miffed and confused when I didn’t find them. But I played some of the most intense games ever in the West Marches, and I have to say it wasn’t because we were saving the princess but rather because the environment was totally believable, realistic, consistent and deadly. I guess that’s why Ben calls it a Grand Experiment.
Ben, great stuff, and thanks for answering all my questions (I just noticed).
I’d love to do something like this, but I have such little time to prep games these days. Maybe 4e will save the day! Until then, I keep pointing my friends to this site and hoping they’ll take the bait.
Wow, ask and ye shall receive (see my comment on West Marches 3).
I’m completely in love with the West Marches idea. I really, really have to find a way to incorporate this into my future campaigns, or something like it. It seems to solve problems of attendance, scheduling, and other such issues. This is just astoundingly awesome, and I hope you keep writing stuff like this for a long time.