[Glorantha] Re: Lack of Information in Sartar Rising Scenario Books

[Martin Dick]

>From: Paul Andrew King <paul at morat.demon.co.uk>
>>Except he and Kallyr are leading the fight, it very much looks as
>>if they were both supposed to be thrown off the ship yet Kallyr
>>doesn't miss him until she returns.

>Assuming that getting thrown off the ship was the objective. 
>Minaryth says that "Kallyr wants to kill them before they find us" 
>implying that the plan is to stay on the Ship longer.  While it does 
>look as if Kallyr intended to meet the dragon, it certainly isn't 
>clear that the fight was started with the intention of getting >thrown 
>off, and it looks to me as if Danar was meant to stay on board even 
>after the rest of the Questers departed (hence Kallyr doesn't notice 
>that Danar is missing).

All of these comments, like Paul's above are indicators of why I
found the Shiprise a disappointing scenario, apart from being
pretty much a railroad, I finished the scenario having very
little idea about the motivations of the NPCs and where this
all fits in the big picture.

There is a lot of talk about YGWV and I don't have a problem
with that, in fact My Glorantha Always Varies, but the problem
with the Sartar Rising sequence is that not enough background
information and arc information is provided for me to make a
decision to Vary My Glorantha Logically. Sure I can go off
wherever I like and end up with Gloranthan SubSpace Explorers
taking on the Uruk-Hai as the Tower of Orthanc is dimension
shifted into the middle of Pavis, but what I want to be able
to do is take my group of Orlanthi rebels and put them into
the situation and modify what's going on to suit my game
and my player characters and still have it bear some resemblance
to the ongoing canon arc. 

If I have an idea of the overall story arc, then I can do this and
that it makes it much easier to use the new material that is
released in my game. 

I have never found that keeping information from the Narrator
in source books adds anything to my enjoyment of the game.
A classic example was the original L5R game where they
deliberately refused to give the correct distances between
parts of the Empire, because in-game, the Imperial maps
were wrong. Neat idea in game, but lousy idea for the
GM.

Is there anyone on the list who actually likes key plot points
being kept from them as the Narrator in source material and
scenarios?

cheers

Martin


Dr. Martin Dick
Lecturer
School of Business Information Technology
RMIT Business
RMIT University