Bogeyman in a game – splitting the party?

[Joël of the FoS]

Experimentation planning!

While I was away, I had this crazy idea of splitting my group in two parts when I will introduce bogeymens to the game.

Half of the players (they are 6) will play their regular PCs, as well as another PC usually played by the other half of the players group. The other half of the group will play little kids having caught the attention of bogeymens.

For the kids, I was thinking of giving them the Little Fears RPG rules, with a few modifications. That part is relatively easy: the mechanics for playing a kid is simple and very cool also (thanks, Corrupted Loremaster for introducing me to this very cool RPG!).

But a problem to solve is how to make sure the whole thing is interesting in a session, i.e. making sure the “PCs” group doesn’t do things they should not do, or how to control what the “PCs” group knows. Also, making sure it’s fun for the “kids” group as well. Any suggestions welcomed!

Joël

[Corrupted_Loremaster]

Wait, you mean running both systems at the same time? That seems like it might end up being needlessly complex and confusing, dispite the Little Fears' system's simplicity.

I've never run a group large enough to even be split, so I not sure how much of problem that might present. Still, a simple solution might be to have alternating sessions, with the entire group playing "PCs" one week, then children the next, but occuring at the same time in the game world. The two groups might cross paths with each other, but never for more than a quick encounter. You might have to do a little bit of quick thinking to avoid paradoxes though.

[Jack of Tears]

Or you could have half of the adult pcs leave to solve a seperate part of the mission. One week three pcs play their characters and another three play children they may interact with. The next week you switch off and the other three players portray their adults, while the first three portray different children.

I am always loath to let any player control anothers. You tread on dangerous ground and risk creating bad blood between players.

Alternately, you could play half a session, or even an hour, with the adults - then switch back and forth. (uncertain how long your sessions are, but you could run all the players as adults for an hour or two, then as children, then back again ... I'd say an hour before each switch on average, but you should let the flow of the story dictate that, really.)

This reminds me of a game I ran once. It actually occured on three levels.

-First the players portayed homeless people who were falling victim to an apparent serial killer. When the party found themselves in a tight, cliffhanger situation, I ended the session. (timed it well for that)

-The next week the players portrayed children engaged in another part of that same scenario. In this instance they encountered the golem the aforementioned serial killer was running from. (as kids they portrayed the children of a group once responsible for the creation of a created. Throughout their adventure they began to unwravel some of the secrets behind the creature.)

-Once that portion of the story reached a suitable stoping point (again at the end of the session) we moved onto the third week and another scenario .. in which the players portrayed investigators attempting to capture the murderer and determine how certain individuals (the parents of these children) were somehow linked to the homeless killer.

Each session convered one third of the overall story. In the final session of the month, I ran each set of characters for part of the night, as the mystery wrapped itself up. First the investigators arive in time to save the homeless characters, who lead them to the sewers where the children are facing down the golem before it can kill the last of their parents. The final encounter was difficult to juggle, but vastly entertaining as each set of characters used its third of the knowledge to aid the other two.

It takes a group willing to work with the scenario, but was overall rewarding in the end.


PS: I've been touting Little Fears on these boards for years, it's good to see someone else finally gave it some attention.

[Joël of the FoS]

Well indeed a better way is to have all the players alternate between "PCs" and "kids". They play spooked kids, then heroes, then kids again and so forth. It would solve the metagaming OOC knowledge problem.

The "kids" part will be pre-prepared caracters. I won't stop the game to have the players prepare kids stat sheet.

The idea to have players playing kids is to make them feel the fright of being a kid hunted by a bogeyman, alone and nearly powerless. I think it is better with this bogeyman encounter than cut scenes. Bogeyman are special and it's worth the extra DM planning.

So the heroes could encounter a bard or story teller such as in DT&DL intro, then be aware of children diseappearing. Then we switch to playing kids who are horribly aware of what's really going on, with kids eyes, but the adults refuse / do not understand the kids...

Joël

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

I agree... I think splitting the party like this is an unneccessary complication. Go with alternating the whole group, and when the groups intersect, so be it. I think your group has been playing long enough to handle two characters for a night. In fact, it's probably easier to play your own regular PC and your own kid PC, rather than your own regular PC and another player's PC, or two new kid PC's.

And this way everyone gets the fun of playing a kid.

If you can contrive a situation that splits up the combined group such that there's a mix in each group, that might be fun.. what I mean is, if "A" is player A's adult character and "a" is player A's child character and you have 4 players, A-D, split them like: ABcd and abCD and alternate between the two groups. (maybe there are two bogeymen that need to be confronted in two places at the same time?)

[Joël of the FoS]

PS: I've been touting Little Fears on these boards for years, it's good to see someone else finally gave it some attention.

Hey, I'm getting old and having problem hearin' so it takes some times to get messages through.

And this way everyone gets the fun of playing a kid.

Yep, indeed, I thought of this and it convinced me.

If you can contrive a situation that splits up the combined group such that there's a mix in each group, that might be fun.. what I mean is, if "A" is player A's adult character and "a" is player A's child character and you have 4 players, A-D, split them like: ABcd and abCD and alternate between the two groups. (maybe there are two bogeymen that need to be confronted in two places at the same time?)

I'm not sure I fully understand what you mean , but the way I see it, they will play as kids scenes that could have been great cut scenes, i.e. meeting the bogeymen in the park, the stalking and the kids talking to each other about "things adults do not understand". I will probably play a NPC kid as well, to lead this part of the game.

The "grown up" PCs will first be introduced to Hans & Jacob's work, as in the DT&DL chapter intro. Then kids will start to be missing.

Then I will have them play kids, with Little Fears inspired rules. Their goal in this part is to survive, gather information and try to communicate it to their "grown up" PCs, with all the difficulties that adults ignore this topics.

Since the players will be on the defensive when they will play kids, I will probably have to force their hands sometimes with Will checks to accept Mr Foxman's toys, or Madame Croquemitaine's candies.

The trick will be to give them information as kids that they can't use when back to their "grown up" investigating PCs. Or perhaps another Will check in order to take notice of certain things, or else completely ignore the information.

Suggestions welcomed to improve this idea!

Joël

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

If you can contrive a situation that splits up the combined group such that there's a mix in each group, that might be fun.. what I mean is, if "A" is player A's adult character and "a" is player A's child character and you have 4 players, A-D, split them like: ABcd and abCD and alternate between the two groups. (maybe there are two bogeymen that need to be confronted in two places at the same time?)

I'm not sure I fully understand what you mean , but the way I see it, they will play as kids scenes that could have been great cut scenes, i.e.

Let me try to explain.

I see what your plan is, my sugestion is for when the two groups finally meet up, and the Adult PC's are finally convinced to help the Kid PC's.

Suppose you have 4 Adult PC's, we'll call them: Rudolph, Victor, Firan, and Leyla. Then you've got 4 Kid PC's, we'll call them: Eva, Irik, Erasmus, and Nikko. Assume that Rudolph and Erasmus are played by the same player (Al), Victor and Eva are the same player (Bob), Irik and Firan are the same player (Carol), and Leyla and Nikko are the same player (Dave).

When the final confrontation comes, you could split them into two groups to go after the Bogeymen as follows:

Group 1 goes after Mister Fox:
Adult Rudolph (Al)
Adult Victor (Bob)
Kid Irik (Carol)
Kid Nikko (Dave)

Group 2 goes after Madame Croquemontaine:
Kid Erasmus (Al)
Kid Eva (Bob)
Adult Firan (Carol)
Adult Leyla (Dave)

Anyway, just an idea. Might be hard to set up without forcing them....

[Joël of the FoS]

I see. But this party of 6 PCs is very difficult to split. If they could rent one room in an hotel for safety, they would.

But I'll toggle with this idea.

Joël

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

I know the feeling... I've had an encounter ready for months to use the next time the party splits up in a town, and haven't been able to use it because they won't split up.

Anyway, just an idea that sprang to mind...

[Jack of Tears]

That's novel. Me, I have the hardest time keeping my groups together. At the least provocation my parties will rush off all in their sepperate directions and not actively attempt to see one another again until they meet up at the hotel for dinner and a night's sleep. Me, I have no personal problem with this, as I can run a split group just fine - but some of the players complain that they have to sit idle for too long while I deal with their companions. Seems no matter how many times I try to explain they can't have it both ways, certain players are unable to grasp the concept.