The Nesting Problem

[astral kernel]

Hey all. A player came to me and pointed something out about my GMing style, and while I kind of agree with him I don't know how to curb the problem.

So the players have a list of problems that they're dealing with. One "Core" problem, then a bunch of sub problems. Then those subproblems have... more problems beneath them. And those problems have problems. It basically looks like this atm:

Save the World
=>Stop Disc 1 Boss
=>Stop General
==>Figure out how to keep the general from exploding (don't ask)
=>Build up Faction
==>Help City of Science
===>Gain favor of the Assassin
====>Construct magic weapon she asked for
=====>Gather Parts (p1)
=====>Gather Parts (p2)
======>Deal with murder mystery in town (Basically as they were leaving after obtaining part2, lawman asked them to stay in town while an investigation is happening.)
==>Deal with the Dream Eaters

As you can see it's quite a lot to do, but the player is specifically unenthused with the murder mystery next session as it feels so distant from the rest of the stuff they're doing. It doesn't help that when they don't do something, there tend to be negative consequences.

For example, the Dream Eater situation I warned them about at the start of the last adventure, as well as their consequences (player is a monster hunter and knew the lore), but they just never got around to it despite having their minds on it, and 2 NPCs were dead for it (1 completely minor showed up once, the other who was important to a major NPC). I ended up retconning this outcome for reasons that can be its own post, but the effect still lingers.

I can explain the reason for the nesting - because there are independent actors and their actions are impacting the player's environment. I also tend to warn players that there's a possibility that their action can bite them in the ass - 50/50 if it actually does. But I can see that the players always have so much to do and not enough time to do it.

Any advice?

[meager junco]

Oof, now this is a tough one to deal with. Are you familiar with clocks from BitD?

Though before that I should ask what system you are running.

[astral kernel]

I'm running a custom homebrew system. I am not at all familiar with BitD

[meager junco]

https://bladesinthedark.com/progress-clocks
Check this out. Having these visible to the players helps give them an idea of how things are working towards the greater scheme of things.

For example, instead of having a specific method of “helping the city”, it’s now that anything they do to fill this four-segment clock helps the city.

Same thing with building the faction itself.

You don’t want to go too many layers deep in clocks though- try to limit it to a max of two connected clocks at a time. Unconnected clocks go ahead and do more.

Regarding your last paragraph though- a 50-50 chance is really quite low and demoralizing. I’d recommend at least 75-25 given that they are already undergoing challenges to make change in the first place.

[ember yew]

This is the harshest of truths, but I think your best bet is to kill your darlings. Simplify your overall plot by excising the elements with the least player payoff along with their tails. If you really can't part with any of this, turn the elements that least need PC involvement into setting truths rather than interactions.

Bad things can happen in the world that the players don't find out about ahead of time, or that they are helpless to stop. That's fair game.

Regarding the murder mystery in particular, I share your player's confusion that you would add apparently unrelated objectives to a chain this braided. If I were a player in this game, my immediate in-character reaction to the lawman would be, "We'd love to stay and help, but now is a really bad time. Good luck."

I also think it's important to note that some groups would absolutely eat this up, and if it is important to you to run this way, you should find a group that does.

That being said, yeah, oof, most players are just trying to engage a power fantasy for a few hours on a weekend. Defaulting into a failure state is a powerful tool that should be rolled out sparingly.

[astral kernel]

Yeah, I did not think of 50-50 as being pretty low, but maybe you are right. When I think of problems, they're usually important enough to mention, like "X person is sick and needs a cure." or "there is a couple kids in the woods." there are times when it is so minor that the players can wave their hands/offer a potion to just cure it, and they do. If I think they will resolve simply, they just resolve without player input as normal.

[astral kernel]

I think that part of my problem is trying to communicate when a "problem" exists and can be very, very easily ignored with little effect, and when a problem can have lasting, tangible effects. I wouldn't have minded - even expected- if the players just ignored the lawman and left. At the absolute worst case scenario the murder goes unresolved and people suspect them after they skipped town, but the 'planned' consequence was someone in the village (who they've only met ONCE for a few minutes) is incorrectly blamed for the murder. They would only learn this outcome if they ever, ever came back to this otherwise insignificant town that they only came to, to complete the quest.

When talking to the player, though, it seems that the issue is more 'WE HAVE SO MUCH TO DOOOOOOOOOOO' than the actual murder scenario itself. We talked and there are little bits we keep finding of side quests that even I haven't determined the outcome of (I introduced a quest log recently to help players keep track of things). If there was less on the plate, they would feel more fine engaging in it.

[ember yew]

When talking to the player, though, it seems that the issue is more 'WE HAVE SO MUCH TO DOOOOOOOOOOO'

I mean, yeah, I picked up on this. That's why I'm telling you you need to cut back. The murder mystery is absolutely a symptom of a larger problem.

It's not that your way of doing things is wrong, it's that it is wrong for this player, and possibly your group as a whole, if it has gotten to the point where you are hearing about it.

I agree that you need a good way to indicate when something is a side quest rather than a main quest, and that would probably mitigate the situation provided that you really do have a lot of side quests, and it's not just that your main quest has too many steps. You're the only one who can assess that.

It is perfectly acceptable to tell your players out of character, "You don't feel like this request is consequential to your primary objectives." Show is always better than tell, but if telling will keep your campaign from derailing or disbanding, please tell. Don't be the captain who orders the band to keep playing. Be the lookout who warns the pilot about the iceberg.

[meager junco]

I agree with DMZ. Part of why I recommend using clocks is that it gives perspective as to how much an individual set of events contribute to the greater plot in a tangible way.

[astral kernel]

Yeah, you guys are right. I have a temporary solution to clean up the side quest log that won't take up much time on the player's end. I tried suggesting a solution to the player having the issue with the Murder Mystery and told them blankly that the party isn't going to suffer consequences if they choose to skip/wait it out, but they told me "you're going to hate me for saying this, but I'm already committed to doing it." Honestly they felt a lot of relief when I told them I'd give them an opportunity to just quickly clear up the side quest log and move on

But going forward I'm going to try and refrain from adding stuff to the list until it's clear there's not much else to do but focus on 'main' plot stuff.

I'm asking around and it seems like the rest of the party like things as they are, with some expecting that as the game progresses they will get less busy with side material and more focused on main material, so I think they will appreciate some of the cut backs.

[ember yew]

they told me "you're going to hate me for saying this, but I'm already committed to doing it."

You know, I very nearly mentioned that clearly denoting side quests from main quests would also only work if you had the kind of players who are likely to bypass side quests, and I thought, "Nah, not relevant here." That'll teach me to be circumspect. 🙃

I'm glad to hear this seems to be blowing over without too much fallout. Honestly, your players are lucky to have you. This kind of commitment is impressive. It's awesome that your dial goes to 11, and the fact that sometimes maybe you only need a 9 shouldn't detract from that.

[solid lodge]

An entirely separate thing I'm noticing is that there isn't necessarily a way for a player to turn stuff down

That is, they don't have any say in what they want to take on or not, it's just a growing list of problems that are starting to spiral out of control

Because there's a finite amount of time and resources for players to do things, it's very difficult to take care of what seems to be 4 large problems and 3 immediate ones in a timely manner because a game is not an agenda for players to cplete

[astral kernel]

Upon reflection I can kind of explain how this style came about. Sort of a three part problem.

The first and simplest to explain is system design; basically, we have a faction system, and we have random tables in which there are small but not insignificant chances of a problem coming up. There are ways to handle it that are not adventure-side within the faction system, mind you, but the players would prefer to spend their faction actions building. I can talk about it more, but it's basically a matter of system theory at that point.

Second, it's a problem of carrots and sticks. I learned pretty early on that sticks are pretty effective at getting the party to stick and work together, and that the party scatters like cats when it comes to carrots.... then get frustrated when they couldn't find the specific carrot, or that they lacked the skills to obtain the carrot on their own. And it frustrated me at the time, because I was uncomfortable handling party splits and they kept happening, and trying to address it OOC with the party was not working. The table has changed now, but I never readjusted to the new table dynamic. I'm hoping that once things clear up I can have consequence-free carrots again.

Third, and this is a personal problem that I've had that is 100% on me, but when I go to conclude something, I always swing toward the negative. It's more subconscious than anything; basically, the thinking goes, 'if this person needs help, and don't get it, then like... obviously it's a bad end, right?' And worse, some of it I recognize as sort of neutral? Or leave open enough that there's a way to come back around for it. You can see why the problem spirals; Problem A goes to Solution B, I tell players that we're at Solution B now, and even if I see the inevitable turn around, players want to jump in and stop the bleeding at Solution B.

I can't think of a specific example from my campaign at this exact moment, but for example: Let's say we have a student studying for a really important exam for a class. Party can help them or not. If they don't, we move then to the student failing the class. to me, the natural conclusion is the student fails the class, but maybe realizes that they don't actually enjoy their major, and switches to something they actually want to study. But the party immediately jumps in to save the student from failing the class.

[solid lodge]

The thing I'm talking about is sort of an intersection of GM theory and system theory, where (from my limited point of view here) you're presenting the situation as overly reductive, you HAVE TO DO SOMETHING about this, otherwise, something bad happens. This means that they're only reactive and not proactively choosing to take on problems.

Using your example, it seems like the party has had this student thrown at them, where they have a basic assumption "The DM is showing this to us, this means we HAVE to do something about it." Players are playing to have fun, unless they've indicated that they prefer a more generally negative lean to their results.

My example would be something like a bounty board. Leaving a bounty on the board and not taking it is a third option compared to success or failure, it's a neutral option that leans towards good (most bounties will generally be solved).

Players want the possibility of success or failure, but it seems like you've made the possibility of failure a fair amount larger than the possibility of success.

As an aside, the carrot thing is because everyone wants different things, but you're providing "unifying sticks" instead, where everyone might disagree on what to spend extra money on, but they all agree they don't like getting robbed.

[astral kernel]

There's moments when I specifically indicate that nothing will happen at all if they choose to be neutral, and they still do something. I had a random encounter that started with a smoking tree-stump, where the NPCs spoke not one word to the party and were minding their own business/pretending not to be home... and the party still stayed and managed to make it into a four day in-character event. I admit that I do present some situations as overly reductive, but even when I'm bluntly stating "nothing bad will happen if you choose to move on," the players will still choose to explore and interact.