|
Fellow Marshals:
I’ve got two questions, but here’s the setting:
My players have made characters with very rich, but very diverse, backgrounds. I’ve been in parties before where the GM has forced the character histories to cross, and contrives some way for the characters to already be working together. It works, but it’s not what I want to do with my posse. So far I have a British Bio-Mechanical Mad Scientist bent on “perfecting the human condition”, a Gunslinger of the “I’ve been framed for my parents murder and now I’m after the real killer” variety, a stereotypical drinkin’ whorin’ smokin’ ornery gunslinger, a Huckster of the “I wanna be a huckster ‘cause spellcasters are cool” variety (don’t expect to much role-playing depth from this one), and a Saloon Gal who’s not bad with a gun, but uses seduction and persuasion to get men to do her bidding. There may be one more player, but that’s an unknown at the moment.
I need some way to get these players together and working for a “Mysterious Character” without contriving it or pulling something like, “You’re sitting at the bar when you notice a guy walk in with a flashing light over his head that says, ‘I’m a Player Character too, work with me.’” Any good ideas? I don’t want to use any adventures from the books, because I have very avid readers in my party, and they can’t seem to resist reading things they shouldn’t. I know kind of what I want to do with the Mysterious Character, but I want to use an intermediary to start with. Eventually I want to build them up to an “Oh crud, we’re in way over our heads,” sort of moment, but I’m drawing a total blank on the hook. Any ideas?
Second, does anyone out there have some good modifications that speed up the combat system. Last time I ran a game, we got so bogged down in minutia that combat seemed to take forever. Anyone have any handy quick reference charts or spreadsheets the I can put on my PDA or something? I *don’t* want to use d20 conversions… I want to maintain the feel and the elegance of the original system, but I need some streamlining. Any help would be appreciated.
Thank you all in advance,
- Matt Lavery Webmaster, host, and namesake of MattLavery.com "You are responsible for everything you think, say, do, feel, and believe. That is all you are responsible for, and you are the only one responsible for it."
|