The Shaman's Block and More

If you've not been following along with this series, you'll want to start with this index post, with a list of the foregoing content relative to what's written below.

Before continuing with the Stavanger 9th century adventure [content below], I'd like to press the subject of game feel and tragedy a little further.  The reader may remember I drew out six mechanics relating to player participation: agency, response, context, sensation, meaning and boundaries.  I recognize that it is difficult to keep these things in mind, as it is with any list, just as it is hard to remember the seven rewards that we want to provide players (wealth, toys, power, status, novelty, enlightenment and purpose), or the four points we want to provide for building blocks (service, personality, adventure and value).  I count 17 terms that the reader was unfamiliar with just a month ago and, no doubt, it is next to impossible to keep all these things in one's head at one time.  Add to that the 24 petards and it is enough to make anyone throw their hands in the air.

I suggest deep breathing.

For years you've been looking for frameworks that would help you better construct adventures. These are the frameworks.

Let me quickly paraphrase what we've established with this recent Stavanger adventure.  The chieftain wants to expand the village; he is dealing with four recalcitrant bully boys; the bully boys may or may not have been lax in their work, resulting in the death of a child, who was killed by a wolf.  The wolf has been caught by the shaman.  The shaman has organized a hunt.  Whoever kills the wolf will sleep with the dead child's mother and a new child will be born.

This, as far as I know, is a novelty in terms of player reward: a kind of adventure introducing problems that haven't come up before.  Are the players offended at the idea?  Possibly.  Would they take part if they did kill the wolf?  Some players, definitely not; others, perhaps.  Few, I think, would be champing at it.  But even if the idea is offensive, it is still new.  The players are not being denied their agency.  In fact, they are being given an opportunity to establish their agency.  They can say, No.  And face the consequences.  Those consequences being uncertain, given that the whole village seems ready to take part in this adventure.

So the player's response is in jeopardy.  They may, if they wish, escape from Stavanger at once and set out for another place ... but any party of mine, having played in my world for even a few sessions, knows that there's just going to be another similar dilemma put in front of them.  We cannot improve our lives by running away from difficult-to-thread situations.  Run away, and any reward is lost.  Rewards come from the party making up their minds, standing their ground, taking the consequences, and winning through.  They may choose poorly ~ but that is the risk inherent in this game.  Here are two, perhaps three, questionable options, any one of which could lead to tragedy.  Choose.  Respond.

The players will naturally seek context.  They are told by their family to see the shaman.  So we describe the shaman's block.  This is the last block I'm going to create an image for; by now, the reader gets the idea.

The shaman's lodge, as I said earlier, is occupied by the lowest residents in Stavanger. These are people without clans, whose people have almost entirely vanished, or who come from outside Rogaland, though likely not further than neighboring Agder, or Hordaland, that surrounds Bergen ~ which I've twice confused with "Haugaland."  Fixed those instances on the blog now.

These hangers on have no real influence, and are entirely dependent on the shaman.  Effectively, they exist as a cheerleading squad for the shaman, and as protection.  A player wouldn't be able to lift a spear in the shaman's presence without being mobbed.  A hit on the shaman would find a follower in the way ... making the shaman virtually invulnerable.  The personality of the hex IS the shaman; somewhat spiritual and quietly fanatic (no one speaks until the shaman does).

The shaman knows everything that goes on with the adventure, but what he chooses to tell depends on how the players affect him (basically, how well he is treated, how polite the players are, how smart are the questions they ask and so on).  In this case, it doesn't matter how much the shaman tells the party ~ knowing everything won't spoil the adventure.  But I would hold back information if the players did not ask a particular question, or if they were oblivious, or they were rude.

We could make the shaman oppose the chief's agenda, but we don't actually need that conflict.  And it is cliched.  The shaman would love to see the players kill the wolf, and here's why: if a player, as a hero, is the father of the future chief, that chief will be a mix of the Haralds and the Sands, but because the players are outsiders, the child will be somewhat unique.  So it is the shaman's agenda to say that he foresaw the arrival of the players [he's lying], that they were meant to kill the wolf [he hopes] and towards that end, he will give them a token that will ensure that if they take part, the bearer of the token will be the one the wolf attacks.  This isn't true, but the party will think it is true, particularly since we as DMs intend to attack the party with the wolf.  But afterwards, the party will find the token has no magical value.

The Shaman does not intend to have the hero player sleep with the dead child's mother. This will be planned so that the father sleeps with the mother, but it will look like the player did.  This will be the case no matter who kills the wolf.  The chief, and the village, will believe the falsehood.  However, it will be easier to convince the party, a group of outsiders, to participate in the ruse.  The shaman will provide a +1 spear (reward: toys) for the brave player who will carry the token.

So now the players will receive wealth if they kill the wolf (gifts), status from the chief, a toy from the shaman ... and they have context as to what's going on here.  The shaman will warn the party that if they do participate, there may be conflict with the Orre clan, so "Be careful."

Let's look at the whole village again:

What is the party's sensation, then?

Throughout all that happens, we want to emphasize how it feels to be in this village.  Look at the trees surrounding the shaman's lodge, how relatively peaceful and isolated it is ... and how quiet and contemplative.  Remember the sound of the wolf's jaws and the cage as the wolf hurls its body against it. The wash of the waves on the shore of the lake, the glint of the sun as it reflects off the water.  Think of young cousin Alfdis's eyes as they stare at the party, being touched by the amazing existence of family who come from so far away, a place Alfdis has only heard about.  Think of the chief's gruff voice; the shaman's gentle, patient tones; mother Yulene's snapping at the children while complimenting the party.  THINK of the actual scene, how it would be, how it has to invest itself into the minds of the players.

We have a tendency to think we need great sweeping descriptions of Stavanger, but we don't!  People remember small things.  How cold the water is.  What does the turf covering the roofs of the dugout houses smell like?  How dark and juicy does the cooking meat look like?  How does a pouring rainstorm change the grassy, stony compounds?  How does it feel to wrap one's own furs tight around oneself, in front of the campfire.  Think in small details, then say them out loud when they occur.  You won't be good at it, not at first.  But if you get one good one in per session, players will remember that one good one and forget the rest!

Now, this adventure.  What does it mean?

That's tricky.  We can couch this in a number of ways ... how the events will be remembered by the party, how it will give them experience and tools with which to become stronger and fight their next adventure; we can fit the next adventure somehow into the details of this one, so that the "meaning" is that it made the second adventure possible.

But there's are higher meanings, too ~ I mentioned one already.  There's the notion of facing down a difficult situation and overcoming it, and how that makes the player feel, as opposed to getting out of town when things offend or look hazardous.  There's the sense of seeing the fictional townspeople, who don't actually exist, as existing anyway, because it is immensely satisfying even to pretend that we are doing things for other people (the oxytocin hit is the same).  If we can relate to things like that ... then we can see, as players and as DM, that the adventure becomes about how this series of events will affect the village.

And this is how purpose evolves ... when players feel a direction emerging that doesn't start and end with, "What do I get out of this?"

That brings us to boundaries.

The village, and the immediate wilderness, is a boundary.  Leaving the village before resolving the adventure is a punishment only in that the players won't get the reward.

But IN the village, they must accept the rules of the village: that there are other clans, that will try to block their intentions.  That other members of the village have agendas of their own, unknown to the chief and the shaman.  That the wolf is an unknown variable.  That other unknown variables might be anywhere.  Staying in Stavanger, knowing that there's an adventure in play, puts the players at risk of ... well, anything we might create.

These are the boundaries the players have to win through.  Why would they?  Why do we play games at all?  Consider the video games that you, the reader, personally like to play: side scrollers, first person shooters, puzzle games, whatever. You drift to those games, specifically, because you like the particular boundaries they create.  How many shots you have, how fast you can run and how hard is it.  The agency, yes, carries weight for you, but you like games with a certain kind of boundary.

Role-playing is the same.  If your DM fudges, and you like it, that has to do with the boundary to your play that satisfies you.  If you like the boundary including a virtual guarantee that you'll survive the adventure and succeed at it, and it is enough to go through the motions, because it is interesting for you, fun, pleasant, relaxing, then you'll keep playing those games.

Me, I like games where the boundaries are unpleasant and off-putting.  Where I feel like I'm making progress, and I'm not moving in a circle, or staring at an insolvable problem, but the progress costs.  I like games where the boundaries are not immediately visible.  Where they are virtually inexhaustible in their design.  Where after playing the game for 40 years, I'm not exactly sure where all the boundaries are.  Not yet.

Sand's Block

If you've not been following along with this series, you'll want to start with this index post, with a list of the foregoing content relative to what's written below.

In the morning, after a long chat with the chieftain of Stavanger the night before, the party will be gently asked where they spend their second night, as the chief's long house will be closed.  Two options will be given: that they can visit the shaman, and possibly be allowed to dwell in his house, or they can seek their clans people and seek their hospitality.  Either will do, but we'll start with the clan of Sand, which the reader will remember is the party's clan.

Now, parties will tend to wander about aimlessly, making enemies with the Verda or the Orre, by stumbling into those parts of the village.  As the party will be recognized instantly as Sand clan, by the way their clothes are made and the motifs on their leather garments, as well as the shape of their head and their noses, the party will get little out of this rubbernecking except to get themselves thrown out of Stavanger by a chieftain who wants only peace.  So I suggest that we create a guide, a nice big fellow who can clout a rude party member in the chief's name if someone gets too friendly with people who don't want to be friends.  We'll call this person Nidhogg, because it will be remembered (as at least extravagantly different, until heard often enough).

Nidhogg takes the party over to their people and they are immediately met by their cousins ~ no direct family, those are all in Haugaland.  The party means three young men named Knut, Dag and Ulfmaerr, and two women named Alfdis and Norna, and of course Mother Yulene, who is the head of the clan.  I've gotten all these names from this invaluable site, which can be sorted by name origin.

Let's define the block's character.

• Personality: welcoming, loyal, friendly, supportive.  This is the party's family ... and they will act like a family, because they will also recognize the features of the party that define them as Sand.  This is a low-development characteristic, that helps define the 9th century Stavanger culture (and cultures in my world that exist at this level in the year 1650).
• Player Needs: a home, food, company, potential allies, information about Stavanger in the way of rumor and story.

To unlock the rewards the block offers, the players must adventure; and when they arrive in the block, as DMs we must measure their worthiness of that adventure before revealing what the reward would be.  We want to play our cards close to our vest.

The players can't stride haughtily among their people, led by Nidhogg, and then stick out their hands and shout, "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!"  Though that's exactly how I've seen parties act, when told, "This is your game family."  We've all seen players who treat their family like some third arm that exists to perform instant favors ... which is strange, given that families are usually the last people in the world willing to do anything for you without strings attached.  Families are often prone to high expectations, giving advice, refusing aid "for your own good" and otherwise resisting our choice to pursue this adventuring life when we ought to be at home, working, marrying, producing kids and acting all respectable and like.

So we should expect Alfdis' father to push the girl on the most attractive member of the party, and to have Norna's mother waiting to do the same when it is her daughter's turn.  We should expect Mother Yulene to break it up, with, "It can be talked about later," while starting a litany of inquiries about home, family, who's recently been married or whatever else she can get out of the party.  We don't need to concentrate on details ... but we do want to measure the players' love of their existing family in Stavanger.

Yes, love.  If the Sand clan is ready to feed and house these strangers, who happen to have similar habits, it's only fair that the players show pleasure at meeting their family, a show of generosity, some curiosity about how old Alfdis is (she is quite attractive) and appreciation for that which they are receiving.  This is almost impossible for players.  Embarrassing, even.  Words like, "I pick the little girl up and swing her around, and ask how old she is, and tell her she's a brave child," just do not turn up on the lips of strong tough adventurer fighters ... which is all the more reason why this is a unique and interesting situation.  And why a lack of friendliness should be noted.

Oh, no one should say anything outright.  But we should describe the appearance of the Sand clans people as diminishing: "They seem disappointed; they are looking at your suspiciously; the way you're all sitting together, in that aloof way, has caused your family to draw away from you; several are looking at you, then talking about you, then looking away with worried, upset or judging looks on their faces."

We might mitigate this a little by saying, before Nidhogg shows the way, "People, these are your family; they are very close to you in ways and speech; you feel comfortable around them.  You've heard tales about these people told by your fathers and mothers.  These are not wholly strangers ... so be careful to show them respect and kindness."  But, sigh, I know parties, and that probably wouldn't work.

But let's say that it does, and the party gets a tour of the block.  They spend the night around the fire in the wide clearing, they see the forest and take note that there's an eight foot high wall of brush and thorns that has been built between the trees, they are shown the tanning tents and at one, the tent on the hex boundary in the map above, they meet two friendly fellows from the Orre clan: Ingharr and his brother Ingemar.  The discourse is brief and suggests there's some tension, but this tanning area is nevertheless shared.

The party is shown the enormous rock, marked by the letter A.  This rock is 20 feet long and ten feet high.  It it like a cairn laying on its side; it has been carved and it serves as a monolith for Stavanger.  The whole village has permission to come and read the rock, and touch it. The images tell of the destruction of the froglings, the final successful battle of Harald Fairhair that made him King of Norway, the Viking tradition and, most recently, the founding of Iceland, that took place 18 years ago.  These things hardly touch Stavanger directly; this is just too backward a village to take part in such escapades.  But the villagers know about it, and Chief Horik certainly has ambitions to teach his people how to build galleys and sail.  Those things will not come to Stavanger for centuries (in my world), but they will come.

Marked by the letter B will be a tanning tent that will, instead, contain an enormous cage that contains a large wolf.  This is the wolf that killed the child, that the party learned about in Horik's house.  The wolf was not captured, it gave itself up of its own accord to the Shaman, who led it into the village two nights ago and then into this cage (built ready for the Shaman's return).

The wolf is snarling and vicious, and obviously dangerous.  When it howls, the air shakes.  It hurls itself at the wooden wand bars of the cage, made of saplings, and the cage trembles as though it will break open.  The story is told that the spirit of the child that was killed is still tied to the wolf; that it is the child trying to break free, not the wolf.  The Shaman has been in communication with the child and has learned what must happen, for the good of Stavanger.

The party is told that in two days, the wolf will be released into the woods east of the village, where it will be trapped between the village and the sea, except along the south edge.  Every hearty male in the village will be waiting in the forest, to hunt the beast.  Whoever succeeds in killing the wolf will become the child spirit's guardian. This male must then take the place of the child's father, and lay with the child's bereaved mother, whereupon the spirit child's kin will be implanted into the mother and the spirit child will be freed.  The clan that kills the wolf, and the Harald clan, will be bonded together forever.  If a member of the Harald clan destroys the wolf, this will be an especially good omen, telling that the newborn child will one day become Chief of Stavanger.

If the wolf escapes, surely, this will be a Bad Omen.  There is no telling what will happen.

Whereupon the party should be asked, "Will you hunt the wolf with us?"

The unlocked reward of the block, then, is the opportunity for experience, combat, the respect of the village even if the players takes part, and the risk that a player will have to perform in bed with a woman of the Harald clan.  Obviously, this would result in a connection with the Haralds, and other opportunities. Status is involved, but more especially wealth, as success in this venture would bring many gifts.

Horik's Block

If you've not been following along with this series, you'll want to start with this index post, with a list of the foregoing content relative to what's written below.

There are still some threads I need to pull together before I can start creating an adventure around this old Stavanger village I've posited.  First, we need to return to those four keys that a village block ought to possess.  I'll just repeat them here, adjusting the language a bit.

1. The block should service the players' needs.  In the construct of the world, think of the block as being a microservice ~ functioning as an application to provide for a particular need.  This could be a market, or an embarkation point, or a source of information, or whatever other everyday service we might expect the world to provide for the busy player on the go.
2. The block should have a personality ... a recognizable, though interesting environment with a character that can be predicted, examined, interacted with and challenged, according to the basic "rules" of behavior and respect that the inhabitants require.
3. The block should offer an opportunity for adventure.  Essentially, this means the presence of a conflict of some sort that the players might choose to resolve, if they're willing to risk failure.
4. Finally, enacting the value the block provides, winning over the inhabitants and successfully resolving the conflict should "unlock" some sort of reward.

This Stavanger village from 892 is not the Stavanger of my world.  It is an exercise that I am employing in order to demonstrate block and adventure creation to the reader.  If this were my game, I would set up a few of these blocks initially, then add more as they were needed.  The concept of the module, where every block needs to be specified, is the model that says the DM should not learn how to fish, but to let others do the fishing so the DM can eat.  My purpose is to teach the DM how to fish ... and I don't need to make every block here in order to do that.

I would like to make seven blocks; this will enable seven types of reward, as stipulated by the link above: wealth, toys, power, status, novelty, enlightenment and purpose.

Because I intend to go through this process with each development level of Stavanger that I intend to show going forward, over the next few months, I'll ask the reader to continue to imagine running characters that are very low-tech and crude in terms of both motivation and worldliness.  Let's say the player characters are all fighters, all from the clan of Sand in Haugaland.  We can make more sophisticated parties later, when we discuss more sophisticated environments.

Let's start with this hex.  On the above map, it would be 0302.  This is the hunter's lodge, or perhaps more correctly the chieftain's lodge.  The residents of the hex are overwhelmingly of the Sauda clan; most of the lodge itself is Sauda, or owe fealty directly to the chief.  This numbers about 55 persons.  Three of the sod houses are Sauda; the other three belong to the Loda clan. While the Sauda also stretch into other hexes, these three sod houses are the whole Loda clan in all of Stavanger.  All of about 15 persons.

Now, remember, this hex is only 435 feet across. That's 142 yards.  I used to be able to run the 100 yard dash in just over 12 seconds, when I was in Junior High School track.  So remember how small this area represents.  And yet, seeing the map, having a grasp of the scale, we can imagine we're here, can't we.  We can see the boats moored on the mud flat, the grass roofs of the houses; the smell of the trees as we lean against the side of the lodge.  That's the sort of tactile understanding we want.

We can talk about the smell of the fish drying, or the fish guts, which are used to attract sea birds that are then killed.  But really, we should talk about what sort of person the chieftain is.  Remember, point 2 is that the hex should have a personality.  The personality of this hex relies on the chieftain's character.  As I said, we have those 24 motivations to choose from, each positive or negative; we want to start there.

Because this Stavanger was founded only 20 years before, and because we know it is going to develop into an important city, I'll visualize this chieftain ~ we'll call him Horik ~ as possessing social intelligence.  That is, he's empathic of others, and he's very concerned with directing the behaviour of his people towards a better, more comfortable life.  Horik has some understanding that a better existence involves everyone working to improve the village, make it more secure, promote the birth rate, build new and better boats (though how is an issue) and bring everyone else to his way of thinking.

He isn't any smarter than his people, but he knows that others are smarter and he knows a good future is in acquiring knowledge.  But he doesn't know how to read, or do much of anything, except to hunt.  And thus we are setting up a conflict: Horik wants, but he doesn't know how to get.  And between Horik and the village, he sees, but the rest of the village potentially does not.

Horik's block is the most diligent.  The Sauda work hard, as do the Loda ~ though the former are hunters and the latter are fisher folk.  There's virtually no conflict with these two groups.  There is a conflict with the rest of the village.  Most of the clans support Horik and such, but there are six young men ("bully boys") in the village that do not.  Four of these are Orre clan; one is Erfjord; the last is a Verda boy.  The chieftain Horik has had trouble with these; but he doesn't want to start a clan war and he needs everyone.

As the party arrives in Stavanger, they are pressed to visit Horik and declare themselves.  They may wish to visit their relatives first, but these are distant relatives and what there might be to say is put off in favor of letting the chief know there are strangers in Stavanger.  The party meets Horik, hopefully acts properly (respectful, supportive, curious, perhaps moderately generous in giving a gift if it occurs to anyone), and Horik offers his hospitality for one night.

So, we have conflict; and we have personality.  The party watches everyone work to make a meal ready for 100 people and wins respect for themselves if they help.  They win respect if they ask good questions. They win respect if they give a gift.  They win respect if they listen to what others have to say and do as they're told.  The puzzle here is for the party to win respect.

If they get it, they will hear a story, told during dinner, by several Sauda clanspersons.  The party is seated no where near Horik, but everyone talks about the chief.

About two months ago, the bully boys were told to rebuild one of the enclosure fences, a defensive line make with brush and thorns, near the clan of Harald.  About a week later, a big wolf broke through that defense and killed a six year old child belonging to the Harald clan.  Everyone suspects that it happened because the bully boys slacked off and didn't properly mend the fence.  But no one knows for sure.  And now the issue has hung over the village like a cloud, without anyone knowing how to resolve it, Horik included.

The available reward here is STATUS.  Status comes in many forms.  Winning respect is one.  It lets you be recognized by clan leaders, who then treat you well, and potentially share information.  It makes what you say matter to the listener.  It entitles you to stay in Stavanger, and to come and go as you please, knowing that when you return you'll be welcome.

Having privileges given is much more.  Privilege gives the right to do things, like build a house, walk freely around the town, teach others how to do things, take part in hunting parties, ask for a place to sleep, sit near the chief and thus speak freely with him.  Eventually, you may be allowed to build here.  Or marry someone.  And have your children be considered part of the tribe.

In a role-playing game based on only this much technology, these things are very, very important.  Not having them means being completely outcast.  There is no other village in Rogaland; and the next village might be no more advanced.  It might be run by a real bastard, and you'll have no clan of your own that you can turn to if you're in trouble.  You really don't know what's out there, because this is 9th century Europe and things like trade, learning, an abundance of food, even actual population centers, are very few and very far between.  Most of Europe hasn't been founded yet; and it's a long, long way to the parts that are, without roads.  It's very important that the people around here like you.

So Status is something that you're going to want.  And the person who can grant it is Horik.  So in effect, you need him a lot more than he needs you.  He has a whole village under his control?  What have you got?