What makes LARP, or Roleplaying for that matter, good.

[dragonmagnet]

So recently I've had the desire to start a game again. Get a couple people together and give the good old staffing thing a try once more. Though I'm not sure if anything will come of it, the information would be useful to everyone who runs a game

Comments

[satyrlovesong]

The game must be internally consistent.

As a personal aside, Storyteller Fiat breaks the game.

[anarchylad]

a good game should be engaging and interesting. A storyteller should take into account his/her characters, their goals, desires, fears and backgrounds in order to give the game a personal feeling, and to give the characters emotional investment in the plot. Foresight and planning is a must, as a game that feels rushed and unplanned is usually pretty crappy.

[hoobajoo]

Running a Mage game and letting me play in it are paramount virtues of a great table top ST.

My personal agenda aside, planning the setting is critical. Even if you have a whole plot planned out, players cna destory that all with one whack-ass plan. And you shouldn't stop them. Rather, if you have a whole city fleshed out (e.g. vampires control the casinos, but the technocrats control the police and the traditions live in their own hidey-holes) then your players can do something that doesn't move the plot along and still maintain consistancy.

In my mind, what a ST should throw at the PCs is a good hook, some ethical dilemas, a well-mapped world, and when all else fails, sharp intuition and balls of steel. Of course, that's for a TT.

[hoobajoo]

>>Also, try and single out people who aren't doing much. Don't give everything to the go-getter. Pick a shy, silent face in the crowd and toss them a bone. Have an enemy pick them out of the crowd, or the crying damsel ask them for help. If they aren't given the push, most will never break out of that shell. That is, if they even continue LARPing.

I speak from personal experience when I say this is really, really hard to do when you have a bunch of go-getters. And you do need to reward the go-getters, because they're your vibrant player care that puts as much life and effort into the game as the ST. But it's nice to hook those wallflowers up sometimes, all the same.