Ok, to continue we need a situation that will keep the protagonists (players) active with the antagonists (bad guys) for a good long time. A good example of this is, believe it or not, Star Wars; there are two sides in Star Wars and each is so large in scope that the conflict has literally lasted for 30 years, 6 movies, and countless books… And there is no end in sight.
All “epic” games have this commonality in that the scope is so large that the players are but a small piece of the greater whole, even when the players are the biggest pieces on the board. So, as we see in “Episodes I and II”, Obi-Wan and Anikin are both “main characters”, but we are shown that they are just mere players in a much bigger game. This mirrors real life where we are the main characters in our personal episodes, but the game is much, much bigger. Game wise this gives your players a conceptual “peripheral vision” that helps to immerse them in the story.
So, with this in mind we need to formulate an overall synopsis that is vast enough in scope that the players will both be challenged for many repeat sessions, yet will have enough hooks to allow the players to be larger than life, for where’s the fun in being Normal Joe?
The classic example of this is war, much like in our Star Wars example. War gives us a reason for conflict which is a key element to the growth of characters and personalities. Conflict can come in many flavors from interpersonal crisis to all out racial warfare.
Now that we have that ironed out, we need a conflict of our own:
We know who our bad guys will be, and we know that we need some kind of conflict, so let’s brain storm a few options.
To be continued when I get home, it’s busy here today…