| This Page: | Other Pages: | |
|---|---|---|
| Cross-Campaign Coordinated Events | Logo & credits | Dark Fantasty Core Set |
| Linked Games for Players | Awarded Content | Copywrong licenses |
| About the service mark | Screen readable DFCS | |
Midian's Immersive Game World idea is that a single dynamic campaign world can be shared by all players and Game Masters. Player input is, of course, accepted—in fact, that's what it's all about. The goal is a continuous, believable ("realistic"), growing, evolving, collective game world for everyone to share. That is, the effects of your home game can affect someone else's, and vice-versa. Each Game Master still retains control over his or her own campaign and story, and determines the effects of this shared game world. This can be new additions or changes to the ongoing story, or can be rumours of distant happenings—it may not even be true. You have the opportunity to make your mark on the world. However, this is without being forced into a playing a metaplot, or buying new books when a novelist licenses the property & changes the world just to sell a sequel. Making your own decisions in the game is one of the core concepts of Midian; this includes both the ability to ignore, and the ability to share, your campaign with others.
The Midian game world is like a sandbox. You can add or change things as you will, with your creations left so that new people should see how you left it.
"An immersive world (to me) is one that is already in motion by the time the PCs enter the story, and will continue to chug on even after the PCs are dead and gone — time stops for no man, woman, or half-orc. As such, the events of the story should unfold whether your characters get involved or just spend every night in a tavern getting drunk."
——Simon Ringwood on OpenRoleplaying.org's forums
The advantages of an Immersive Game World are many. Your characters have a better sense of the world, you can interact with other players across the world (in-character and out), guilds can either compete or cooperate with one another, your actions can truly become legendary (or infamous) both as a player and as a character, even intercampaign wars are possible, and the world just feels bigger. The Immersive Game World continues even after a character retires, raises a family, dies, and her children grow up to find a place in the world for themselves. Campaigns integrate, causing an even greater continuum for the game.
Participation is simple. By posting your character journal in the Battle Scars section, by interacting with characters in other campaigns via play-by-post games, by posting your campaign's events on the forums or in a campaign log, and by using these resources for your own games, you make the game richer, more interactive, more immersive, and more "living" for all of us. In addition, this is a growing game world, where your ideas are valued. If you have ideas for a new skill, a city in the Byzant Empire, or dress designs for new summer fashions in the Kingdom of Formour, then let us know—let everyone know.
"The idea of different GM's games interacting—and my campaign can affect the 'official' game world—while not really losing control over my own game, is one of the big reasons why I got into Midian in the first place."
——Liam of The Way of the Blade Guild posted on the Lost Souls forums
We want to help improve your game experience—and by extension help everyone else—not screw everything all up. The game world will never be restructured just to fit someone's novel or movie. There isn't, and won't be, any forced meta-plot to restrict your stories. There hopefully won't be any pretentious "this is how you must play" rants (but we can't promise anything from the forums…). We promise to do our best to keep the "what the?" moments rare and minimal. Like you, we want to limit everything in the whole 'campaign killer' category. What we will do however, is try to help out. We will help you flesh-out your ideas. If you need ideas for a campaign, help creating a character, advice on being a Game Master, or if you just want to bounce a few ideas off of us, just ask. There is also a very helpful community of Midianites, many of whom are also working on their own new stuff, who are also willing to help.
The only portion of the continent of Suditerre that will ever be fully explored by Lost Souls Publishing is the northernmost portion of the Byzant Empire. The rest of the Empire's states, and the Elder Kingdoms further south, are left to the imaginations of the players. This portion of the world is devoted exclusively to house your ideas, without fear that they will ever be invalidated by an 'official' update. That is, the southwest quadrant of the map is off-limits for Lost Souls Publishing, and is held in reserve. There will never be any worldbook or supplement set there; nothing will be added, removed, or replaced; and only vague generalisations will ever be used. Everything that is south of the equator & west of the prime meridian is for the sole use of the game's players, Game Masters, and fans. Let me re-emphasize, the bulk of that continent is set aside to be populated exclusively with cities, nations, and other areas created by the game's players… that's you.
It's your world, too. Share in it.
"When you as a character find yourself in a living breathing world, where events take place without you, and mistakes can cost you your life… perhaps your character has even lost a friend or two in her adventures… at that point, in my opinion, a real player-character bond is formed. Its that bond, that for me as a player, makes the game worthwhile."
——Macabrevity on RPGHost.com's forums
How do you coordinate games in different campaigns?
This is something we've been doing for a while now, but felt that some guidelines would help others. The main thing is communication between Game Masters. Email works well, and the Battle Scars section of the Lost Souls website works even better. There, you have forums, chat, and private messages for your communication needs. Also, the full texts of all Midian guidelines are right at hand. If you actually know one another, phone calls or in-person meetings can also work well.
The first communiqués between Game Masters should be to get a handle on where each other's campaign stands. Some campaigns will have high level guilds with tight teamwork, and others will have a factuous collection of starting characters. Different campaigns may be set in different parts of the game world. There may be events that shaped the world in one story that simply aren't a part of another. If necessary, events from one campaign that are irreconcilable in another may be treated as rumours, but it is best if they are treated as factual. That is, if one campaign has Byzant and the Northern Protectorate at war, another campaign may treat this as building to a possible conflict. Then again, the news that the two nations are fighting may have only just reached the player characters. News, rumours, and some outright lies, are found in the typical campaign anyway, but this way you have much more story material available.
The next stage of communication between Game Masters should be to form a rough outline of shared events. This can start as simply as one is planning on sending her guild to the Killian Empire as a band of privateers. The other Game Master adds that his group is already in the Heldannic Confederation, and could thus provide either assistance or a source of dramatic tension and competition. They collectively decide on a plan. The Doom Squad guild will attempt to get a letter of marque from the Killian Empire as privateers, and failing that will just be pirates. The Guild of the Fist will continue their mercantile efforts in the Heldannic Confederation: build a supply base & port, keep the waters clear of raiders, and establish new trade routes. Depending on the efforts of the Doom Squad, the Guild of the Fist may have waters that are surprisingly free of piracy, and have a good repeat customer at their new port. Or, they could have a new threat in the West Sea. From the perspective of the Doom Squad, there is either a potential place to unload their wares, or a port to raid—not to mention all of the merchant ships they can plunder if they turn to straight piracy.
The third step is to continue to keep the lines of communication open as the games progress. Each Game Master can feed off of the others for story ideas, and keep her own updated as shared events change. To continue the above example, the Game Master of the Doom Squad loves the idea of a port-of-call for her troupe, especially as her guild left many enemies among the Heldanns in a prior chapter of the campaign. The Guild of the Fist's Game Master takes that idea and suggests the possibility of counter-anti-pirates as a direct threat to the Doom Squad and a new behind-the-scenes enemy of his own troupe. To this, the Doom Squad's Game Master adds a recurring foe to be the captain of one of the counter-anti-pirates. The Fist's Game Master can use this, as he feels it's a much better idea for a recurring villain than the one he was developing on his own. For his campaign, he will now have all of the prior evidence of the old (and as yet unused) villain be false clues set by the new shared baddie: Captain Zacharia. The Game Masters should still continue to share events from individual sessions as much as possible, at least until the end of this shared story arc.
After the end of this shared chapter of each campaign, the Game Masters need to compare notes. Major changes should be discussed, and they should conspire as to how to handle the inevitable fallout in each of their campaigns. The Guild of the Fist's Game Master used the Doom Squad as non-player characters who raided the Fist's port whose ship was sunk during the battle. As this obviously didn't happen in the Doom Squad's campaign, this needs to be reconciled. Either it was a different ship that was sunk, or the Doom Squad must have somehow survived and escaped. Likewise, the the Doom Squad called a temporary truce with Captain Zach, and the Fist's Game Master wants to continue using him as a main enemy and pirate. This could be a source of continued tension between the two guilds in the future. Perhaps the Guild of the Fist can trick the pirate captain into turning on the Doom Squad, thinking they violated the truce.
It is important to remember that there is no Game Master for Game Masters. That is, there is no referee, arbiter of the guidelines, and especially no one overseeing the shared story. Each must handle his or her own campaign. Every gaming troupe has its own quirks, limitations, and preferences. What works great for one may not work at all for another. Thus, each Game Master must decide for themselves exactly how to handle the content provided by their peers. If need be, the Lost Souls staff can act as mediators and arbitrators in a dispute, but this is unlikely to ever happen. Each troupe's Game Master has a better handle on their own campaign than anyone else.
There are no limits to the number of campaigns that can be linked in this manner. Though there will never be an "official" or manditory linked campaign, all such integrations are inherently part of the Immersive Game World. It really isn't any more work for each Game Master, and it may even be a bit less as the task of crafting a story is now shared. It's also a great deal of fun to share gaming stories, trade ideas, offer & receive advice, add new content, compare how your campaign compares to others, and to just have someone with which to share campaign secrets.
Players can also integrate their stories between campaigns, albeit in a different manner. There are three main avenues this may take.
The simplest to describe—but the most difficult to actually execute—is to take your character from one game to another, temporarily or otherwise. Just pick it up and go. This is only possible if the two troupes are geographically close in the real world. This can cause problems if the character isn't a good fit with the new group, is too high level, has too few skills (like speaking the right language), or is just too different conceptually. There is also the cognitive dissonance factor: you disappeared in the middle of a fight, popped-up somewhere else in the world & hung out with new people for a while, then rematerialised back in the original fight, all without missing anything or anyone being able to tell you ever left, except that somehow you are now much stronger & equipped with the Sword of Snickety-Snak.
The next method is to get involved in an internet game. This is a play-by-post on the forums, -by-chat, or -by-email game. Characters interact in these game in their "off time" between sessions, and such games essentially exist as part of the journalling process. Time and geography are kept pretty loose during these games, as the character's main campaigns may be widely spaced in the world, and progress at very different rates. Events from these internet stories may be coordinated and integrated into the main campaign (the tabletop game) using the guidelines detailed above. Some players choose to "retire" their characters to the forums. That is they no longer play that character in an active tabletop game, but continue to occassionally interact with other players on the boards as a permanent part of the Immersive Game World.
The final method is the quickest, and generally causes the least amount of change in the home campaign. These are events that don't involve full play-by-post campaigns, but only use other tools of the Lost Souls website. For example, a character wants to learn a certain skill, one that requires a teacher, such as a specific spell. The player posts a "classified ad" online looking for a qualified instructor. Another, more oblique, example would be if the events of a player's journal are used as fodder for rumours of distant events in someone else's campaign.
This is awarded by the design staff at Lost Souls Publishing as fan-created material that fits in with our shared vision well enough to be considered cannon. It is the logo/Service Mark found at the top of this page, with a smaller version following this section. In other words, nothing contradictory will be written by LSP, and we may expound upon it even. The accompanying license reads as follows:
By publicly displaying this symbol, you hearby acknowledge that the associated work is considered a portion of the collective Immersive Game World of Midian as recognized by the designers and creators of the Midian Dark Fantasy Roleplaying Game and allow same or other players of the Midian Dark Fantasy Roleplaying Game to create derivative works based thereof. This in no way is intended or inferred to surrender the legal protections for copyright enjoyed by you according to the laws of your nation of residence and/or citizenship. Lost Souls Publishing acknowledges that full rights are retained by the author, but may create derivative works without requiring further authorization, as may other players of the Midian Dark Fantasy Roleplaying Game, in compliance with the accords of this license, and agreed upon by the originators of said creative works with the issuance and public display of the Immersive Game World Service Mark Logo. This license and the accompanying work so covered is in accordance with the Midian Open Content License of the Copywrong dual license schema as a derivative work based upon the Midian Dark Fantasy Roleplaying Game. The following portions are covered by this Service Mark: [the specific portions covered will be detailed here].
In other words, we are saying "this is cool, we'd really like this to be a part of the game world for everyone." You don't have to agree to allow this use, it is purely voluntary. Note that you are not giving up any of your creator's rights—you are simply allowing LSP and your fellow players to share your great ideas. A link back to this page would be appreciated, as it would allow others to participate in the Immersive Game World as well, and this page includes the full list of Immersive Game World Content.
Thank you to everyone who contributed these great ideas for the enjoyment and better gaming of all.
Copyright is retained by the original author, and does not become property of Lost Souls Publishing, without a separate agreement to that fact. Content can be submitted online for either the Lost Souls 'zine or the Midian Dark Fantasy Roleplaying Game by either the forums, by email, or by the contact form on the main page. Ideas can be for an addition or ammendment to an existing work, or may be an entirely new proposal. Unless such is not possible or unwanted by the creator, proper accredation for one's work will always be given. Permission is granted to create your own fan-site using the concepts and ideas of the Midian DFRPG. Remember that the Copywrong states that it's all free & shared, unless you want to give to charity. In addition, LSP may be contacted for proposals to publish your work for the Midian DFRPG as a separate body of work. LSP is under no obligation to publish any submitted idea nor is obligated to include any submitted idea for inclusion in the Midian DFRPG or Lost Souls 'zine.
Content types can include but are not limited to: new communities (towns, countries, organisations), skills (suites, classes, skills, spells, traditions, & codicils), stories (fan fiction or novelisations), items (equipment, magic items, vehicles, alchemical creations, arms & armour), chronicles & logs of campaigns or individual characters, and vivid descriptions of settings, people, items, or events.
Stories, new skill suites, et cetera. will be treated as any other Immersive Game World content. That is, there really isn't anything 'official'. It's all a matter of community and individual acceptance. No one is forced to accept an idea that they think is bad. Of course, one must remember that this also works both ways. We will help you however, so that your submission is the best that it can be.
This is a smaller variant of the Immersive Game World Logo. This may be used as a more bandwidth and page-realestate friendly Service Mark for those sites containing Immersive Game World content.
*Phrase "Immersive Game World" credited to Simon Ringwood on OpenRoleplaying. org
Thanks to Dave, Liam, & T-Bone for repeatedly linking their campaigns into one giant, complex, and continuous story. Their efforts formed the basis of the "coordinated events" guidelines above.