(05-28-2015, 11:21 AM)Emberhair Wrote: Has anyone had success in using an existing duty (trial 4man, 8man dungeon etc.) effectively in their RP? To keep on topic, how do you think villains and story tellers could effectively utilise these?
I've been in a few events where a duty was used pretty well. There was a whole arc about cultists kidnapping people to siphon their aether that involved a couple of these delves - gathering information and evidence, rescuing captives, destroying the aether-sucking machines, and so on. The party ran through it while the "DM" explained the what was happening over a LS.
It's mostly due to these things that my own event will try this angle. Mostly because not only does it help streamline things and a little bit of action for the participants to bite into, it also keeps things from being bogged down in what is effectively PvP when my villain and his cronies go up against the heroes.
Yes, there's the whole /random thing and other dice roll methods to do the combat, which allows for more freeform action... but you also get to avoid (on both sides) a dramatic or tense moment being ruined by a string of bad rolls (on either side). It removes a bit of the randomness and allows for all those involved to focus more on the action and the straight RP.
It helps that the goal is for my villain to be defeated in this bit, but you could also use such things to orchestrate small victories and such to have the "good guys" interfere with the bad guy's plans without just straight fighting him. Refluff a delve into Qarn as raiding a camp of mercenaries the big bad is using to assail a nearby village. Or Brayflox as traveling through a jungle to get a MacGuffin needed to overcome their defenses. So on and so forth.
It's all in how you want to work it, and the creativity of all those involved.
EDIT:
(05-28-2015, 11:46 AM)Hyrist Wrote: Not sure how one plays an antagonist in a dungeon where the only mechanical role a player can play in there is a protagonist. Maybe a 'traitor' scene at the end?
"Replace" the last boss with the villain or one of his cronies, or have the actual "scene" of the confrontation take place somewhere outside the dungeon afterward. They fight through a hidden passage lined with traps and dangers (the dungeon), to confront the villain in his lair (a FC room or someplace in the world that's aesthetically fitting).
In my event, the bosses of all the dungeons are effectively "not" the bosses that are actually there. Instead, they're the Commanders of the Big Bad. I'll introduce them as such before the boss pull, and then can RP the aftermath remotely through the LS. And the big bad is actually a character of mine, so I can always swap to him for more personal interaction outside the dungeon if needed.
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