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Improv on Location

Population Tire
In pre-printed tabletop games, and even morein freeform adventures, we know our location from the start. Your pre-published map shows all three levels of the castle, along with a a list of shops and other points of interest in the town. The spaceship blueprint has a list that covers crew quarters, the engine room, gunner stations, etc. Or maybe your book doesn’t have maps or blueprints, and presents flavor text and broad descriptions of the the people and places it covers. Both maps and descriptions, even general ones, are helpful when you’re running a game, and can cut down prep time for a scene. For those of us who fly by the seat of our GM pants in sessions, though, these may sometimes become a hindrance when we haven’t had a chance to go over them in advance. When presenting players a location, knowing where things are placed, what's secret or hidden, what doors are sealed/locked, where all of the traps are and so on, are all things you should probably know ahead of time. But there isn’t always time to do all the prep you’d like to, and most of us probably can’t keep the whole playbook memorized. To help alleviate this issue, let's take a look at some locational improv.

On the Road

Are your players traveling across a featureless landscape? In most circumstances, players and GMs alike are unlikely to imagine that. Certainly we spend plenty of time on all the NPCs the player characters may meet along the way, but what of the area just beyond the road? As they travel, what can they see off in the distance? Including small details like ruined old buildings in the hills at the mountain’s edge or wisps of smoke a short way off in the forest, the unexpected asteroid just a few parsecs off from the usual smuggler’s run, can all lead to interesting scenes you haven’t planned on and would otherwise have never been seen. Don't be afraid to throw these descriptions to your players to investigate if they so choose. In my own recent game, I happened to throw in an old crumbling watchtower a short distance from the main road. While I did need to scramble to pull open a map for them to explore, they enjoyed finding a group of zombified orcs on the battlements to dispatch. Will there be other surprises or treasure for them to find inside? That'll be up to the improv of the location. (Of course, we wouldn’t want them reading this if I already do have plans for their exploration indoors.) 

Population Tire
On Location

At times, locational improv may not even come from your running the game. The players may inspire it themselves as long as you’re open to the "yes and…" of the tabletop.  They’re exploring a crashed abandoned starship - can they search for the captains quarters? Perhaps you hadn’t planned to include that room, but it's certainly reasonable that there would be one. What's in it? A bunk, a locker, a foot chest... a secret compartment, even? All these are reasonable things you may not have planned on, but could certainly include. To go back to my own game, the players recently visited a farmhouse where a murder took place. Can they search for an entrance to a cellar or basement? There isn’t one on the plans for the house, but it's certainly reasonable for one to be there! They might find old food stores, hidden personal keepsakes, or even a mysterious treasure map. In this case, my players stumbled onto a potential side quest involving a stack of old love letters and a ring. Something that never would have existed without improving the cellar room they chose to explore.  The key here, though, is "reasonable." Does the old farmhouse have a secret dungeon? Perhaps, but unlikely, and would likely raise more questions than you're ready to improvise answers for. Does it have a hidden entrance to a cave full of magical treasure? Almost certainly not. Players will generally push for what they’d love to find/have, and part of maintaining reasonable expectations (and game balance) is keeping them from getting too outlandish. On the other hand, you should be open to allowing their requests. Cellars are reasonable for farmhouses, and captain's quarters are reasonable for starships. Just because it isn’t on the map, it doesn’t mean you can’t put it there.

While you can "yes, and…" yourself into may wonderful situations, keep "reasonable" in mind. Don’t let yourself get "yes, and"-ed into making the fountain in the old castle courtyard a fountain of youth. Reasonableness in both directions here is warranted, and it's still okay to say "no, but..." even in a "yes and..." environment. You shouldn’t be afraid to include random areas, though, or you may miss out on discovering subplots and missions in your game that might have never been. Sometimes the things you hadn’t thought of, or the things not included in the book, can be the most rewarding - even if the players don't choose to follow up on them. Until next post folks, enjoy your dice and your tables. (Or maybe you play on a modified set of old desks. Does one of them have a locked draw that could be picked open? Or hidden compartments we could search for? Or...)

Send questions, comments, and exciting improv descriptions of Boring Places to neversaydice20@gmail.com.

Under Strongbadia

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