PC Logs

Here's something interesting that my group had never really tried until recently, and I thought I'd mention it to the rest of you all.

In my group, which consists of my character (the Chief Engineer), another PC (the Executive Officer) and the final PC (the Chief Medical Officer), we've started presenting the option of writing log entries, ala the various Trek series, to try and add more flavor to our campaign. For each sessions log entry (or entries, if necessary), we award anywhere from 1 to 3 experience points, based on the way the log is written, whether or not the player has attempted to use meta-game knowledge in the log, how well the player has remembered the events of the gaming session, how well the log is written "in character", and so on. For instance, here is a log entry from tonight's session. For sake of background, the campaign is set is 2379, and the Federation is at war with the Romulans. Additionally, the Romulans are at war with the Klingons, and the Klingons have been invaded by the Borg, via a wormhole in the Klingon Empire, which our crew is going to investigate.

Our ship, the newly commissioned USS Sentinel, is a new class of ship (the Sentinel class). Our Captain is Chakotay, from Voyager, and our Ops Manager and 2nd Officer is Annika Hansen (the former Seven of Nine), who has the rank of Commander. The XO, who is a PC (as mentioned above), is Commander Gabriel "Gabe" Archer, who happens to be my characters best friend. My character, by the way, is Commander Thomas J. Jackson.

Be warned, though, that there are elements of the log which may seem controversial (such as the Borg ship), but it's part of our campaign, and we're having fun, so please, no flames! :D

Here's an excerpt from my characters log entry for the session:

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Chief Engineers log, Stardate 56346.35 – We’ve been patrolling the former RNZ for about six weeks now, and haven’t really seen any action, which I’m not complaining about. I have just returned from a senior staff meeting, where Captain Chakotay told us that we were headed to Klingon space, to render whatever assistance we can. Apparently, things have gotten far worse for them, and judging by the sensor footage that Gabe showed me today, I can’t help but think that it’s going to get far, far worse. The video of the Borg colony ship was some of the most terrifying video footage that I’ve ever seen. I can’t really imagine even facing a Borg ship that’s over 7 miles in length. Hell, it’s so large, it makes standard Borg cubes seem insignificant. I’ve shown the footage to my staff, and I’ve got them brainstorming about it. I know that some of them have prior experience with the Borg, either through study or through practical experience. No one that I know of, though, including Commander Hansen, has ever seen or heard about a Borg ship this large. I’m expected to coordinate with Gabe, and the chief science officer, to see if we can come up with some sort of strategy for dealing with such a threat, but at this point, I have to admit to feeling a little overwhelmed. I don’t know much about the Borg, other than the basics that they teach you at the Academy and the little bits and pieces that I’ve picked up along the way, but I’m going to see if Commander Hansen would be willing to further my, and my teams, knowledge about both Borg ships and Borg technology.

Honestly, I’d really hoped to go my entire career without ever really dealing with the Borg. The Dominion was bad enough, and the Romulans have essentially been a constant thorn in the side of the Federation, but at least those two governments could be negotiated with. There is, however, no negotiation with the Borg. To survive them, we’ll have to destroy them, and that’s a prospect that I’m not overly looking forward to. Oh well, though…as Gabe often reminds me, “When we put on the uniform, we have to be willing to take risks.” It seems, though, that stopping the Borg, once and for all, may be the greatest risk that Starfleet, and the Federation, may ever take.

_________________________________________________

There it is...and I hope you all enjoyed it! :p

My point to this thread, though, is to ask: does anyone else do this with their groups? Do you award experience for log entries?

In my group, we don't expect log entries for every day of the characters life, but rather a "highlight" log entry for each session, or in the case of tonights session, which lasted for 12 hours (hey, what can I say, we're EXTREME gamers! :D), I made several log entries. We, as a group, do this for a few reasons, none of which have to do with experience.

Firstly, it makes an excellent roleplaying aid. Imagine if a character is placed on trial, as Kirk was in Star Trek VI, and his or her personal log is used against him. Also, what if a player forgets an important bit of information from a previous adventure? Well, fortunately he has his log handy, and can look at it...but did he remember to mention that crucial bit of info? It can eventually become something pretty useful to both players and Narrators, alike.

Secondly, it allows the players to further "get into character". I find that, when I write my log, I begin to really think like my character. I don't always agree with the decisions that I make for him, but I make those decisions because it's what I think he would do.

Finally, it really enhances the entire Trek experience. For instance, I was watching the episode "Data's Day" today, and noted the instances in the episode where he would mentally composes parts of a message that he was going to send to someone. In a lot of ways, it seemed like a personal log entry, and it really made me think that, if you didn't know a lot about Data, watching that one episode might help you to understand him more.

I'm starting to ramble on here, but, again, I'm interested to know what the rest of you think about the idea of PC logs.



Greg

Damn, that is a great idea!

That should get players a little more involved in the makeup and background flavor of the game. . .

A tip of the hat t'you. . . you won't be too offended if I steal this idea and use it on my group, would you?

Me, offended?

How could I, a frequent poster on these boards, ever feel offended? :rolleyes:

Seriously, though, I posted this clip of a log entry and mentioned it because I think it is a good idea, and I thought that it would be a good contribution to make, for everyone to use, if they see fit.

Frankly, the fact that someone likes it, and is going to "steal" it makes me glad that I took the time to type it all up.

Steal away, and have fun with it!

Oh, by the way, if you require more inspiration, I can always post more log entries...I've got several pages of them handy. Heck, if nothing else, it'll fill you in on the plot of our campaign (at least what's happened after we left the Academy.)


Greg

*nod* I've done this with groups, though most often out loud rather than written down. A Captain's Log is usually how we start a new adventure or story arc. :)

The Doc

In the group i am in we have been using the idea of personal logs for 6 months and we have fun doing them. We don't get experience for it but someone who writes logs for every session will be about 2 or 3 ranks ahead of someone who doesn't at the end of the 7 seasons. If you want to know more ask Polanski. He is the GM of our group and has some real doozy logs. Particually from the Bajoran!

Well, I'm glad to see that I've finally started a thread that's getting some attention. It's nice to see that there are other people out there that try to "get into character" as much as possible.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Michael Barratt
*nod* I've done this with groups, though most often out loud rather than written down. A Captain's Log is usually how we start a new adventure or story arc. :)

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Well Michael, we read them out loud, too. Those are the interesting times, especially when it's a more personal log, rather than a duty log. For sake of convienence, though, we've just combined the logs into duty logs, unless we specifically want to make a personal log, in which case we do so.

Like your group, though, ours starts every episode with a Captain's log, and, as we pass into various stages of the story, we each make updates, or the Narrator will make an update of the Captain's log (since the Captain is an NPC).

If, however, we are focusing an adventure on a certain character (for instance, my character in the last episode we played through), then I, as a player, am encouraged to make log entries and updates and such, which I work on when I'm involved with the story, or when we take a pause in the game.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Marcus Kavart
In the group i am in we have been using the idea of personal logs for 6 months and we have fun doing them. We don't get experience for it but someone who writes logs for every session will be about 2 or 3 ranks ahead of someone who doesn't at the end of the 7 seasons.

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Oh, if our campaigns could only last that long, Marcus! :eek:

Actually, though, as I mentioned previously, we write and present the logs as a way to get more in touch with our characters (which is the same reason we played though our time at the Academy). For us, the experience matters little, but the Narrator, bless him, feels that we should get some sort of reward for the extra work, hence the couple of Experience Points. At this point, though, I can certainly use them, so I’m not complaining!



Greg

Fantastic Idea!!!

I've never thought of doing such a thing. My players are always nagging me about the command decisions of the PC commanding officers and this would give me good in-game explanations for their reasoning.

One question, is the xp given as extra or part of the 1-2 for good roleplaying?

I've always encouraged (and rewarded) personal logs and other writings from my players. Sometimes I open an episode with an officer's log other than the captain. Either I'll write it and have the player tweak it to fit his/her character, or I'll ask a player to come up with a log off the top of their head.

My players generally pick up the ball and run with it, going on to writing short stories about parts of their character's life, or psych profiles, or any number of little writing "moments" that help define their character.

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Originally posted by Lt.Khrys Antos
One question, is the xp given as extra or part of the 1-2 for good roleplaying?

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Well, firstly, I appreciate your enthusiasm for this idea. Thanks! :)

In my group, the experience awarded is separate from "good roleplaying" experience, which we typically don't overly worry about. In my group, you're expected to roleplay good. If we're not all "in the groove", so to speak, then we simply stop the game until we're "back in the groove".

As an example, a standard adventure for our group lasts about 6 to 8 hours, and can occasionally go longer. We try to break experience awards down by the "average" session (the 6 to 8 hour length). These awards usually run anywhere from 6 to 8 experience points, depending on a variety of factors, such as the difficulty of the adventure (though we never have simple, easy adventures!), how "into" the story everyone was, how well we accomplished our objectives, and so on.

We generally don't use the LUG rules for experience, but instead just sort of "guess-timate" based on previous experience awarding scenarios, how much we need the PC's to advance, and so on.

As I've said before, though, we roleplay to roleplay, and not "rollplay", not that there's anything wrong with that style. Heck, we sometimes go entire game sessions without picking up the dice, except to maybe make a notice roll, or something along those lines.

Based on the ICON system, though, I would encourage the experience from the logs to be separate. For instance, you can roleplay your character very well, but not make a log. Given the Core rules suggestion of "1 - 2 points of experience for good roleplaying", a player who only roleplayed adequately, but made a log, would get equal "good roleplaying" experience, which doesn't seem overly fair, IMHO. Take, though, a player who both plays his or her character well, plus rounds things out with some log entries, and that character will more than likely have developed, in terms of character and personality, more than any other character during the course of the episode.

And that, to me, is what roleplaying is all about...




Greg

Quote:

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Originally posted by Ineti
I've always encouraged (and rewarded) personal logs and other writings from my players. Sometimes I open an episode with an officer's log other than the captain. Either I'll write it and have the player tweak it to fit his/her character, or I'll ask a player to come up with a log off the top of their head.

My players generally pick up the ball and run with it, going on to writing short stories about parts of their character's life, or psych profiles, or any number of little writing "moments" that help define their character.

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It sounds like your group and mine would get along rather well! :)

The only element that seems overly different is the idea of the Narrator writing a log for a player. To me, it is the role of the Narrator to do this for NPC's, and semi-NPC's, when necessary and appropriate, but not necessarily for the PC's.

In instances where I would want to steer the log in a certain direction, I would probably briefly explain to the player a set of circumstances, events, happens, etc, that would have occured to the character in question to guide him to constructing a log entry that would include that information.

For instance, imagine you want to run an adventure set on Risa, and you want to use one of the players as the "hook character" for the group, but he has no reason to mention Risa in his log. You might start the game mentioning that a certain, attractive young officer has been acting somewhat flirty with the character, and maybe the character might be interested in the NPC. You could then inform the group that the ship will be stopping off at Risa to pick up the Risan Ambassador to the Federation, and shore leave, for a couple of days, is possible, given the groups outstanding recent performance.

Given that information, the player could then construct a log entry, in his or her own style, and be able to mention the pertinent information, without feeling overly railroaded, or controlled by the Narrator.

Just my thoughts....



Greg

Quote:

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Originally posted by Greg Davis


It sounds like your group and mine would get along rather well! :)

The only element that seems overly different is the idea of the Narrator writing a log for a player. To me, it is the role of the Narrator to do this for NPC's, and semi-NPC's, when necessary and appropriate, but not necessarily for the PC's.

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It does sound like they would get along! :)

The elements aren't really all that different. The campaign I was in ran for over three years (real-time) and in that space of time, I got to know the PCs as well as the players. The first few logs I wrote for them I encouraged them to tweak to better fit their characters. As we all got experience, I learned their characters' speaking patterns and cadences, to the point where I'd hand them a first draft log and they'd say "This is exactly what my character would say." Otherwise they'd tweak it. :)

At any rate, the players wrote their own logs far more often than I handed them pre-written ones.

A standard session of 6-8 hours?!:eek:

I'm lucky if a game lasts a little over 3 hours. The log idea is great and I've started to bring it up with a few players.

6-8 hours average? Wow. Of the 60-odd episodes I've run, the vast majority fall into the 4-6 hour range, give or take. A handful have run over 6 hours, and a couple clocked in under three (wherein the players were on top of things and just plowed through the episode).

I haven't run a game in a while though - it's hard to find players willing to commit to a long-term game and invest some time in really developing their character.

Well, I'm certainly aware that not all games run the way they do in my group, especially in the area of length. For instance, we've had gaming sessions that have lasted upwards of 12 hours.

However, I still think that the idea of awarding separate experience for log entries is a good one, as I explained above. I'd suggest, though, that if you want to incorporate logs into your game (and reward the players for constructing them), an extra experience point or two wouldn't hurt, and I think that the players would appreciate a little something for the extra work.

Just my opinion...once again expressed! ;)



Greg

I think it's a great idea! I should mention it to my own GM. (Actually, I probably just did, as he's the one who introduced me to this board! :D )

I like this one too...

We did have something similar once: a friend of mine guest-starred as the Romulan counterpart to the player first officer. The idea was that he would be a recurring character, with this guy always play him.

The player opted to do a Romulan version of personal logs. Then he went one step further, got hold of an old laptop computer, whipped up a Romulan Windows desktop theme, and spent most of the session typing reports to the Tal Dian in a somewhat sinister fashion...

It added a lot to the game!

That sounds cool, Imagus! :)

I'm glad that so many different people think that logs are a cool idea. In fact, I'm somewhat surprised that LUG didn't recommend doing something like that in the rules. Heck, they may have, and I just missed it.

If I had any sort of design skill, I'd try and whip up some sort of "Personal / Department Log Entry Form", as a game aid. If nothing else, it would be useful for keeping notes during an adventure.

As to the laptop use, our group occasionally uses our graphic calculators as PADD's, and as Tricorders. It works good as a roleplaying tool.

Of course, my group is something in between a tabletop group and a live-action group...so maybe we're just a little weird! :D



Greg

Do we use PC logs? Well, yes, by all means! For one thing, we found out that without logs, we were often unable to remember key elements from previous sessions :o ... that's even more embarassing for me as I'm supposed to be the GM ;). No, we don't have a memory problem, but we tend to have rather long games (over the week-end: Saturday 12-14 hours, a bit of sleep, then sunday 6-8 hours), but way too seldom (once every 2 or 3 months). Writing logs helps keeping last adventures in mind.
On the other hand, writing logs for a 20 hours session can be cumbersome at times, so I award experience (1-3 also) for those. Players usually write one log every 2 sessions, and I sometimes write one, either their commanding officer's, or any other character's which I feel could offer an interesting/unforeseen insight. With 3-4 players, this gives us an average of 2 logs per session, which helps covering most of what happened during the session.
It also helps roleplay, for sure, but IMO my players have yet to find their own style ... or get accustomed to the traditionnal "Trek Log" style for the logs to convey the right feeling. I think what you suggested (breaking down the log into several smaller pieces corresponding each to a day or the end of a shift) could help us there ... I'm going to suggest it to my players :).

The only thing that's sometimes a bit frustrating for me (as a GM) is seeing how much the players tend to forget from what's supposed to have happened to their characters. Or how often they tend to get it wrong ... gosh, how can I be that bad at describing things? ;)
The funny thing is that I had never noticed how bad it could get until we began to use those logs
:eek: ...
Just wondering: has any other GM here ever felt something like that too?

We've experienced that too, Calcoran. If it helps, I'll pass along what we did to remedy the problem of a player not paying adequate attention to the game.

In our group, the player that controls the medical officer used to have attention issues, to the point that she'd actually fall asleep during the game. Well, she didn't want to be the odd person out, so she'd write her log entries, using her only partially complete knowledge of the adventure.

Well, after a few adventures where this occured, Starfleet came to investigate the ship. It appeared that her log entries didn't match up with the log entries for other officers that had taken part in the same situations, so Starfleet felt that there was sufficient reason to investigate, since it was possible that there was some sort of cover-up or discrepancy occuring.

After that, and the character getting into a fair amount of trouble, she began to pay quite a bit more attention. ;)



Greg

Actually, I don't recall reading anything about logs for PCs in LUG books. I got the idea from Ambre diceless RPG, which quantifies rewards for different types of reports, novels, or anything the players feel like writing/drawing/and so on that he feels might enhance the gaming experience of the campaign. I thought it would be well suited for Trek, as TV episodes often begin or end on one of the main cast's log.

About players not paying adequate attention to the game ...
We had this sleeping problem a lot when we were student and used to play at night (8PM till 3AM, once or twice a week), and 2 or 3 of us used to doze off a bit after 1AM ... though never at the same time, so we had always 3 players fit at any time ;). Now that we're working, we have to wait for the week-end to play, so doziness is not as big a problem ;), but strangely enough, misunderstandings seem to happen rather more often than it did. I wonder it it's because logs make them more obvious, or if it's simply that they do happen more often ...

Anyhow, I can hardly want to punish my players for not paying attention or getting it wrong, after all everyone is there to have fun. Maybe it's just us getting old ;) ... and deaf too ;). Maybe roleplaying needs training and we're not training enough! Maybe I'm loosing my GM skills! Aaaaargh! :eek:
;) :D

MANY moons ago I was playing in a game where we played ourselves, revived after being frozen into a post-oops Earth with high tech and magic (ala Rifts). Since I enjoy writing as a hobby (and I'll skip over the fun involved in writing porn...) I started to keep a log in character.

The log, titled "Where and Back Again" was an instant hit!!! Almost all my players begged to read my post session additions!!!

Some of the fun in John's game included Nikki, a cute, innocent 'lil D-cupper of a lass who had a knockout body BUT didn't realize she had a knockout 'bod. The main bad guy, Ezekiel, had captured her, and we planned her rescue. My write up went something like this:

"As we drew up our plans, my mind couldn't help but to think of poor little Nikki, held by the evil one. In his secret torture chamber, her naked body writhes against the leather straps, Ezekiel's slimy hands caressing her young, nubile, firm yet soft body. Nikki moaned in a weird mix of horror and arousal, a bead of sweat running down the gentle curve of her bre...um, er, brow..."

Fun, huh?

YES, even Nikki loved it...

What I did was jotted down notes during the gaming; alas, this meant I missed out on gaming participation, but the GM understood. After the game, I re-wrote my notes into something readable. AND next session, the 3 ring binder, thicker, made it's way around players and GM...

ANYHOW, IF you have a GM who is willing to make allowances, and can write well, it is a LOT of fun!!! DO IT!!!

Hmmmm...maybe I should post the whole thing to our gameclub's website?

http://www.smilies.nl/rough/flamethrower.gifhttp://www.smilies.nl/rough/plasmawhore.gif

http://www.smilies.nl/tales/lsvader.gif

My brother and I are the primary GMs of our adventures. Instead of our PCs keeping a log, I am the keeper of the Archive (that's what I call our collection of logs).

What I do is tape each game on audio cassette then transcribe the game in the form of a story story (about 20 - 30 pages long). This results in excellent continuity and as a GM, I can use an off- handed comment that a PC made during an adventure and turn it into a whole story.

Currently my Archive contains 230 log files. I also keep a database of all the information included in the logs such as people, planets, technological items, etc.. Soon the database will reach 5000 entires.

This Archive is an invaluable reference guide for me and the PCs.
It has taken me nearly 10 years to get it the way I want.

Damn Khyber...that's dedication!

I don't think I could offer that sort of dedication to a roleplaying game, though I really wish I could.



Greg

I've never been able to tape the sessions, but sometimes I wish I could have. So many tangents and wonderful one-liners get lost... :)

In the SW game I'm running now, I have a player who takes copious notes (even to the extent of who hits who in combat and the damage dealt out). I take his notes and transcribe them. He tends to catch just about every conversation or event in the game. I can't tell you how valuable this is, especially when the session veers sharply away from my outline and I resort to ad-libbing scenes.

I used to take detailed notes, but it began to get in the way of playing so I decided to use a tape recorder. A few times I video taped our sessions, but I didn't like watching us just sitting there.

The one disadvantage of audio recording is that when the GM pulls out a picture of an NPC we all know and he just says, "you see this guy." Sometimes it is several weeks before I transcribe the session, so I tend to forget who that guy was. Now I purposely say the name of the NPC to get the reference.

I'm not as dedicated as I would like to be but I've had 16 years of tweaking my logs and database to finally get it the way I want it.

Right now, my group only plays about 5 times a year. For a few years, we would play 36 times a year with most sessions lasting 6 or 7 hours. Real life tends to get in the way now.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Greg Davis
I'm glad that so many different people think that logs are a cool idea. In fact, I'm somewhat surprised that LUG didn't recommend doing something like that in the rules. Heck, they may have, and I just missed it.

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We did, it was in the Players' Guide. The entries I wrote up I even stole from my own game that was running at the time. Cless Mora anyone? :)

Logs (and other player-created aids) are good tools but should be non-compulsory. Remember that not all players are comfortable doing such projects, don't enjoy the extra "work," or lack the skill to do so. Players can become upset if, say, a player with writing skill writes up all these log entries and gets extra XP while the player with no writing skill has no such avenue.

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Originally posted by Don Mappin

Logs (and other player-created aids) are good tools but should be non-compulsory. Remember that not all players are comfortable doing such projects, don't enjoy the extra "work," or lack the skill to do so. Players can become upset if, say, a player with writing skill writes up all these log entries and gets extra XP while the player with no writing skill has no such avenue.

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Very true. I kept the XP awards for writing logs and such very modest. The non-writers of the group tended to make up for their lack of XP for writing in other ways; wearing uniforms or bringing a character-specific prop, or role-playing really well (using a character voice and/or mannerisms).