How long are your seasons?

[KillerWhale]

Duh. Do not act offensed, my dear Cardassian.

I will answer that ST and BtVS are too very different approaches of storytelling, and hence, roleplaying.

IMO, in BtVS the tension mainly comes from social interactions. In ST it mainly comes from the phenomena or conspirations encountered, and the way players react to it (which do not exclude social roleplaying, on the contrary - need I remember you the whole Chloe Ellington episode...? which, IMO, is one of the best plot threads yet to be resolved that we have).

In ST, things move along faster, that's all, because lots of people are encountered; the crew is developed, but the goal is roughly the same; the plots very often come from outside the ship. So seasons are shorter. BtVS happens in a city, with many different interests; it focuses on the inside of the city, so time has to be taken to build it and give it verisimilitude.

This is not a judgment of quality, my friend. These are two different approaches, and hopefully I will learn from each, thus getting a better GM for both games...

[loryk]

I was sure you'll say something like that

I think it's important in that thread to explain how each GM has chosen his/her seasons length.

all depends on the rythm he wants his story grows.

that's right that ST and BTVS have 2 different rythms

and if I made the precedent post it's because I think each group with it internal inertia has in the same way different rythm.

and you could think our rythm was inappropriate to develop social intrigues...

[KillerWhale]

you could think our rythm was inappropriate to develop social intrigues...

Not really - we also had our share of that. It's just that in BtVS, social roleplaying often takes 40 to 50% of game time. In ST, things don't work that way...

Social interactions also help to ground the characters, and from characters, motivations, many interesting plots come (something I learned from BtVS). As long as all things remain logical and have a REASON to be. (No sense throwing baddies at you if you have done nothing to annoy them, for instance...)

Would the Ascendant's observer, James McBlish, be as interesting if he wasn't Tim Paige (our flight ops officer) Academy rival?
Would Adm. Ogby be as interesting if the first officer of his flagship wasn't the daughter of your nemesis, adm. McMillian?
Would you have hated Coralia Deventris, one of s3 and 4's arch-enemies, if she hadn't teased you so much and stolen valuable data right under your noses?
and so on...

(Precisions intended for non-players of the game of course )

Hmm, conflict, conflict, is there a real evil and where is it?

I'm thinking of entering the Evil GM Support Group

We went wayyy off topic, I propose we get back on track

[loryk]

agreed