[Churchofgaming] One player, one referee

[karl at rpgreview.net]

I suppose like any communication perhaps the best start is to consider  
the referee, the player, and the goal. With these in mind picking and  
choosing from the solutions presented will be easier. An inexperienced  
referee trying to introduce a new player to rpg in a one off session  
is a very different situation to two very experienced rpgers who want  
to meet every firday night for an extended campaign.

Further Comments in line.

Quoting karl at rpgreview.net:

> Hi all,
> While we have as many as seven players at our sessions now this  
> opposite situation, one player only, has had some discussion at our  
> sessions of late. I've faced this a few times and am always looking  
> for tips to do better. What are *your* solutions to the three big  
> issues:
>
> A) lone player fragility and death

Over the years I have heard and trialed several approaches to this problem.
i) low combat frequency. The adventures are investigative, political,  
exploratory, or stealth/hiest so combat is less frequent. This even  
works in traditionally bloodthirsty genres like sword & sorcery, Young  
Conan was a thief who relied as much on stealth as he did his blade.
ii) weak opponents. Whether it be fighting rats in AD&D or mooks in  
newer FATE based games you stock the adventure with weak opponents.  
Never really liked this solution much. Fighting a bunch of rats or  
pickpockets just isn't very heroic. Making opponents like orcs into  
tissue-paper-flimsy mooks despite them looking like muscular dangerous  
foes seems arbitary and unsatifying, your players know their heroes  
would not be that good in a 'fair' fight.

iii) player character power. The character begins with more  
experience/power/levels making them tougher to kill and giving them  
more resources to tackle problems. This was most common in older  
level/class based games mentioned by Lev in his post. This works ok if  
the player is experienced in the game system. Inexperienced players  
will be snowed under in the many skills, feats, spells powers or  
whatever. For longer campaigns this option robs the player of the  
opportunity to play through those early developmental portions of the  
character's arc.

iv): Helpful NPCs. The PC has friends who save his bacon. My least  
favourite approach. More work for the referee and the tendency to  
become a crutch. A related approach used in T&T 5.5 and lower was the  
assumption that each player control a number characters.

V) player character competence. Some systems create characters with  
broad competence rather than assuming a party of specialists like AD&D  
did. This is almost the norm for games now. Most FATE games, Fantasy  
Craft, Conan, and other have character creation rules to ensure this.  
Others like GURPS and BRP can create broadly competent characters *IF*  
the player deliberately does so.

v) Game system fixes. These are things like the Conan game's *Left for  
Dead* rule that gives the character a limited number of 'lives' in a  
way that makes sense in the narrative.  'Where No Man' has a redshirt  
rule and Paranoia famously used clones.

vi) Setting fixes. political/cultural/socail factors lessen danger.  
For exanmple if goblins are citizen rather than hunted monsters  
perhaps they'll risk goal to rob but balk at murder for which the  
penalty is the hangman's noose. Perhaps the PC is a ransomable noble?

vii) Bloodshed. Don't try to save the PC at all. Use a game where  
character generation is fast and write simple action story adventures.  
Fast generation reduces player investment in the PC and after a couple  
of deaths the penny (hopefully) drops and the player is ready to  
heroically throw thier character into the meatgrinder of battle. T&T,  
Fighting Fantasy, Tunnel Quest, are good choices for this style of  
play. Player personality and game style are important considerations  
for this one.


> B) all the solutions have to come from one player what if they get stumped?
> C) all the entertainment has to come from two people
>
> Also what systems work better?
> What kinds of adventures, genres, etc?
>
> I have some ideas but will leave that until tomorrow...
>
> Cheers
> K
>
>
>
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