[Dungeon Fantasy] Quickest Way To Start Playing?

[Gold & Appel Inc]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

[snip] You get some of the same effect with fewer players built on more points, but at a certain level (one that is far beyond the comfort point of the average GURPS GM, who hyperventilate in frustrated angst when confronted with something as twee as the 250 CP templates in GURPS DF) it becomes silly.

PROTIP: To avoid the appearance of being a troll on one of your typical drive-by insult sprees, be sure to back up this sort of claim with, y'know, evidence.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

With a single player and a single character, it's easy for the player to end up assuming everything just happens because of GM fiat, and that the character sheet is a piece of fluff, never taken into account.

Also, having a single character makes the campaign very much his (or her) story. This can create an appearance that the character is immortal, since his death is, effectively, the end of the campaign. The story might continue, but it becomes the story of somebody else. This might lead to a GM being reluctant to really challenge the hero, the player overly reckless because he expects the GM to pull punches, or the campaign suddenly ending when the PC dies or becomes unplayable.

Having a party of heroes creates a continuity that outlives any specific character, or even all of the original members.

[Graham]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

With a single player and a single character, it's easy for the player to end up assuming everything just happens because of GM fiat, and that the character sheet is a piece of fluff, never taken into account.

My experience is the complete opposite of this. With a single player character, that character sheet becomes all important and far more closely scrutinised than when I have multiple players.

Graham

[Graham]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Also, having a single character makes the campaign very much his (or her) story. This can create an appearance that the character is immortal, since his death is, effectively, the end of the campaign. The story might continue, but it becomes the story of somebody else. This might lead to a GM being reluctant to really challenge the hero, the player overly reckless because he expects the GM to pull punches, or the campaign suddenly ending when the PC dies or becomes unplayable.

Having a party of heroes creates a continuity that outlives any specific character, or even all of the original members.

This is all true, but assumes that the game in question is one where the character is in frequent danger of death. That's true of Dungeon Fantasy (so the rest of my answer is off topic, sorry) but not true across many other genres. Even with Fantasy, in most of the adventures I write it's the plot or mystery at the forefront, rather than the combat being deadly, which is perhaps why single player works well for me as a GM. The stories are character-driven rather than combat encounter-driven.

Graham

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Graham

My experience is the complete opposite of this. With a single player character, that character sheet becomes all important and far more closely scrutinised than when I have multiple players.

Graham

Note: the OP mentioned rules-lawyering in Battletech. I see that as actually dangerous, since GURPS has a big emphasis on when in doubt, the GM should apply what is sensible (despite rules being very solid and detailed compared to many systems).

[Anthony]

Since you want a DF style game, I would start by trying to familiarize yourself with particular subsets of the rules (think of the training missions in CRPGs, where they introduce all the controls and so on). For example, to figure out combat, start by just having a 1v1 arena battle, then gradually increase things.

Alternately, while Caravan to Ein Arras is not designed for dungeon fantasy level characters, so you might want to use cheap versions of the archetypes, it's actually a rather well built introductory adventure.

[Kuroshima]

I second Caravan to Ein Arris as an excellent intro adventure for both novice GMs and novice players. You can even play it with only Lite. In fact it will help you learn the ropes. I recommend against your wife controlling many characters. You're doing one on one, so take advantage of it, and go immersion-heavy. Make her the hero of her own movie (scale the encounters to match her character).

Working with many characters is trickier than it seems, and will break immersion. Maybe neither your wife nor you know enough to see that, but trust me on this.

BTW, one piece of advice, specially on your first game, "when in doubt, roll and shout" (I'm pretty sure it's in the basic set, as a pullquote, and does not require actually shouting), meaning that you must keep the ball rolling. Prepare to feel mentally exhausted in your first sessions.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Graham

This is all true, but assumes that the game in question is one where the character is in frequent danger of death. That's true of Dungeon Fantasy (so the rest of my answer is off topic, sorry) but not true across many other genres.

Good point. A one-on-one campaign of, say, a globe-trotting reporter would work great.

[ULFGARD]

Originally Posted by Kuroshima

I second Caravan to Ein Arris as an excellent intro adventure for both novice GMs and novice players. You can even play it with only Lite. In fact it will help you learn the ropes. I recommend against your wife controlling many characters. You're doing one on one, so take advantage of it, and go immersion-heavy. Make her the hero of her own movie (scale the encounters to match her character).

Working with many characters is trickier than it seems, and will break immersion. Maybe neither your wife nor you know enough to see that, but trust me on this.

BTW, one piece of advice, specially on your first game, "when in doubt, roll and shout" (I'm pretty sure it's in the basic set, as a pullquote, and does not require actually shouting), meaning that you must keep the ball rolling. Prepare to feel mentally exhausted in your first sessions.

Yes. Good advice. Generally the KISS (keep it simple stupid) method is best, especially the first time. Go for immersion. You'll be exhausted to some degree because you aren't just the other characters -- you're the special effects, cinematography, etc., for the entire world. You all but write everything EXCEPT your player's part. It can be tough, but I have very much enjoyed one on one play. In fact, in my blog, the earliest sessions in my current campaign were both one on one. It works great, but you have to be careful to tune them to the character.

If the intention is to create a powerful, heroic character, you still might want to go for a couple of sessions to establish background where the character is younger and/or less experienced. Also, just outright getting used to combat can be scary if you're allowing your PC to die; one way for both of you to get used to this is to run a couple of mock combats.

[Snaps]

I've only run a couple of one player games but I have to say the best was when that single player was a thief-type character.

IMO Rogues, Thieves, Burglers, etc make for the type of Solo play. Anything can work obviously, but a good thief game is almost better done solo.