It recently occurred to me during the course of play in our current Hunter game that one of my Disadvantages–much to my horror–had not been used after roughly 8 sessions. My character is “Unlucky,” which is to say that once per session a roll–at the Storyteller’s discretion–should have its difficulty increased by one. So who’s responsibility is it to remember these character facets? Honestly, I had forgotten, but I’d certainly put the onus upon the GM of the game in question. So, here are some tips on remembering and incorporating character idiosyncrasies.
Bake It In
I’m a proponent of character-based adventures (and campaigns) and as such design every adventure through that lens. That means tying the story to the character’s backgrounds, skills, or traits–or, ideally, all of the above. Give everyone a chance to shine but also an opportunity to be challenged. Speaking as a player, I look forward to opportunities that push the boundaries of my character or take them out of their comfort zone. As a GM that same philosophy holds true. Put the non-social character in a position where they have to confront their weakness; make the non-combat character the linchpin on having to rescue the group; put the level-headed thinker in an emotional hurricane.
Look for these options but don’t rely upon them week after week; shift the spotlight as well as taking a character out of their comfort zone. No one likes to be incompetent every week!
Memory Aids
It may sound silly, but sometimes I would put Post-It notes on my GM’s screen that “Bob has Telepathy!” Keeping it front and center (literally) also keeps it front and center in your mind. This technique is primarily for those idiosyncrasies that are real-time or dynamic in nature. The ones you can’t plan for in an adventure ahead of time. My “Unlucky” disadvantage mentioned at the top is a good example, versus having a trick knee that applies a physical task penalty. The latter you can build into an adventure, the former is better to ebb and flow through the game.
All Hands on Deck
Another method is to put the responsibility upon the players. Now that can be the individual player or in an open game with shared backgrounds and total transparency, the other players can even help. That’s going to be based more on your table’s social dynamic and whether it’s okay for other players to chime in and present these “opportunities” to the GM. This ultimately comes back to everyone wanting to share in an engaging experience and good story. If the GM and the player have forgotten about that trick knee while climbing over the fence while being chased by zombies, why the hell wouldn’t you want it to be brought up to raise the stakes?
Sure, most games are giving points for these disadvantages but realistically its their roleplaying opportunity–not those points–that players choose them for. Well, at least, that’s what I like to believe.
How do you remember the subtle options that characters in your campaign have and work them in? Share below!
I’m in awe of any GM who does this sort of book-keeping, but I am way past the stage of giving a tinker’s damn about tracking PCs stuff for the players.
When it comes to feats/edges/advantages I have a hard and fast rule: “No rewinds; it’s not the GM’s job to know how your character works”.
When it comes to disadvantages/hindrances I have a habit of waiting until everyone is mired in some situation and then saying “what hindrances does your character have?”
The second is really down to players not remembering they have disadvantages rather than their not playing to them usually.
The first is down to a truly depressing trend in gaming: the not being bothered to read a single paragraph of rules even when it does your character (and usually, ONLY your character) good.
This is why BRP/Call of Cthulhu is such a great system from an RP/GM standpoint: you truly can tell the players not to sweat the rules and to just tell you what they want to do because there are no complex rules or modifiers to speak of. Of course, that comes at the cost of people playing unrealistic characters sometimes.
Munchkins can’t get traction on Call of Cthulhu characters because they are very simple (just a bunch of skill scores really). The newer versions of BRP have added complexity for little reward (in my opinion), but it still eschews Advantages and Disadvantages entirely.
In my experience players tend to forget their advantages rather than disadvantages.
We don’t normally play systems that have advantage/disadvantage trade-off mechanic. So, if a a character is one-eyed, socially retarded, or has a serious addiction, it’s an integral part of the character concept. It get’s remembered. (How do you play “One-Eyed Billy” the degenerate gambler and all-around asshole without his foibles?)
If the little bonus, power, or perk isn’t a big part of who the character is, then it often gets lost in the shuffle. As a quick example, my wife’s 2nd Ed. tiefling character used her tiefling abilities (rolled randomly) maybe five times in the 2 years we played that campaign. She once actually exclaimed something to the effect of, “Oh shit, I can turn invisible.” They just weren’t a big part of who the character was. She almost never remembered them. (Plus, they were on the third page of the character sheet.)
If the disadvantage isn’t a significant part of the character concept, I don’t see a reason to take it at all. Of course, I don’t like adv./dis. advantage systems to begin with… YMMV.
I’ve seen this a lot and I’ve come to be of the opinion that, especially in non RPG setups like war games, requiring players to remember each other’s weaknesses or admit to them is unrealistic and so those rules should be minimized.
When I play games without point-buy disadvantages, I always remember my disadvantages. When I play ones where I get points for them, I tend to only remember a few of them, because I have too many to always keep in mind.
One of my favourite characters was a Goliath in D&D4 whose entire character arc evolved due to him getting dominated repeatedly; and he eventually developed multiple personalities, which I played to the hilt because it was fun.