My narrative may be invaded
by inaccuracy and confusion; but,
if I live no longer, I will, at least
live to complete it.
Charles Brockden Brown Weiland

Chapter 3

Storyteller Reference

Introduction:

In HUNTERS there is not one storyteller.  Everyone who is involved in the campaign is a storyteller. One of the major concepts behind HUNTERS is that there is no single story, plot, or theme but a mix of many.  This page will give you information on how to story tell HUNTERS giving you tips on how to run an entire story in one session, how to come up with adventures and other hints on storytelling.

What you will find:

Starting a Game:

The first part of starting a HUNTERS game is to make characters.  See  Chapter 2: Character Creation  for more details.  Next, is to decide who is going to Storytell for the evening.  Hopefully, someone has an idea that they have been pushing around in there ahead for awhile and is willing to volunteer.  If more then one person is willing to Storytell then the best choice is the person who most wants to run a game.  If everyone is being modest then choose the person who has not run a game in awhile.

Once you have chosen who the Storyteller is it is now time for players to choose which character to play.  If the Storyteller has an idea for what type of characters he would like to see in the game he can give suggestions, or request a player to play a specific character.  If a player only has one character then he should play that character (duh.)  Once all the characters are chosen it is time to sit down and start playing.

Getting the Characters together:

One of the more complicated parts of any adventure is trying to get the characters together.  This can be done real easily or can be complicated.  Some games can have the characters never knowing each other and by chance they meet, and might get along.  An easier form is to have the characters already knowing each other and the game starts without any characters having to meet for the first time.

HUNTERS uses a combination of this.  The Storyteller has limited time to run a single adventure (usually 3-8 hours.)  This means you cannot spend too much time with long character meetings, but you cannot have characters starting off together if they have never met; it takes away from the mystery of other HUNTER characters.  The best way to handle it is to have the characters' organizations put them together on a mission/assignment and tell the character that they will be working with members from the same/other organization.  This can be kind of cheesy and monotonous but the adventure gets going after the characters get together and say their "hellos."  You do not want to spend more then 15-20 minutes on character meetings.

Why would different organizations work together?

Many hunter/investigative organizations tend to be secret about their nature and goals, but they all have one thing in common, the supernatural.  Each organization wants to destroy, study, or discover the supernatural.  During their investigation they may discover another organization that knows of the supernatural.  The two organizations wanting to know about the supernatural will want to share information (even though they may not be willing to share information about there organization.)  So, if the Arcanum discovers the possibility of a vampire, they might require the help of the church who seem to be knowledgeable on the subject.  Of course the Inquisition is more willing to help because if the Arcanum discovered a vampire, that vampire might lead to a nest of vampires to exterminate.  The Inquisition sends the Arcanum a representative of the church to help with the investigation.  This is one reason to use organization lores (see Lores, Chapter 2: Character Creation) when characters learn more about another character's organization.

Adventures, Write-ups vs Improvisation:

Once all the character are together it is time to run the adventure.  Of course the storyteller needs to have a adventure to run.  Some storytellers love to have a written adventure in front of them, while others just sit down, look at their players and say "let's begin" with a blank piece of paper in front of him.  Which works better?  Both work fine in a HUNTERS game, and each has advantages and disadvantages.

Written Adventures:

Written adventures need to be prepared before the game.  Weather you plan or don't plan on playing a HUNTERS game it is always a good idea to bring it with you as you never know when you might be running it.  The advantage to a written adventure is that you have everything planned out and you don't have to do a lot of trivial work behind the storyteller screen.  You are also unlikely to get stumped.  Written adventures can work well since they are fairly straight forward one night sessions.

    The disadvantage of written adventures is that if the characters get side tracked you have to start improvising to get them back on track.  Easy for some, difficult for others.  The other disadvantage is if you forget your adventure then you cannot run unless you want to improvise, which if you spent a lot of time preparing an adventure then you probably do not want to improvise.

Improvised Adventures:

Improvised adventure can be some of the best and worst.  If you decide to improvise then take a look at some of the notekeeping suggestions below to help you keep track of things.  Nothing is worse then a Storyteller who forgets what is going on (believe me, I know.)  However, improvised adventures have two big advantages.  You only need yourself and some players (and maybe an idea) to start.  It also allows everyone to see how the adventure will turn out, including the storyteller.  If you like to improvise and are good at it then this can be one of the best forms for a HUNTERS game.

Written Improvising:

One of the best options is to walk in with a couple of notes, and idea and improvise the rest.  You have a basic idea of what you want to happen but you will not get stumped if the players go off course.  Possibly, the best choice for a HUNTERS game but suffers from the note restrictions that "Written Adventures" do.

Shaping your adventure:

Most adventures that you run are linear, or they have a beginning, middle and end.  There is nothing wrong with this,  linear shapes for adventures are the easiest way to run, but changing the shape could drastically improve the mood.  Changing the shape of an adventure can be complicated but if done well is very rewarding.

What is Shape:

Shape is a literary term commonly used to show how a story moves.  Most storytellers have probably played with shape before and did not know.  Most adventures are a straight line; what if you started at the end, then moved to the beginning and ran the adventure to the moments that occured in the end?  The shape changes from a linear beginning, middle, end to a loop with the end, beginning, middle.  A simpler example of shape is that a specific event may happen every morning in the game, or every half an hour real time.  You still have the linear beginning, middle, end but it has bumps that push the adventure forward.  Your players might not instantly pick up on the shape of your adventure but they were subtley aware.  Some books and movies that have some great examples of shape are: "Pulp Fiction" "Fight Club" "Absolum, Absolum" by William Faulkner "Death of Ivan Ilych" by Leo Tolstoy "Neuromancer, Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive" by William Gibson.

Using shape in HUNTERS:

You have 4 to 5 hours to run a HUNTERS adventure.  How are you going to include this shape crap in that amount of time?  Shaping an adventure or chronicle does not take long nor with it require a lot of play time.  Whether you like it or not, your adventure will have a shape.  If you decide to use a specific shape for you adventure you need to decide what that shape is.  If you wanted you could theoretically draw a shape and try to come up with an adventure just by staring at it.  If starring at shapes on paper is not your forte then you could come up with a linear adventure and play with it.  Start the characters in the middle (maybe in a big action scene or captured) and let them find out what happened in the past.

You will have to do a little planning to shape your adventure but it also helps to do some improvisation (see write ups vs improvistation above.)  You can plan the shape and just let the adventure run itself.  The nice thing about a HUNTERS adventure is that it allows you to experiment a little and if you have been thinking about experimenting with shape or other styles of storytelling now is your big chance.  If it worked in a HUNTERS game it might work in a larger chronicle.

Vampires don't suck blood (using the books):

Many of the adventures that are run will involve the five main supernaturals of the World of Darkness (Vampires, Werewolves, Mages, Ghosts, Changelings) but what if you do not have the core book that describes the supernatural which you wish to portray.  The Storyteller has a couple of options: he can make up his variant own of any supernatural, he can use the descriptions given in the back of the core books, or he can buy and use the original material.

Making up supernatural creatures:

Making up supernatural creatures has its advantages, and disadvantages in a HUNTERS game.  If you wish to make up your own supernatural you can do anything you want with it.  This creates an atmosphere of mystery, even for those who have read every single White Wolf book in, or out of print.  Imagine the two situations.

Storyteller: "You see five figures sitting in a circle: two women, three men.  They are passing around a chalice in which they cut their wrists' and bleed into it.  They once again pass the chalice around this time each one takes a sip."
Player: "Well, duh, it is a bunch of Sabbat vampires performing the Vaulderie!"

Suddenly the atmosphere is broken and all the mystery from your game is gone.  They know who they are chasing (or at least they think they do, the same technique can be used to miss lead players) and your Inquisitor goes running off to tell his superiors there are a bunch of vamps ready and waiting to be executed.  But what if you...

Storyteller: "You see two figures, a man and a woman walking down the street about mid day.  Suddenly, they duck into an alley."
Player: "I follow him, stealthily so he doesn't notice"
Storyteller: "You manage to follow him into the alley.  The man leans over and bites the woman's neck.  You can see blood seeping from the man's mouth.  He then lets the woman go, and she drops to the ground."

Your characters may think they are following a vampire, but it is mid day and vampires are suppose to be comfortably sleeping in their coffins.  Is the man a new breed of vampire, or even a vampire at all?  The problem with using this technique is that you are not the only storyteller, and you do not want your ideas to conflict with others.  Characters are suppose to be learning about supernaturals and the occult but they will never increase their lore scores (see Lores: Chapter 2: Character Creation) if the vampires continue to change (Sparks has 1 point in John's vampire lore, 2 points in Sally's vampire lore, but doesn't know a single thing about Ron's vampires.)

Using the books:

The advantage of using the standard supernatural is consistency.  They do not randomly change after each adventure but you can create enough mystery by slightly changing things in the books.  There are many different variants on the supernaturals themselves and there are many more which White Wolf has yet to cover, but you will.  Every Core Book has a little information on the other supernaturals in The World of Darkness and a quick read, then a couple personal twists and you are ready to go.

Non White Wolf Supernaturals:

You can also make up your own personal supernatural.  You can have alien worms, or the man with a second head and not have it at all connected to the original World of Darkness (though your players will probably try and connect it making it that much more fun.)  You can also use stuff from other roleplaying games (Call of Cuthulu,  Darkmatter, Unknown Armies or Kult are a few good games which might give you some more ideas for creatures of darkness.)

The Unfinished Story:

HUNTERS games are suppose to last one session, but the inevitable will happen when the storyteller is not able to finish the adventure.  What does one do?  Well, the storyteller has a couple of options:

Game continuation:

If everyone was really enjoying the game you can always plan to finish the adventure at a later date.  This of course creates the trials and tribulations of a regular campaign of trying to get players to show up on a specific day, but if you and your players are willing then go ahead and plan the session.  The adventure should not suffer do to time restrictions.

The Spontaneous Inconclusion:

If you know you are not going to be able to finish the game in the time given, then just end the adventure.  Not all mysteries are solved.  You have to be aware that you will not be able to finish the adventure so you must plan ahead about half an hour before finishing the session.  You need to remove all clues, make the current ones dead ends.  Any missions turn up dry and the characters have nothing to do but pack up and go home.  You might have to give a couple out of game hints that the game is over because most players will continue searching for clues assuming they will eventually find one.

One of the advantages to this is you can leave some kind of cliff hanger, but still the characters have no choice but to quit.  You can then pick up the same story again, but you might have a different set of characters and the mystery from your previous game emerges its ugly face in your new adventure, only there is background information in the new game.  This can became a mini campaign in a series of adventures (similar to the alien/conspiracy story line in X-files.)

The Quick End:

The quick end involves taking your previous material and cutting, chopping the adventure.  You chop out certain parts of the game and rush to the climax.  This is probably the cheapest way to end a game but it works.  It also takes some planning so you know what to cut out, and what to keep.

Evolution, HUNTERS and beyond:

You just ran the most excellent HUNTERS adventure of your life but it had a lot of cliffhangers.  Yeah, you could run another HUNTERS adventure involving the same plot, themes, and NPCs.  Or you could turn the adventure into a brand new chronicle.  All the HUNTERS adventures you run have the potential to become a full blown chronicle in another game (kill all the characters, blam, instant Wraith chronicle.)  One of your adventures may heavily deal with an event in the Werewolf, or Vampire world.  The characters complete the adventure but the event is not resolved, and by dammit, you want to resolve it.  You can then create another chronicle were everyone makes the appropriate supernatural (possibly an NPC from the HUNTERS adventure.)  If a player was playing a character that was heavily involved in the supernatural event that occurred in your HUNTERS game he can play that character temporarily taking him out of HUNTERS.  If someone from the HUNTERS game who is not in your chronicle can always play (make a guest appearance) their HUNTERS character who dealt with the original adventure that launched the game.

The Guest Appearance:

One night you are planning on playing a HUNTERS chronicles and 3 players show up.  Two of them have HUNTERS characters but the third one does not and you don't have the time for him make a character (you want to play!)  However, he does have a Mage character that he played in a Mage chronicle a couple months ago.  There is no problem in having a player use a supernatural character that makes a guest appearance in one of your games.  If the player's character would throw the game into oblivion then do not allow it.  The character does not have to be "The Supernatural Guide" to the HUNTER characters, but can be attempting to mislead them, or can be a crucial part of the adventure.

Art of Notekeeping (Storytellers):

If there is one thing that almost all storytellers do it is notekeeping.  Some storytellers have a complete adventure written out when they start, others may have important NPCs and events, while some storytellers just take notes as they go along.  Any form of notekeeping is important for storytellers and it is no different in HUNTERS, the only problem is that there are many different storytellers.  All the storytellers are going to take different notes for adventures and soon you will have a mass of old papers filled with cryptic notes of other storytellers.  This can be a problem if you want to use a NPC from a previous adventure of another storyteller, or you want your adventure to connect to one a couple weeks ago.  Here are a couple suggestions to avoid the problems of notekeeping.

The Sheet of Characters:

The Sheet of Characters is a sheet that has all the current characters in the HUNTERS game.  This sheet will have the name of each character, who's playing the character and maybe some other miscellaneous information about the characters (organization, merits, flaws, advantages, character plot twists.)  The reason for this sheet is so that the current Storyteller doesn't have to look at all the characters in the game and write down information about them.  The Storyteller already has all this information in front of him.  If someone makes a new character he should copy down the important information on "The Sheet of Characters."

The Generic Info Sheet:

This sheet contains important people and places that may appear in many different adventures.  Information like important NPCs such as organization heads, major bad guys, relatives, and contacts.  Each NPC's name should be written down and then given a brief description.  This is important because if one Storyteller creates the head of Society of Leopold in Paris, and another Storyteller wants to use the same NPC he is going to be flipping through old Adventure Sheets or creating a new head of the Society.  Soon you'll have 3 or 4 different heads of the Society of Leopold.

The Adventure Sheet:

For each adventure the Storyteller should have an Adventure Sheet.  The sheet has all the characters who are in the game and any other important information (NPCs, locations.)  Everything should be labeled so that other Storytellers who look over your notes know what's what.  At the end of each sheet should be a quick summary of the adventure in case you, or another Storyteller want to use something that happened from the current game.  Any other information that you find important to the adventure should be put on too.  Information that may be important in a later game should be transferred to "The Generic Info Sheet" for quick reference.

Beginners:

HUNTERS presents an opportunity to introduce beginning players to your group.  These can be beginners to people who are playing with you, beginners who are new to The World or Darkness or even roleplaying itself.  Someone who is curious as to what roleplaying is might have a better understanding in a HUNTERS game then throwing them in your Wraith chronicle that has been going 3 years and would only be slowed down by the newbie.

Newbie Players:

Another reason to encourage newbies to play in a HUNTERS game is that they will know little to nothing about The World of Darkness creating an atmosphere of mystery for both them, the Storyteller, and the other players.  I strongly encourage that any newbie to a HUNTERS game make an ignorant character and allow the player and the character discover the World of Darkness.  This is much more fun then the player taking 10 points in lores and then everyone else trying to explain what the player's character knows.

Newbie Storytellers:

Have a player that has been thinking about Storytelling for awhile but is afraid of starting a large game only to have the pressures of Storytelling come down on them and the game totally fail.  HUNTERS gives these new Storytellers a chance to get their foot in the water.  No one should be forced to Storytell (they should be encouraged) but some players who have never thought of running a game in their life might consider running a session, they might even like it and never go back to simply playing a character.  Once a player has played in a couple of sessions of HUNTERS he will get use to the rules and how other Storytellers run.  A quick read of the core rules out of one the White Wolf books (if the player hasn't already) and, viola, new Storyteller.  Remember, Storytellers don't have to stick to the core material so they do not have to read all the pages in Vampire: The Masquerade just to run an adventure with a vamp in it.