My corner of your imagination
bard noir
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Posts by bard noir
Effortless Motivation
Sep 3rd
As a GM you have to make sure the players always have something to do, but you don’t want the players to feel like you’re pulling them through the plot by their nose. At the same time, you’re not doing your players justice by letting them ride your coat tails while you guide them through your scripted story. The days of dungeon crawling are over, and a game should not be a system of A leads to B leads to C.
If done right, you should be able to run the same adventure three times and have three different outcomes. I, myself, have run published adventures more than once with the same group and it never ends the same way twice. If you find you’re always getting the same results then you’re railroading your players through your plots. Now don’t get me wrong, as many players would rather not think for themselves, but I personally feel this takes power from the player and that’s the purpose for this post.
For me, players are the star of the show and they should feel they are so. For those that want to find a way to empower their players, I offer some advice on motivating your players without actually doing anything on your part. All you need to do is ask yourself this questions: Is there something else the players could be doing right now? If you’re doing your job as a GM the answer should always be ‘Yes’.
I will give you an example from my own, recent, Shadowrun 4th ed. game (which you can get in PDF format from Drivethru RPG for just $15 right now!)
In the game the players were hired to kidnap someone. As they wandered around, doing next to nothing, I asked myself; Is there something else the players could be doing right now? The answer was that they could be planning the kidnapping. Obviously. So I did nothing as a GM and let the players wander around talking about doughnuts and coffee. This not only lead to some very funny player to player interaction but I took the time to make notes for the upcoming double cross (more on that later). Feeling like nothing new was going to jump out at them one of the players finally said “Okay! Seriously, we need to decide how to grab this guy.” Sure, I could have said that – but then I’m driving the story. Make it seem like the players came up with the idea, and suddenly they’re in charge of their own game.
I let them make calls, buy a van, discuss some options for where they could grab him including how and when. I let them formulate this plan and even came up with, on the spot, a concert they knew the target would be attending. And what ended up happening? They ran into the target at a coffee shop and grabbed him like a Grande Mocha Frapp and ran back to the van!
Now, obviously my plan, as a GM, was to have them go to the concert. But I was effortlessly waiting for someone else to say the words “So we’ll just wait for the concert” but that didn’t happen and one lucky roll of the dice and three phone calls later they were causing public panic. Again, had I told them we were going to jump to the concert I would have had to come up with a much more complicated scenario than a pastry counter. I waited for them to tell me when it was time to go to the concert and, funny enough, they ended up derailing their own plans while making my own job easier in the process.
Back to the story-
They go back to the safe house and instantly go into securing the perimeter. I knew what was coming, but I still asked myself; Is there something else the players could be doing right now? The answer was still a ‘Yes’ because I was about to make them fight for their lives. I’d had the NPCs specifically tell them to sit tight and the players even relaxed not knowing what was about to come next. Why? Because I don’t pull them around the plot. They, on their own, constantly hit these pockets of thinking they have nothing to do for a while or they’ve created their own space to breath. Sometimes they realize there is something they could have been doing and other times they don’t realize I was just letting them get lulled into a false sense of security.
When the attack came they were all surprised. They thought the point of the day’s adventures was the kidnapping! It helped that I wasn’t rushing them with urgency, knowing I wanted to kick the real plot off later. Now they are sitting around trying to figure out their next move. Is there something else the players could be doing right now? As a matter of fact there is, but I’m not going to tell them.
Another way to effortlessly motivate your players is to do nothing. I mean, literally do nothing. A player in a game once sent a text message to someone asking for help. I said, “okay you send the message.” and then sat there. And sat there. Aaaand sat there. Finally the player says “okay, I give it 5 minutes.” I responded “Okay.” and nodded that I understood, but I still sat there. And sat there. Frustated they said “Send another text…” and I nodded “Okay. You send the second text.” and I sat there. Finally the player looked to the others and said “We’re on our own!” to which another replied “You think!?”
I could have just as easily told them that no one calls them back. But then it’s me telling the player they need to come up with a new idea. By doing nothing I seem to give total control of the game to the player. After a while they learn that I’m not going to feed everything to them. What’s great is when a group of players does something to surprise me.
In one game I ran, the heroes are fighting their way up a tower, Game of Death style, to reach the top. Half way up one of them told the others, “Why don’t we just bring him to us?” and so they decided to take out the building from the ground floor. As a GM I could have said “No! Impossible!” and forced them up the gauntlet – but why? Because I had written out the stats of 4 more bad guys they had to fight? That’s petty. Instead I rewarded them for thinking up a creative solution. I had to get just as creative to keep the bad guys alive, but it’s nice when they make me think too! As a GM I like to be pushed to improve just as much as I push my players to improve. We really do need one another.
Role-Playing Anti-Immersion
Aug 27th
Posted by bard noir in Bard's Abyss
On the heels of topics like Immersion and Bleed I thought it would be good to take a moment and discuss some solutions for dealing with these things. Once again, I’m blessed to know some very academic role-players. One of whom, SJ, defined what was traditionally abstract. I would like to take her short bullet points and expand on them a bit.
The first thing to keep in mind is that you are not your characters. This is probably the hardest part because a lot of our characters are based, in some small apart at least, on ourselves. This can either be by taking on a part of our own self and pushing the character to that extreme, such as a guy who fixes computers playing a world famous computer hacker extraordinaire. You could take part of your personal life and make it a part of your character, like both you and your character unable to admit your feelings to the object of your affections. Or even taking on strong opposing traits to what we perceive as character flaws, like someone who’s single and working minimum wage playing Jame Bond. So either way a part of our psyche gets built into the character.
Between emotional and creative investment, as well as the sheer number of hours it takes to write up a good character, it’s important to be able to distance ourselves from these on-paper creations during a role-playing session. There are also times when a role-playing session may simply hit a little too close to home as even I’m not immune to it. I had to admit to a GM that he’d accidentally touched on a very real, and deep rooted, personal fear I had. He apologized for it and in the end I didn’t blame him, but I can still remember how shaken I was by that game session.
First of all, it’s important to remember that role-playing is an emotionally-charged medium. In many games I’ve set up moments that were meant to challenge or even traumatize a character. It’s only through conflict that a character can develop and grow, so without personal conflict and growth you end up playing 4th Edition D&D.
Second, there will be cases in the game where NPCs will, and should, take the lead in certain threads and game sessions. This one is for both GMs and Players because a balance and understanding has to be found. GMs could, being as they can break all the rules the want, end up using NPCs to just walk all over players. Players, having to do as the GM says. They have to trust that the GM isn’t bending and breaking rules or if they are, the GM is doing so with an express goal in mind. But if there comes a time when a Player feels this is starting to become an issue they should feel comfortable addressing it with the GM and GM’s should always be open to suggestion. the GM/Player relationship is very symbiotic. GMs need players or they just have a shelf full of books that are barely worth the paper they are printed on. And Players need GMs or they have a character sheet that isn’t worth the ink jet cartridge it cost to print out.
Third, is issuing a disclaimer. Do this by telling your fellow players how immersed you’re planning to get so that players don’t feel like OOC malice is coming out in game. You can take another player aside (as a GM or fellow player) for just a second to simply say, “This is my character that has a problem. I just want you to know that I like everything you’re doing in game. Keep up the good work!” The goal here is just to let other players know that the in-game intensity is intentional and not some kind of un-conscious bleed from some out of game drama.
Taking a break! High emotions can be pulled up when you least expect it. In my experience taking a break doesn’t mean you walk away from the scene and then mull over what just happened with your character. It means leave the game world for a bit. Something as simple as being fully in the moment of pouring just the right ratio of salsa to chips on your plate (don’t you hate when you run out of one before the other anyway?) can be enough time from a scene to shake off a lot of tension you’d be lugging around if you, instead, gathered food while planning what you about to do in-game. In a LARP you can admire a painting while drinking a glass of water. The goal here is to take a mini-vacation from the intensity of the game and your character.
Remembering to speak in third Person can also help. This is one that’s pretty common in table top play. If you notice, we do this to describe our character’s physical actions but speak in first person for dialog. This is not so easy to do in LARP settings because you’re acting out everything and don’t break character to describe what you’re doing. But pausing to think about your character, and remind yourself you’re just playing a role, and then start your next line of dialog with “{Character} is going to say/do…” can help take the pressure of you as the player and remind everyone else that this isn’t personal either.
Have an out of character area or gesture. In my own troupe we hold up our hands with fingers crossed, a kind of “time-out” signal. Often, if a player isn’t getting heard, they ‘fingers crossed’ and a repeat of the statement as a “player to GM” moment that is totally out of character. In LARPS there are often areas designated as the OOC area, so that people standing there are out of character and immune to what’s going on in game. And while I don’t recommend taking up the habit of smoking, the OOC and Smoking area tend to be one in the same. Still, there are times that I’ve joined the smokers to just sit on the bench and enjoy NOT being around in the game for a little while.
Personal Space. One thing, I think, that goes unnoticed, is how players camp out when there is not a table present. In all of my sessions everyone picks a place to sit and they stay there. You get to see gamers with a little pile of books and dice where they want them or feel comfortable having them. And they don’t ask a player to up-root without a good reason. Players should feel like they are in their own little Power-Cave with dice as their totem. This is an element missing from any LARP setting, and the amount of tension you can feel in those games can be as thick as the summer heat of Houston.
Try and remember that you’re playing a game and the game is meant to be fun. People get into this hobby for many different reasons but no one Role-plays to try and be psychologically traumatized in real life. So try and use some of these if you find that tensions are running too high in each game or make up your own. The goal is to break the tension somehow and if your in a combat LARP, perhaps what works for everyone is to stop and do a scene from Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along Blog just because that’s so removed from the game it requires you to break character. And above all, don’t borrow trouble. If the last session went bad, don’t go into the next one anticipating it to go bad or you’ll find a way to make it so.
Have Fun!
When Players Attack
Aug 20th
We’re not talking about when they roll to attack something in game, we’re talking about a player turning into a rabid ferret and trying to take someone’s face off with their teeth. Yep, this is going to be part bitch-session but it’s also taken from some advice I’d given another GM who was having problems with this very thing. Recently another GM has also had a similar issue, and I felt it was about time to post what I shared the first time around because this, clearly, isn’t as rare as people may think.
In my many years of role-playing, I’ve learned that some players just do not play well with others, but at the same time I can still love the character and role-play I get from that player. To me it is hard to understand why almost everyone in a game world could get on the last nerve of any character that a particular player makes and yet I seem to walk through unscathed. Or, by contrast, that a player feels I’m being a tyrannical and unreasonable GM while everyone else in my troupe only sings praises about my games.
I now believe it’s just the nature of the beast that a game can just come together in all the wrong ways, and key players aren’t going to get along with other key players, or even myself, for one reason or another. But just because a problem-player shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near one game, doesn’t meant they can’t be one of the most valuable players in other games. And just because a player may think I’m being too heavy handed, doesn’t mean they don’t add something to the game that the others feed off of.
So how do you deal with this without feeling like you should hang up the GM hat forever?
As a GM you have to be political about how you treat players. It’s easy to slap one player on the wrist for crossing a line. The problem comes when you find that other players don’t see them as a problem at all. In those cases it then seems you are the unreasonable one. Any time more than one player feels there is a problem it should be something you need to look at as a GM. The old days of the Dungeon Master saying ‘My Way or the Highway’ are over. You have to give a player the benefit of the doubt and quietly take the moral high-ground.
I know that it may feel like you’re giving up and letting the players run your show, but the reality is that a GM without players is a movie director without actors. In the end your just a person with a vision and no one around to give it life. Time and time again I’ve see other players instantly respect any GM who proves they are willing to work out problems with another player. It proves you would do the same for them and that your commitment is to the game, and not to the power one can get lost in as a GM. The Win-win of it all is that you learn to calibrate your GMing style or new develop new techniques to use for future games and sessions.
When it’s all over, I’m often glad to have had the experience of a problem player. You always learn something new from it! But, just like getting kicked in the head teaches you to keep your Karate guard up, I’d rather not have to experience the pain more than necessary. Here’s to hoping you don’t either.
Good Luck!
Character Bleed in Role-Playing
Aug 13th
Posted by bard noir in Role-Playing
“Bleed” is a buzz word that I’ve been hearing a lot in the RPG community. So what is it?
“Bleed” refers to a player’s thoughts and feelings influencing the character, or the character’s feelings and thoughts influencing the player. An example of this would be two players having a falling out during their real life, and when they come to the game these feelings “bleed” into the characters who suddenly, and for no in-game reason, start having a falling out.
Bleed isn’t always bad, however. In a Call of the Cthulhu game I was able to use character bleeding to scare the players and thus freak out the characters. To me bleeding is a “necessary evil” because we need to know what our characters are feeling and thinking in the moment. All of my games focus on the human element, and even in fantasy games it’s not all about running into the dungeon and killing the dragon. It’s also about the town under a tyrannical dictator, or a corrupt sheriff trying to force a tavern owner’s daughter into a loveless marriage. Without empathy the players could care less because there’s no measurable XP for “preventing a wedding” but this is measurable XP for killing a human with 12 hit-dice so long as you don’t mind having amoral characters in your world.
So in these regards, immersion is good, but you can run the risk of the fantasy becoming your reality. I’ve seen and heard of players who’s character goes through so much that the player ends up depressed, angry or jealous of things that have no basis on in real life. I’ve had people who are all smiles in life, but very bitter and cruel to one another in game as they vent in a way they think is safer for the ‘relationship’. In truth it’s only going end up bleeding back out into reality eventually.
There have been times when I’ve raked my own character over the coals so that I can step back and watch what happens next. Now there are also times, especially in LARPs, when I’m not setting out to do so and I feel upset by what happens but usually it doesn’t affect my characters or my out of character interaction. In one particular LARP, recently, I had [fake]guns pointed in my face three different times before I even drew my own gun. And when I did, it was to shoot at someone who was shooting a teammate. After that I was later gunned down while tending to my wounded just because the other player knew his stats made him almost unstoppable.
So I was upset, and I took a break for a bit. When I came back, 15 minutes later, the character who’d killed me had been killed because of 1 bad die roll (the only way he could be killed it turned out) and I missed it. With a new character in hand though, I didn’t immediately start targeting the bad roleplayers who were needlessly holding guns in my face earlier. I was upset about that, but I couldn’t let my feelings towards them bleed into my character.
Bleeding is something I feel you want to simply recognize and control. I’ve seen many games fall apart because of player/character bleeding. One player was so bad at it, we changed both the day and time of the game and just didn’t give him the updated schedule. Easy enough. And one D&D game fell apart because I was finally given in-game justification to kill the character of a player who’d been harassing me (in-game only), for weeks on end. It bothered me out of character because I could tell he was using his character to pick on me (the player) but in-game my Chaotic Good character continued to defend this party member with his life because he never know this klepto Cleric (srsly?) was the one picking his pocket and causing him to “misplace” all his stuff.
Let your characters tell you where they want to go, go there and then let THEM go there. You can follow along, but you don’t have to stay there with them when it’s all over.
DriveThruRPG Sale
Jul 23rd
Posted by bard noir in Uncategorized
I just found out about this. If you don’t know, DriveThruRPG is a place that sells PDF version of role-playing books. Why is this important? Why do you want to spend money on a version of a book you can’t hold?
Well First, it’s the only legal way you should have digital copy of an RPG book.
Secondly, They are often already cheaper than the regular book. For example, the new World of Darkness: Mirrors PDF is $22 versus $32. You get the same information and you shave $10.
Third, You don’t have half a dozen books on your shelf taking up space. now you, as a GM can take a laptop and a flash drive to the game session. Hate looking through a book going “I know there’s a rule about…” do search!
I have just about everything I need for Shadowrun on a 2 gig flash drive. Have you ever been on break, at work or school, and gone “If I just had my book with me…” There you go!
Now, all this can be yours with an extra 25% off.
Seriously why are you still reading this?
Did I mention they have free stuff too? This site just rocks.
And We’re Back
Jul 9th
Posted by bard noir in Bard's Abyss
Growing pains… the Tavern is upgrading to WordPress 3.0 which is a lot better than WordPress 2.idonothing.1
This is a good thing, but it means a little bit of set up. Stay tuned.
WotC… WTF?
Jun 9th
In case you haven’t read up on the latest and thought D&D was dead there’s a new article talking about a new product that Wizards of the Cost is trying to promote called “D&D Encounters”. Here’s the full article, http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/wayoflife/06/08/new.dungeons.dragons/index.html?hpt=C2 but I can save you some time.
“Wizards of the Coast, the current publishers of D&D, recognized that some of the 24 million people who used to play the game left, not because they didn’t want to play, but because their lifestyles changed and they didn’t have the time anymore — so they have created a new rules system to address those concerns and bring back their former fans.”
Yeah, this sums it up for me right here. WotC, WTF?! The reality isn’t that the people who used to play have had life style changes. Trust me, I just did a Firefly Shindig and these guys still have the same free time for gaming now as they did 20 years ago. No, it’s that the 24 million people who used to play hack and slash games have evolved to seek a higher level of entertainment than just “roll-playing”.
“”Encounters” has premade characters and a premade adventure provided to the game’s referee and storyteller, the Dungeon Master. Maps, tokens, game pieces and player aids, such as bonus cards, are all included.”
So let’s just call this for what it is – “Gold Box Pen and Paper!” Yes, I went there! I mean let’s get real, this is everything you love about MMOGs without the subscrpitions or creative thought process. At least “Daggerfall” let you crate your own character before it tried to railroad you along the plot line.
“Wizards of the Coast wants to remind players that using an active imagination can be very satisfying compared to simply being fed information from a computer screen.”
Because being fed information from a human, word by word, is much better than walking around the Shivering Isles going “Wow! Check out the trees!” Thanks but compare that to my friend who named all the vendor stalls in town after pop culture references that only we’d understand. And I can’t forget a Toy Store owner who looked at my character and went “Oh, thank God. I thought you were some damned kid. I hate kids!” I’ve never talked to him since, but I haven’t forgotten him either.
Even though I’m loosing faith in White Wolf, I do have to thank them for changing the role of Game Master to Storyteller. What real Role Players want is the story. To live the story, and be the story. We want to create something that is our own, not just meander through the motions of a setting someone else created. If I wanted that I’d re-install “Neverwinter Nights”… the original http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neverwinter_Nights_(AOL_game)
*shudders*
Dead Witch Walking
Apr 15th
What I like in all of my stories, if my own style hasn’t become obvious yet, is for them to be driven by the personality of the character. I also like my characters to be flawed in some way, or at least unable to do everything all the time. Even Doctor Who has his problems, and I like to see Extraordinary characters in Ordinary situations. That’s what I got when I rolled the dice on ‘Dead Witch Walking’.
Let me take a step back and say that I was looking for a good Audio Book for a road trip, so I was willing to take a chance on just about anything outside of the norm. I’m also reading many books right now so it had to be something I didn’t already have in print. No sense in buying an Audio book for something I’ve already picked up a normal book for. I also wanted Unabridged — needless to say, I was getting very specific.
“Dead Witch Walking” seemed to fit. It was Unabridged and was right up the alley for what I wanted with Modern Fantasy (I’m a sucker for that kind of stuff). It takes place in an alternate modern world where humanity was almost destroyed by a tomato. I’m serious, you have to read the book but a tomato almost wiped out mankind and thus pasta would never be the same.
The main character is Rachel Morgan, a witch. Since paranormal types are immune to the tomato virus the events served only to balance out and reveal the paranormals that had been hiding along side humans the entire time. Vampires, Weres, Pixies and their arch rival Faries all exist with Ghosts, Demons, Witches and Warlocks just trying to make a living along side nervous humans. But can you blame them?
Rachel is an awesome character, and not just because she has red hair and the kind of girl-fight that would make her a perfect Slayer Side kick in the Buffy-Verse, but because she’s strong and sexy without being overly sexed. Rachel’s lack of “assets”, frizzy hair and freckles make her seem, almost, vulnerable and more endearing. She finds herself unemployed and living with a vampire who is her total opposite. Ivy exudes sexual energy but I quickly got the sense that there is a soft underbelly to this Vamp Vixen. A crack in the armor that she’s clearly trying to cover up. And then there’s Jenks, the 4″ Pixie who ends up being one of the bolder and most dynamic characters in the story. He constantly acts like someone who forgets he’s so small, which almost makes sense if I imagine a character who’s lived his whole life in a full sized world. In some instances he even comes across as tougher, and I found myself glad he’s not human sized or he I would wonder if he was truly unstoppable.
Like Books before it, I found myself being drawn back to the story to find out what characters were going to do next. I would forget about the main plot in some areas, and there is a heck of a mystery to solve. Sadly the underlying mystery never does get solved, but the point of this book was how the Hunter Becomes the Hunted. Rachel has to survive loosing her job, loosing her apartment, loosing all of her stuff (someone put a curse on all her worldly possessions leaving her with nothing but the clothes on her back), and a price on her head welcoming assassination attempts just when I thought she could relax. And yet, even when I knew the threat of death looms over Rachel if she so much as checks the mail I found myself more interested in her reading a book Ivy gave her.
I’m hooked!
Strange Phenomina has Houston in a Quandry…
Dec 4th
Posted by bard noir in Bard\'s Abyss
By 10am, today, it was confirmed that some unknown force had caused flakes of ice to fall from the skies of Houston Texas! And while the best minds at Texas A&M are currently in seclusion and still trying to understand what this means, many have started turning to religion. Still others seem unaffected by this indicating either a certain knowing, or possibly denial.
Normally, December is simply considered an extension of Autumn, with short sleeves and the occasional leather jacket still complimenting cowboy hats and sunglasses. But today temperatures in the city seemed to plummet well below the normal 50 degree weather that the Lone Star state is accustomed to. As if that wasn’t enough to make even the oldest natives of H-Town flood hardware stores in desperate search for something called a ‘heater’, alarm started to rise as people realized that the ‘rain’ seemed to be falling in the form of light flakes of ice.
“This is crazy!” observed one woman in an HEB parking lot, as she shoved canned foods into her mini van. Local news, and I’m not making this up, is warning about traffic conditions and many offices are trying to close a half day early. Some schools have suspended their classes and sent the student home for an early start on their weekend. No doubt the students who can drive are simply going to be out on the same ice coated roads that the HISD didn’t want them driving home on in the first place, but then again the High Schools in this state have never really been that big on promoting a thought process anyway.
One thing that has started to weight on me is what this means for the world? I found out, through a reputable source, that there is no snow fall in New York. How is this possible? Morally the Big Apple is covered in 12 feet of snow while people in H-Town are tanning on the beach. But for a city that experiences 108 in the shade on a good day in the summer, to be feeling snow fall down on it while New York is flake free worries me.
Could this be a sign? Should we worry that the death of an innocent and a child born without a soul are next? I don’t know about anyone else, but I think I will keep an eye out for a man on a pale horse
What you Won't See in a Highlander Remake…
Sep 8th
Posted by bard noir in Bard\'s Abyss
But SHOULD!
I’m posting this because I know, for a fact, that Davis-Panzer would never steal these ideas from me even if they could use them to save the franchise these men are trying to squeeze blood from. Lets face it, the biggest problem with Hollywood is the constant need to do things their way thinking they know what people want. The reality is that there are people, like me, ready to offer ideas and advice but Hollywood would never listen because someone like me doesn’t have 1 blockbuster hit and a string of dead and forgotten movies *cough*MarkStevenJohnson*couh*
Now, you might not be up to date on this so I’ll give you a quick back-story; The makers of “Highlander” are in the works for doing a “Highlander”-remake. That’s right, they are going back to remake a movie that shouldn’t have even had a sequel. But let’s put aside the fact that Hollywood has run out of ideas to the point of making movies that were already remade, again, and just look at the project as something we want to see succeed. Honestly I think we will find that it could be if they embraced a few changes. But it won’t be, and that’s because they will never do any of the following, even though they should:
1. Don’t Call it Highlaner:
Now, I understand that the hope is people who are fans of the original will want to see a remake so they will want to capitalize on something people recognize. But I assure you, this will be the first nail in the coffin of the Highlander franchise. First off, no one who’s a Highlander fan will appreciate their entire mythos being reworked… again. All that’s going to happen is alienation of the old fans, and hopes to recreate new ones. A plan that would only work when all us old fans are dead, so we can’t go around saying how much the remake sucks. Besides, the problem with the “Highlander” franchise is the name itself. The movie is about a Highlander who happens to be Immortal. You can’t have “Highlander” without a Highlander so you’ve already painted yourself in a corner. Connor MacLeod is the Highlander and Duncan was a Highlander but moving away from the MacLeod line gives you some maneuvering room with the franchise.
So what to call it then?
“Watcher Chronicles”, “Immortals”, “Sword of the Immortal” or anything that would draw someone’s attention but allowing you to have the choice to do something else. I like “Watcher Chronicles: the Highlander” or something similar. It puts you, the viewer, in the role of the Watcher (observer and record but never interfere) and you could have a sequel called “Watcher Chronicles: the Egyptian” and so on and so on. An entire series that doesn’t even have to be a continuation of a storyline and doesn’t have to follow the same characters/actors around all the time – what a concept!
They’ll never do it.
2. Stay away form the original cast/characters:
With the exception of one, which we will cover in a moment the original characters and cast should be wiped from the record. Don’t even mention Amanda or Duncan and don’t even give Adrian Paul so much as a Cameo. If you must bring in a Kurgan or Highlander to make the connection, then do so. I don’t see a problem with Connor, but certainly not the Connor MacLeod knock-off called Duncan. I don’t want to hear about Juan Sanchez Villa Lobos Ramierz or see a dragon head katana as all of those things should be left to the true fans, like little keepsakes from our past. Since Hollywood is obsessed with formula they will probably turn to old character or actors with big name draws.
But it’s the characters that pull us in, and the Connor MacLeod of the 1980′s isn’t interesting to the audiences of today. Duncan MacLeod has become so Gary Stu he simply isn’t flawed enough to be of interest, and Amanda isn’t strong enough to be as sexy as she was 10 years ago. But Hollywood seems to think they can capitalize on the popularity of characters from the past by exposing them to new pople. But that’s like some 47 year old man getting hair plugs, working out and throwing on his high school letter-man jacket and thinking he can score with 18 year old cheerleaders again… Unless you Al Bundy, good luck with that.
3. Focus the Movie on Methos instead of Connor/Duncan:
Yeah, this one probably comes out of left field, considering I just said “avoid the originals” I know. But I think the best bet is to intentionally break that rule and give Peter Wingfield whatever he wants to be the star of the movie and reprise his role as Methos. Methos was, by far, the most interesting character in the entire Highlander universe. The writers and producers struck gold when the came up with the character, and hit the lottery when they hired Peter to play the part. Methos/Peter would pull in all the fans to show, who you want in the first place. There is an entire fan base of people who would love Davis-Panzer forever, for saying they were bring Peter back as Methos to be the star of his own movie.
And, honestly, who wouldn’t want to see a Methos movie? A movie about a 5,000 year old immortal, former member of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse is interesting enough on it’s own. And you can still pull to the appeal of fans from the series who remember that some of the best lines in the series were delivered by Methos like “[I am] a man born before the age of chivalry.” And who can forget the the “I was death…” speech?
Methos would bring back all the people who used to watch the original series and it would properly expose a new group to a very popular kind of character. The cash cow has never been Adrian Paul, and that’s where the producers have been making the mistake from day one. A Classic Heroic type like Duncan MacLeod is as antiquated as he is unpopular. People want Jack Sparrow, Captain Kirk and Wolverine who all fly in the face of a knight in shining armor type. They are flawed, self absorbed, and only do the right thing because it also happens to benefit them too. They are the kind of character women seem to love and men wish they could be. The next, closest thing, is Fitzcairn but only Rodger Daltry is alowed to play him and I think Peter has a look that’s more univerally appealing.
People would love it, but then you have to…
4. Kill Methos:
Yes, I said he should then be killed off and I know many would not agree with this idea of bring back Methos and forming an entire movie around him only to have the character die. But you need to end the connection to the show, and Peter cannot play that character forever but you want the franchise to go on forever. So you also need Methos’ death to hurt, to mean something. You need people to know that “there can be only one” and question who it could be in the following movies. You also need to sever that final tie to the original series once and for all. Up to this point, every movie has tried to be an extension of the show or some attempt to capitalize on it’s popularity. Killing Methos will be “letting go” of that and with his death you can finally move on to bigger and better things.
And when Methos is killed, it can’t be done by an Immortal. No one should be allowed to benefit from Methos’ death, so a Hunter should take him down on Holy Ground like the way Darius died. Maybe Methos sacrifices himself for once, and puts his own life aside for someone else, someone like Alexa who he could love and not live without. Since she would one day die, he knows that he would one day have no reason to live. It would be poetic and it would be a great way to return Methos’ “humanity” in the end. It’s the kind of story that would appeal to people now because I think our audiences are finally ready to look at the pain of loss and the cost of love… “Who wants to live forever, when love must die…” ~Queen
So that’s the formula:
From here it doesn’t matter if it’s Conner, Duncan or Fitzcairn that’s remade from the ground up. Hell, get an all new Duncan MacLeod played by Gerard Butler for all I care. I think he’d be great to be honest and I’m sure there are many women who’d agree. But make him a more hollow and heart broken Duncan who has never been allowed to find a one true love, he probably fights drunk and pushes people away because he’s strong on the outside but always hurting inside. Or do an entire movie around Kenny, they 10 year old Immortal (but kill him off please) who’s been around for 1,000 years conning people. He’d be a great villain if you ask me. It’s like “The Omen” if Damien were an expert with a short sword.
There’s so much that could be done but, as I said, the Producers focus on one word “Highalander” and that forces us to focus on one character. It’s not a bad concept, Immortals who are born fighting to the death until only one remains is briliant but the execution past the first movie has been lacking. In fact, that seems to be the biggest problem Hollywood has the days. There are good ideas out there, but someone always drops the ball.
I hope, and pray, that the day will come when I have to eat the following words (but I doubt that will happen):
I tried to save the Highlander franchise… but as Methos once said “I’m just a guy.”