A note to all who participate my campaigns

[Lucre]

I just thought of something else! At the beginning of the campaign put in a list of all the NPC's names and whether we can write about them or not or bring them into the story ourselves( i made a mistake about that one).

[Legolas]

Okay, your worlds are very good, they are imaginable and seem be balanced. They have plenty of variety too.

Your NPC's can be divided into three groups, those that leave after only a short while and hardly have an effect on the story line at that point., those that have information to part with but can be dumped after it is retrieved, and those which stay with the players for a longer period of time.
Usually, you only give a basic description of each one of them, stating name, race and class. For the first kind of NPC that is not a problem. For the second kind, more details would be nice but aren't truely nessecary. The latter group, however, should be given more detail. I'll get to the reason I think so later.
The direct world around the party is usually described only roughly too. I think this is usually a good thing as it gives the players a bit more freedom to act, and lengthy descriptions are usually not as interesting to read. But a disadvantage would be that players pick up a vase or break off a dead branch where you didn't want them to.

I think that though we should ask more questions, it would be good if you provided more detail as well. In a slow per-post game (compared to a r/l game) asking questions may well mean a delay of twelve hours or more in some cases. Simply acting and hoping you don't say 'you can't, there is no..' seems to work better. And a character can be expected to look around when he or she enters a new area, notice some details standing out.
In my opinion, it would help if you provided more details, though by no means all, or all the important ones. At least, not until players declare they are searching the room for anything useful. Same goes for the NPC's, the longer thy are with the party, the more time there is to examine them and notice details.

As to the speed, that differs from game to game. In the Wolfsheim thread, I think combat lasts way too long (I believe someone made a comment there like "page three already and we're still in the same room". Though sometimes you can do this, most of the time it does not work too well. The focus is completely on that particular room instead of the long term goals of the characters.

Another topic is items. Common items are, as the name says, common. They should be found in a lot of places, to be ignored or help someone out (this could also be the oponnent). Magic items should be rare, you can use them to keep the game interesting or reward players. But most of the time you'll find that players prefer their own equipment and would rather have something else insead. The exceptions to this are potions, scrolls and similar small objects, though rings and amulets are probably left alone as well.
This limits you to only a few items, and having a number of magical scrolls will get quite confusing over time. As a matter of fact, many players only look after their own gear and tend to forget about what the others carry.
Though items are cool, the coolness wears off over time. Items like the cheeseball scroll are forgotten or saved until a better time. Yet you have to think of something for the players to spend their money on.

Combat scenes are fun, but the other scenes are important as well. In combat, your character can show off. In the other situations, the party can interact. Give them something to talk about, an object, a treasure, a monster or a maze, aything at all. You'll see the players interacting with one another. And if you notice the talk is dying out, provide the players with something new. This does not have to be a combat, it can be an NPC saying he/she is off to bed, or the leader informing the members the party will be off soon. By providing many different aspects, you give each player something interesting to take care of, and make sure every single one of them has situations in which they stand out and situations where they are next to useless. What I see most is that fighters and magi get almost all the action, where clergi and rogues are left out.

Finally, keeping it interesting. There is no sure way of doing this, as repetative behaviour and situations become boring over time. Fresh things may change a pretty interesting setting into a boring one. For you as DM, it is a challenge to feel the mood of the players, which can be hard over the internet. Then you should react to it. For players, it is teh challenge to be devoted to the topic. There is nothing worse than a large party falling apart and leaving one or two interested players while the others dissapear. Little will happen, and the last of the interest fades away, causing a good adventure to die out.

[Sir ReGiN]

I have no experience whatsoever of per-post roleplaying before, so I can't really give you much feed-back.. [img]smile.gif[/img]
But legolas has got a few good points..

[Lucre]

Another point i have is that( i'm not sure though ) i got the impression that if the characters started an idle chat about say, why they were in the city you would have said no, like i said i have no idea if this is the case or not, but how else is everyone going to find out about the characters unless you sent them all the questionairre answers.

[Sir ReGiN]

[img]graemlins/offtopic.gif[/img]
Hey Lucre, ever considered re-sizing your sig?
It's a bit long

[250]

Legolas, thank you. good commets, I will work on them [img]smile.gif[/img]

English is not my second language, that is not an excuse, but just something to be taken into consideration. I am working on things do not doubt that [img]tongue.gif[/img]

[Lucre]

quote:

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Originally posted by Sir ReGiN:
[img]graemlins/offtopic.gif[/img]
Hey Lucre, ever considered re-sizing your sig?
It's a bit long

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Never mind re-sizing it, i got a whole new one, much more simple.