Have you ever had two (or more) players create their characters in some sort of arrangement that gave one noteworthy authority over the other(s)? How did it turn out?
For example:
>a noble and his bodyguard
>a wizard and his construct/warforged
>a cult and their leader
There's a pair in my current game, it's quite cute actually
>Runaway daughter of a noble
>The nobles personal thug/executioner/assassin always had a crush on her
>helps her escape and guards her as they go on ADVENTURE
>she's ditzy and completely unprepared for the real world
>he's quick to violence especially when she's threatened
I'm not really doing it justice, but they have adorable interactions
In my last (played) game of Rogue Trader
>Captain on board a Navy Vessel
>Transporting an Imperial Guard regiment
>Shit goes south, we get stranded years out from civilization with Warp Travel inoperable
>Ship goes insane, I survive with the help of a trusty Ogryn
>We survive back to civilisation, and I now have a lackey with an ironclad loyalty
>Against the odds, I inherit my Dynasty's Warrant and ship
>I make the Ogryn my Arch-Militant, him being the only one I trust with my back
>He's my muscle, I'm his brains
It was an amazing relationship.
Such a pity the game didn't last longer.
Im my current campaign we have a pirate storm sorceress who stole the contract of one of the world's scariest pit fighters. The pit fighter, a Goliath Champion (5e) is utterly loyal to the owner of his contract.
I was worried at first, but the 2 roleplay exceptionally. They also help balance an otherwise chaotic stupid party.
The Goliath is also starting to become more independent thanks to a sort of spirit quest he's been on.
Old Men. Money.
My current group's last game had one PC using the other PC as a mount to make a high-speed front-line war machine. Wasn't really an "authority" situation so much as a way to legally get two people into one slot with a side of zoom.
Current group has nobles from two different races in it. The party is actually a mercenary company but they'll often let people assume that they're a noble and their retinue for convenience.
One time we had a guy play a bossy warlock bitch, and my cleric grudgingly went along with her bullshit because he believed her gifts would ultimately serve a greater good or something. She was extremely violent and the only thing that kept her from harming half the people we interacted with was the threat of my character leaving.
The telling probably makes it sound awful, but her player was/is the best roleplayer in our group, so it was great.
I had an amazing WFRP 2e game where this happened. One player rolled a Noble, and rolled TERRIBLY on his stats - I'm talking like multiple double 1s, no stat boosts from his random talents, he was pretty much the worst PC I've ever seen in WFRP.
Another played rolled brilliantly on his stats, with high values in basically everything and a natural weapon skill of 45 from talents. For his class he rolled a Peasant (I can't remember if it was the actual Peasant class or just one associated with it, like Camp Follower or Charcoal Burner).
Anyway, they RP'd out like a noble-and-servant thing for the whole game. The Noble was a complete asshole to the Peasant, the Peasant was deferential and took all of the abuse while saving the Noble's ass. I'm talking like the lord guy would pull out his pistol, shoot and miss horribly, hand it to the peasant to reload while he smoked his pipe, take it back, miss horribly again, and end up over the peasant's shoulder while they tried to escape five beastmen - and still complaining about how uncomfortable it was.
Not exactly but how it turned out like that.
In my last game of Anima
>Playing as a summoner from "not Asia"
>Not the brightest characters but always positive
>New player joining the group, He's playing a warrior monk from "not Asia"
>His Monk is looking for other Monks from his temple
>His aim to become the strongest
>Tell him I'm on a journey to find and save my friend
>Decides to travel with me due to similar paths
>Through our journeys he comes to realise that my character always tries to be honest, and does the good thing no matter what
>My character is not good in combat at all and always relies on protection from him
>He takes a liking to me and decides to protect my character as his new aim
>He became my guard and friend
>To the very end he was willing to put his life on the line for me
Once played a game where two players made characters that coincide with each other. They made their characters as flatmates.
Playing for a better term a shadow run campaign as legal runners
A hacker known as Cayde. Very dysfunctional, likes to meme a lot, gets himself in trouble loads because of things he says by accident. Always dressed in a sloppy fashion and tends to be lax about everything.
A "face" known as Geroge (Cayde gave him the nickname of Gorgeous which stuck). Whilst charismatic also dysfunctional as he could not drive, did not know how to fight, relied on his looks. Even the simplest of tasks he would get others to do. His wardrobe consisted of only suits. Furthermore, he had no idea how to cook.
Anyway, hilarity would ensue as both characters shared an apartment with each other. A large portion of the campaign was actually just living our daily lives.
And then my character got introduced. I was playing as a stuck up Russian soldier. Who was discharged due to political reasons. I also moved into the flat, but my character had no idea of social norms too. Due to the fact that my character for the most of her life lived in the military. It was such a good cyberpunk sitcom.
I would love a Fate/RPG, but I have no clue as to how it should even work.
shame, it would have been amazing.
>genderswapped Fluttercord
Niiiiiice.
My Dark Heresy 2nd Edition game had our sanctioned psyker, and her handler from the Adeptus Astra Telepathica who has a background as one of the guys who tracked down and captured psykers for the Astra Telepathica's Black Ships. Both of them got snapped up by the Inquisition after an unspecified incident, and they play off each-other real well. The handler's job is to keep the psyker from going totally off the reservation, and pop her if she ever gets possessed.
The psyker has become fucking insanely powerful, so good luck with that.
(That said, she's also gotten kinda sweet on the team assassin and has no interests in going rogue of her own accord, so she's not likely to fry the rest of the team and make a run for it.)
OHOHOHOHOHOHO
Both characters sound like they have some form of autism. In a funny way that even people with autism in real life would laugh at. It sounds amazing.
Hatesex when?
It got better as we found out that Cayde Had an extended family who thought he was Autistic and off benefits. They would alway talk down to him and invite him over for Christmas and thanksgiving. Cayde would always give random sums of money as presents like $37.39 or $2321 and so forth. Unknown to them he was an elite hacker working for one of the best mega corps. He only gave those random sums because he liked to round up or down to the closest 100.
We always get stopped by building security when we check in with our boss cos of how scruffy Cayde looks, they just think of him as a hoolagin.
As for Geroge, his entire wardrobe got burned. So for the entire session, he was wearing shorts and a blazer. He had to reaffirm people's image in him due to this.
The GM was joking about doing a diehard session in which Caydes family was held hostage or kidnapped and Cayde would have to come to the rescue.
I played a Pathfinder game where one of the guy's was really new to the whole RPG thing. He liked the fluff but not the crunch so Another player invited him to play a Unchained Summoner. She would play the actual Eidolon and he played the Summoner. They had this really fun romance-strained-by-authority thing going and once we all got over the dur-dur well that how Asmiar are made thing out of our system we had a blast with the RP. And since she was handling alot of the rolling with the eidolon and he was just shooting a bow most of the time it sped the summoners turn up alot tot he point where no one was pissy about having a summoner in the party. It also meant we could have a full team of spellcasters and still have a tank.
My group dit this thing for Call of Cthulhu. Everyone has 2 secrets with someone else. And these secrets gave some people power over others.
Like, for example, the doctor knew that my character had put her siblings in an asylum, so she could inherit everything.
Don't have a story myself, but I imagine something like SIFRP would produce countless situations like this where one player is the heir to the house and another is a sworn sword, or where birth order between brothers plays a role
Played a very roleplay intensive game with a custom magic system, basically, one player was a mage, then other was the mana tank. The mage drained the vital essence of the other to cast spells and help the group, the mana tank was suffering everything but smiled because he could be useful to the mage and the world.
What ever she was using him for, he was ok with being a tool, because he loved her.
Let's say it ended.... harshly, and with too many feels we don't even talk about this in our playgroup. It's too heavy to bring.
We did a band of bards + bard hybrids with one woman as the lead singer/leader. She ended up doing her own thing a lot instead of giving orders, but it was fun nonetheless
I want to play a cyberes up troll who takes orders from a crow on his shoulder.
Don't know whether it will turn out well.
On a pathfinder campaign, my roommate made a bard that carried around a guitar that was always out of tune for reasons undisclosed. I was a Cleric of Gozreh, and his favored weapon was a Trident. So naturally, as the game progressed, it became a tuning fork with the same radius as my channeling abilities. It would put him in tune for a couple of rounds or w/e. I forget the mechanics of it.
This all happened on the fly, and was not planned. Turned out fucking awesome. However I find that when 2 players start the game with pre arranged characters, they inevitably grow apart as they strive for their individual story arc, (rather than together, which was the case in our campaign) Or one of them is blank slate body guard because they can't RP for shit and have no imagination.
I once played a good-natured idiot of a monk who was another player characters "sword". His order of monks just consider themselves weapons, and a weapon needs a wielder, so he set out from his monastery in search of an owner. The problem was that he was so friendly that he kept befriending the people he was supposed to be fighting.
It was fun but the campaign fell apart pretty quick, I'd like to play the character again someday though. The important thing is to talk to the player whose character will have authority over yours before the game to make sure you both have an idea of what the relationship dynamics and tensions will be.
Is that actual art of the party?
I love it. It reminds me of Metal Slug.
Had an entire campaign with that kind of dynamic that worked out very well.
>D & D
Played a Witch (enchant heavy sorcerer) and stole a bit of Diablo lore. Made her a once powerful sorceress queen who had been defeated long ago by a council of wizards. Wizards couldn't figure out how to kill her for good, so they broke her power in pieces, trapped it in what were basically soulstones, and hid them in far flung, custom built, prisons.
Centuries later, she's just an ill-remembered fairytale. Wakes up in a swamp in a decrepit, aged body with most of her power gone (level 3 if I remember right). Proceeds to gather minions and attempt to find all of her power again.
The DM and other players liked the concept enough that we ended up making restoring the witch's power the main storyline.
Party ended up as:
>Cackling crone who spent equal time juggling her relative lack of power, keeping a reign on her murderhobo minions, and the hilarious problems her massive ego caused with NPCs.
>Troll-blooded berserker who ended up becoming so powerful he transcended to Valhalla and parted on equal terms
>Ghost assassin (her right-hand man from the glory days) who kicked up a fuss every time the bodies I helped him possess died.
>Guy who rolled up character after character, only to end up being the Red Shirt through a combination of incompetence, overconfidence, or (once) just for the witch's yuks.
The dynamic ended up being much like pic related (the cackling voice ended up evolving to a Monarchical twang too)...with the fourth guy always going the way of Speedy.
No, just something I found.
But Cayde would carry around weapons he couldn't physically use cos he thought it was cool.
What system did you use? Shadowrun?
We've played Shadowrun before.
But we're using a cyberpunk rule set for Vampire.
Just change the rules whenever it suits the plot.
> Halfling bard merchant with no discernable combat skills
> Half-Orc barbarian that could barely string a sentence of common, but was wholly dedicated to the orcish speaking halfling
It was a fun combo, but the two started to drift away from one another once the halfling started delving into slavery.
You can't say shit like that and then not tell the story, user.
Yeah, she was the Khan and we were all in her retinue.
>Coming of age prince.
>His childhood friend/brother figure turned Knight of high(and boy do I mean high) chivalry.
>Engage in HIGH ADVENTURE! On a mini pre-party formation quest of manhood for prince. Have a funny dynamic of telling him what's what in fights, while taking orders otherwise.
>Two sessions in things are getting weird
>Rest of party has met and started chasing a McGuffin
>No sign of our high adventure spilling into involvement with McGuffin
>Get to high adventure cave
>Shit goes tits up (pretty sure it wasn't very rail-roaded)
>Princeling gets trapped under cave-inafter killing target of HIGH ADVENTURE
>Move to free him, but classic cave-in scene starts
>Trying to free prince.
>Prince frees me from my duties and tells me to run, begging me to live
>Stay anyways, que sappy scene about brotherly love as I try to clear the rubble
>Prince asks me to remove my helm
>Ooohh-kay? Remove helm
>Get pulled into a kiss from prince
>OOC panic, I guess I should've seen that coming some how, like the group expected me to see it coming
>McGuffin Meister appears and whoosh-es us off
>Que drama as McGuffin Meister used all his power to save us 'beings of magnanimous potential' and heals us before fucking off, telling us it's up to us now
>Que animoo drama about a knights heart belonging to one maiden on their honor and how he doesn't love prince that way, before being rebuffed by teary eyed 'i love you's' and 'i order you to see your love for mes"
Fun part was it was a chick DM AND prince player.
>Party hears our screaming match and finds us
Whole campaign kicks off on the note of a gay prince who's just passed their test of manhood screaming his love for his bodyguard
The prince/loyal knight ordering dynamic got more interesting from there.
>Prince frees me from my duties and tells me to run, begging me to live
>Stay anyways, que sappy scene about brotherly love as I try to clear the rubble
That's fucking adorable. God bless your fujo groupmates.
Nice. Wish I could be part of a successful 'underling' scenario, but I don't think any of my group would be down the the dynamic. They'd either command my PC too overzealously and not allow them to make choices, or ignore it entirely and not give them anything.