Sunday, September 2, 2012

In Case You're Wondering...

 
...why there's been no post for over a month and a half, I have a couple of answers. 
 
First of all, last month was busy for me, real-lifewise.  On the professional front, we're training a new coworker and we were dealing with a large wildfire in Central Washington State.  So I've had to work more hours at my day (night & weekend) job in emergency management.
 
On the personal level, my girlfriend's son got married less than two weeks ago.  While this wasn't on the same scale as a Royal Wedding, a lot of planning and preperation was conducted to set up the chapel and reception area--and to clean up afterwards.  Dancing with my girlfriend for the first time made all the hard work worth it.
 
The second issue dealt directly with this Star Wars RPG campaign I've been running.  Out of the five players that signed up, three of them; representing the player characters (PCs) Cad So Billes, Thege Kli Klotaz and Sei'do Avari; decided to leave the game.
 
After several e-mail discussions, two prime reasons for their departure were made apparent to me.
 
First, due to my rotating work schedule, it's impossible for me to run this, or any campaign, on a fixed day of the month.  So it was hard for the players to maintain their enthusiasm about the campaign on such an irregular schedule.
 
The critical hit of this campaign was:  The players felt they were mere spectators in my campaign. 
 
They were not incorrect in feeling this way either. 
 
My rational for my game mastering style was, that I set this game up as a military campaign.  Military life tends to be directive in nature.  An armed force can't have its soldiers galavanting hither and yon all over the realm/planet/galaxy.  In this game, our heroes would be assigned a mission and once they neared their Area of Operations (AO), how they achived their objective, was left up to them.
 
Apparently, I've been too directive, despite my best intentions otherwise.
 
So the RPG aspect of this campaign is, at best, in hiatus.  Our heroes are currently en-route to the TAg Market Islands, to warn the inhabitants of an impending attack by Bongolaan.  We'll tie-up any loose ends of this RPG story arc and come to some form of conclusion. 
 
Since two of the players expressed a keen interest in the wargaming aspect of this campaign, I hope to continue the story as a "Star Wars military history."  I also have plenty of material for a series of graphic novels, based on the adventures so far.
 
So stay tuned Redshift Chronicles fans, there's more to come.
 
Thank you for your time, support and interest.