OK, so the GM has Season Stories, Episode Stories, Character Stories and Retroactive stories and Players have their stories.  When the players finish a story they get points to apply to their Heroes.  Can they bank points to use later? i.e. they get 2 points for an Episode Story and want to save it and get 3 more to buy a 5 point Advantage. 

Really we need a name for the points other than "steps".  I'll call them experience points since all the players know the term, but is there an official name in the text anywhere?  Maybe call them Story Points?  I'll need a place to keep track of them on the Character sheet.

Does it seem like a fast progression with 1 story step per hour or two of game time?  We play on Saturdays and go for 6 hours at a time.

Just wondering what others think of the character progression mechanic.

My thoughts on the story progression method is that it is very similar to how my group generally does experience. I.e. every so often the GM awards a level. It is also similar to how the fate system works with milestones. Once again, something my group generally does already.

The way I plan to play it is that GM story points "bank" (though not too high. I've got a couple of players who are notorious for forgetting to spend XP and then shooting up in ways that catch me off guard.) and Player Stories are towards a specific Advancement.

I'm also thinking that compared to other games, character progression may be on the slow side. I don't know about you, but I don't plan to juggle up to 8 player stories, an arc story and an episode story in every session. A plot, B plot, and maybe a C plot, and having the A or B plot be dedicated to advancing a Player Story and the other to advancing either another player story or the Arc story will probably be my norm.

Fortunately, I already subscribe to the J.M. Straczynski style of storytelling. :)

I'm a very sandbox style GM, so I imagine I'll have stories that the characters choose not to follow.  Of course those stories will progress without them and may come back to bite them later.

My understanding is that there are no "points" earned at the end of any episodes or stories, rather you are simply able to select a reward based based on the number of steps the story took. Personally, I would probably allow my players to bank points, but they would still only earn them at the time a story is completed (i.e. at the end of a 3-Step story they get 3 points they can use however they want.)

 

 

I am of two minds on this. While I like assigning the points after the story and having them spent, I can also see where a player may not have interest in any of the 3 point advancement options but really wants a 4 point thing. As it's not their fault I ran a 3 point story, I can understand banking. Maybe there is a medium. Players use the points when they get them but they create a short list of goals to apply them towards. A statement like, " I NEED TO THINK BEFORE I ACT". Could apply points to wits, Scholar, various advantages, etc. If they suddenly change objectives, that pooled XP sits in escrow and new points go to the new goal.

Reading over the first post in the Old Player Characters thread, it occurs to me that one of the issues the GM is going to have to get used to with the new edition is that campaign prep prior to character creation is kind of futile.

If one of my players creates a story where the first step is to travel to X, I'm going to be hard pressed to plan an extensive campaign in the city of Frieberg.

I think I would insist that players NOT finalize their first story during character creation.  Creating stories in a vaccum is going to lead to some disappointment.  A couple of ideas:

• Have a "Story Roundtable" session before play begins, where all the players talk about their characters and their ideas for Stories.  This way everyone is on the same page (kinda) and we don't get unworkable combinations like: "I'm going to X." "Oh?  I'm going to Y.  Nice meeting you."
• The "First Story" should be the GM's and should be limited to 1 or 2 steps.  After that, the players are free to put down their own stories.
• If the GM has an idea for a definite arc, he needs to make this known to the group up front.  Encourage everyone to come up with Stories that tie into this theme or location.  Maybe offer an incentive like the first step counts as 2.

Anyway, just some thoughts.  Man, this edition is killing my comfort zone!

What I plan to do is to run the quick start adventure as is, and then have the players make their own characters at the end of the session.

This will let the players get a feel for the game and how they might want to create a character, Let them build a bit of the world history before they begin (since the coup attempt in the quick start happens before the general start date for the games), and gives me a feel for what things the players like doing within this genre.

There is also the benefit that none of the players are character building in a vacuum and we are all chatting about the adventure.

As a GM, I would be informing my players of generally where and what I have in mind for the campaign.  The location, the general concept (are we playing sailors, local heroes, merchant journeymen, soldiers, etc.)  and the estimated amount of major travel or other major destinations I am planning on.  

 

After that, they are welcome to build what they want so long as they leave room to tie it into that established material.  If a story is well outside of my plans, I talk to them about revising because odds are good we will not get to it.  

My biggest trouble will be that my former players are always reluctant to create their own threads and want to just be entertained by my doing the work.  having a say in their own plots just isn't their thing.