So a friend of mine who has never played before said they would love to try it but aren’t sure that they want to spend a lot of time making a character. This same friend used to do a bunch of model UN and while I was explaining to them what d&d is they saw a lot of similarities between it and model UN, when I asked what they wanted their character to be like they said “Indonesia” they meant it in more of a geographical sense but it really got me thinking. Furthermore could you mash the two together and have a model un like experience but with some small individual adventures in it that affect the whole? I’m just curious frankly and I don’t have too much experience with model UN so tell me your thoughts!
It would not be too hard to tell a greater story through smaller, connected anecdotes. Each session (or set of smaller sessions) could be its own adventure, telling a story that influences the greater whole. Party failed to save a town? Maybe later in a different session you might hear rumours of the town’s destruction, and further temporary there could be issues where the lack of that town’s harvest is causing food scarcity and unrest (an example chosen because it would fit the geopolitical interests of your model UN friend).
This would not be a traditional way to run a campaign, but it is not without historical basis - Matter of Britain (Arthurian legend) is generally told through anecdotal poems and stories, each about adventurers going off and doing their own quests which still are part of a greater story. Or for those less literary, Monty Python and the Holy Grail does this really well - there are a series of one-shot adventures for the knights, and decisions made in those adventures play a role in future adventures and the ending.
I’m a sense, model UN involves a good bit of role play, so that much is a decent analogy, at least.
And making a campaign with smaller episodes that build toward something shouldn’t be too hard. Think of many TV shows (genre shows like Buffy or arrowverse). There’s a big bad for the season, but in any given episode they are often facing some other obstacle that can directly or indirectly impact the over-arching big bad story, or sometimes don’t have anything to do with it.
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So a friend of mine who has never played before said they would love to try it but aren’t sure that they want to spend a lot of time making a character. This same friend used to do a bunch of model UN and while I was explaining to them what d&d is they saw a lot of similarities between it and model UN, when I asked what they wanted their character to be like they said “Indonesia” they meant it in more of a geographical sense but it really got me thinking. Furthermore could you mash the two together and have a model un like experience but with some small individual adventures in it that affect the whole? I’m just curious frankly and I don’t have too much experience with model UN so tell me your thoughts!
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It would not be too hard to tell a greater story through smaller, connected anecdotes. Each session (or set of smaller sessions) could be its own adventure, telling a story that influences the greater whole. Party failed to save a town? Maybe later in a different session you might hear rumours of the town’s destruction, and further temporary there could be issues where the lack of that town’s harvest is causing food scarcity and unrest (an example chosen because it would fit the geopolitical interests of your model UN friend).
This would not be a traditional way to run a campaign, but it is not without historical basis - Matter of Britain (Arthurian legend) is generally told through anecdotal poems and stories, each about adventurers going off and doing their own quests which still are part of a greater story. Or for those less literary, Monty Python and the Holy Grail does this really well - there are a series of one-shot adventures for the knights, and decisions made in those adventures play a role in future adventures and the ending.
I’m a sense, model UN involves a good bit of role play, so that much is a decent analogy, at least.
And making a campaign with smaller episodes that build toward something shouldn’t be too hard. Think of many TV shows (genre shows like Buffy or arrowverse). There’s a big bad for the season, but in any given episode they are often facing some other obstacle that can directly or indirectly impact the over-arching big bad story, or sometimes don’t have anything to do with it.