Bold New Campaigns
June 20th, 2011
Welcome to Frontier Week, everyone. As you might be able to guess, Frontier Week is all about games set on a frontier. What frontier, precisely? It doesn’t matter. The wild west, space, or even the 4th-edition “points of light” setting where everywhere is essentially a frontier, the basics of the frontier genre remain the same. Later in the week there will be a variety of frontier-related content, but I thought I would spend today’s article talking about what a frontier setting really is, and maybe even find the time to give a few tips and tricks about running games set in such a setting.
So what is a frontier, precisely? We know that space is, apparently, the final one, but that doesn’t tell us a whole lot. After all, space is big and dark, and I don’t know about you, but personally I’ve never been there. Ultimately, I think the best definition of a frontier that I’ve ever come across is that it’s a barrier or buffer zone between one area, and another. Typically speaking, and for the purposes of this article (and, really, this whole week), the two areas in question are civilization and the wilderness.
In the kind of frontier that we’ll be discussing today, one is technically within the bounds of some sort of government, and answers to a king or lord or municipal government or galactic federation or whatever is appropriate to your setting. On the other hand, however, that authority figure is a really long way away, and probably has much more important things to be dealing with, meaning that, for the most part, you’re only as much a part of that civilization as you are willing to be.
Of course, your neighbors out on the frontier might take issue with you suddenly deciding that following the law is something that happens to other people and generally going wild and doing whatever you like. The king/president/galactic senate may be a long ways off, but the lynch mob, or, if you’re lucky, the locally elected (or appointed) town sheriff is not.
On top of all of this, you’re pretty far removed from civilization. If you head off in one direction, in theory at least, you’ll start getting to more and more civilized and modern lands, but most other directions lead simply to untamed wilderness. Certainly the frontier isn’t a place of luxury, and generally speaking the fact that you’re so far out in the boonies means that you have a much harder time with a lot of really basic things, and sometimes find yourself struggling for things like food, shelter, and safety from the dangers of the wilderness. In fact, being wiped out by the environment on the other side of that frontier line is a real danger that you face from day to day, and threatens to put you down at every turn.
Ultimately, then, a frontier society (and, by extension, a frontier setting) is overshadowed at all times by a constant give-and-take struggle between the two forces pressing in on the frontier on either side: on the one hand, there is the wilderness, which proves a constant threat to those living in the frontier, and is an ever-present obstacle that must be overcome and worked around. At the same time, this wilderness and remoteness encourages those living in the frontier to strike out and do their own thing, because in the absence of the strong authorities of true civilization the frontier and wilderness offer a chance to simply take what you want, as no one can really stop you. Opposing this are the forces of order in frontier society: those who want to see their civilization spread out into the frontier, essentially pushing the frontier back further into the wilderness. Their goals in this may not be as high-minded and esoteric as that, it may simply be that they don’t want to be preyed upon by those who feel that things would be better if the strong ruled and did whatever they wanted. Joined by those who want law and order for their own protection are, of course, those who want law and order for their own benefit, preferring to profit through monopolies, land ownership, and all sorts of other virtual banditry rather than true banditry. These people see the lack of law as an opportunity to create their own iron-fisted social structure, just with themselves on top.
Personally, I think that this struggle between wilderness and civilization, or, rather, between law and chaos, makes for very interesting and rich settings. Not to mention the fact that it can serve as a rather refreshing departure from the fantasy meat-and-potatoes of good versus evil, which is fun and rewarding in its own right, but, well, it’s not a treat if you have it every day.
More to the point, frontiers are a great place for your average adventuring party to be. Not just because it provides convenient access to both the dangers and adventures of the wilderness while still leaving the PCs with a place to buy and sell goods (in fact, when you think back on it, you’ll probably realize that most D&D games take place in a frontier of sorts, because frontiers really are an excellent place for adventurers), but because the frontier struggle between the civilized and the wild are embodied in your average sword-and-sorcery hero.
Let’s face it: sword-and-sorcery heroes are borderline sociopaths. They make their living by kicking in doors, killing people, and taking their stuff. There’s one thing, and one thing only, that sets your average classic fantasy hero apart from a murderous cutthroat brigand: his choice of victims. The kill-and-loot mindset of the adventurer is not only accepted, but, in fact, approved of, if the killing and looting the adventurer is doing happens to be against someone else, especially something ugly, weird, and easy to hate, like goblins, orcs, and other monsters. It’s sort of like the difference between a pirate and privateer: one of them steals from you, and the other one only steals from people you don’t like.
As an aside, the idea that heroes and adventurers don’t really have a place in civilized society isn’t new. It goes back at least as far as ancient Greece. For those of you who only know the Disney Hercules, it may come as a shock but the original Greek version was not a very well-adjusted individual, and the real drive behind all of his adventures, including the infamous 12 labors, were to make up for or atone for the horrible crimes he would commit when overtaken by rage. Essentially, the moral of the story, if one can say it has a moral at all, was that Hercules was a warrior who could not adjust to the civilized life, and trying to force himself to be a normal townsperson would only result in him, say, murdering his wife and children. He was only really at home in the wild or half-wild, where he could slay hydras and generally do what he was meant to do.
For those of you who didn’t take Greek literature in college and have no interest in that sort of thing, sorry. We’ll move on now.
I’m not trying to say that all heroes are maladjusted violent criminals whose only redeeming value is the fact that they happened to be pointed in the right direction. Not all PCs are the sword-and-sorcery kick-in-the-door-and-only-ask-questions-like-“How-much-do-you-think-we-can-get-for-the-dragon’s-spleen-at-market?” type. Many have much deeper and more interesting motivations. Some even manage to be pacifistic. But the frontier is an excellent place for these heroes as well: after all, the wild pseudo-brigandry of the average adventurer fits squarely into half of the frontier equation, so guess where these other types of adventurers tend to fall? In the half that favors the spread and maintenance of law and civilization, naturally. What better way to bring out the frontier spirit than to create it, in microcosm, in your party?
Now that I’ve (hopefully) sold you on frontiers, I’d like to take a little time to give a few pointers on running frontier games. Not because I promised I would (I very carefully didn’t, since I know I have a habit of getting off topic and never getting around to my point), but because I think that frontier games are especially fun. So, without further ado, and in no particular order, here are some things to bear in mind when setting out to make a frontier game:
1) Tie the PCs to a Single Place
I don’t mean this literally, so you can put your ropes away. What I mean is, you’ll get the most mileage out of a frontier setting if you keep the PCs in a single location and allow them to affect its development. Historically speaking, a frontier is a place that isn’t civilized yet, but is actively being developed so that some time in the future, it will be. Some frontiers collapse, and the fledgling towns set up there disintegrate, but, for the most part, the march of progress moves ever forward. In this way, that frontier is likely to grow and change as the course of the campaign moves on. The wilderness is likely to become less and less of a threat as the frontier community grows larger and larger, but the struggle for the town or region’s future will only become more heated as different factions try to push it different ways: some will want to fall in with the existing authority that, while distant, is technically in charge. Others will want to throw their lot in with some other civilization or society, or will want to declare independence and form their own sovereign nation.
By keeping the PCs in a single place, they can not only watch as their setting grows and changes, but they can actively influence the way in which it does so. Whom they choose to ally with and whom they make enemies with may have huge ramifications on the future. For example, if the PCs choose to eliminate the nearby lizardfolk tribes instead of befriending them, they won’t have the opportunity to call on the lizardfolk to help them when the king sends a small army to put down the rebelling town. Depending on your and your players’ preferences, they may or may not be involved in really running the frontier (though one of the great things about frontiers is that there’s always an opportunity to make yourself the man in charge), but they should always have the ability to influence it in one way or another.
2) Make Good Use of the Wilderness
An important part of the frontier is that, well, it’s the last stop before you get into total wilderness. Once you get past that last frontier town, well, there’s probably not a whole lot in the way of roads, and certainly not in the way of places to sleep or buy supplies. This sounds pretty typical of fantasy adventures, and it’s easy to be a little underwhelmed by the difficulties of cutting through underbrush, but, due to the nature of a frontier, I think it can be very helpful, especially at low levels, to do everything you can to drive home the fact that the PCs are really alone out there, with none of the conveniences or benefits of civilization. Look up all the terrain features, rules, and obstacles you can find, and then (because this is one area of the game that could probably stand to be improved upon a lot), if you feel comfortable, expand on them a bit. Then, and this is the most important part, actually use them in your game.
Technically speaking, it probably doesn’t rain anymore in the frontier than it does anywhere else, but if you bother to actually break out the rules for what rain does during combat (here’s a hint: probably a lot more than you think), your players are going to feel much more vulnerable to the elements. Don’t be afraid to liberally apply difficult terrain, either. Consider making whole “encounters” that are little more than exposure to a disease (this is, admittedly, a tall order, because diseases don’t come with CRs), especially at low levels and/or when the PCs are deep out in the wilderness and can’t simply retreat to town to recover over a couple of days.
It’s not glamorous, but it really brings the wilderness home to the players, and makes the setting feel like a dangerous frontier. Also, as the PCs grow in level and find themselves less and less hampered by the environment, they will have a strong sense of accomplishment (and, most likely, more than a little glee at being able to float or teleport over quicksand and similar hazards).
3) Establish Strong Factions
This is almost always good advice: just about everybody loves a good faction, and having factions with a clear sense of purpose and identity allows your characters to belong to something larger, and ties them more closely to your game world. They are especially important in a frontier game, however, because the power structure of a frontier is much more flexible and tenuous, meaning that factions fighting for control over an area have a real urgency to what they’re doing: the land is unclaimed, or the claims in existence are highly tenuous, meaning that whoever can get themselves firmly established in control first is going to have a huge advantage in keeping things that way. The territory in question can really be won or lost, and with relative ease and simplicity. By contrast, though factions certainly fight over control of older and more established and civilized areas, these areas usually have fairly entrenched power structures and social orders, and so their ability to gain dominance is usually much more limited and requires a lot more time and effort than is the case out in the wild frontier.
This makes faction life all the more exciting, as characters can really get passionate about their factions, and which faction comes to dominance will likely have a huge impact on the scope of the game. It’s important to avoid having a clear “good” faction in these cases, however. For example, it might be tempting for the king’s army, the legitimate ruling force, to be a clear force of justice and good. Besides the fact that such authority figures often have little more than imperial/colonial interests in such frontiers (that is to say, they want raw resources and otherwise aren’t that interested in what goes on there), having one “right” faction makes the PCs’ decisions and involvement with the various factions much less interesting and much more 2-dimensional. If every side has pros and cons, then your players can enjoy one of the most fun things about frontier politics—realizing that the only person who’s really on your side is you, and everyone else is looking after their own interests first, meaning that you need to be very careful about who your allies are and what that alliance entails.
That’s all for this week, folks. Join me next time, for the first installment in a many-part article.