Coo, man. Coo. (Hatoful GM Q&A)

[Hatoful GM]

You can post questions for the AGM here! Or comments! Whatever!

[Byron Mik]

Which NPC surprised you at how well they connected with the PCs or was more involved than expected?

[Hatoful GM]

Which NPC surprised you at how well they connected with the PCs or was more involved than expected?

Hmmm... probably Glade, with Drascovina being a close second.

Drascovina I expected to show up twice; once in the event, once at the soiree the next day. I did sorta expect that she'd have a cult following. I didn't expect quite the level of interest, nor that people would want additional scenes with her.

But Glade I thought would be a one and done NPC, and while I had Drascovina thought up ahead of time, Glade was more improvised. It was a surprise to have her in two scenes, much less three!

[Byron Mik]

From experience, i feel you there.

Glade was the ithorian child right? Dracosvina was just too awesome to let her be, so I don't mind fishing for more content of a dark and soul crushing nature.

[Zizzy Roosh]

Where did the idea for Camlen and the entire Master Xho story come from? I had a blast with it, much mystery!

[Silas Myles Pearson]

Was there anythign actually in the old Jedi Temple on Auratera? Or was that Just Silas' gamer instincts telling him that there just had to be something? I think that's my big question.

I should probably actually ask if Miss D visited the Jedi temple though, and if she was totally disgusted by it?

[Hatoful GM]

From experience, i feel you there.

Glade was the ithorian child right? Dracosvina was just too awesome to let her be, so I don't mind fishing for more content of a dark and soul crushing nature.

Haha, yeah, in retrospect, I should have recognized from the start how popular Drascovina would be. Writing her was a bit interesting; with characters, I often write something, then go back through and adjust word choice a little bit to better fit them. Her word choice was pretty natural for me, but with her I had to adjust tone. Often this meant making her a little meaner. All in all, fun for me, so I'm glad she got to make additional appearances.

Where did the idea for Camlen and the entire Master Xho story come from? I had a blast with it, much mystery!

I'm glad you enjoyed it! I had a good time with it, too.

As to where it came from... well! At some point during brainstorming, I said to Faily something like "what if instead of an old person, a holocron had a charming young person?" I'd read in someone else's game about someone wanting to date a holocron, which is where I'd got the idea. There had been some talk of including it this in the game (I was thinking a young holocron woman for Silas), but the game began without any specific plans. When Zizzy made a Force bond with it, I quickly wrote up Camlen.

Besides that... literally everything came else from improv or brainstorming during the game. And some help from Faily! She supplied me with Ossus, for instance. But I watch and read a lot of mysteries, and most tabletop games I've run have had a mystery, so I think I'm pretty able to make it all fit together.

Incidentally, there were a few other discarded possibilities: Camlen really did do it, Xho faked his own death and was actually living back there, and it was a Jedi conspiracy. Just some might have beens!

Was there anythign actually in the old Jedi Temple on Auratera? Or was that Just Silas' gamer instincts telling him that there just had to be something? I think that's my big question.

I should probably actually ask if Miss D visited the Jedi temple though, and if she was totally disgusted by it?

Mmm, not really. I'm afraid that exploration improv is probably where I'm weakest; I'm more of a dialogue guy. I think the names you found were a random easter egg for Faily "Jedi Rey + Kylo Ren". A ship that I don't favor, incidentally! Anyway, that's something for me to work on.

Drascovina did keep her word. She went to the temple, understood nothing, and left. Oh, and she asked the lemurs what they thought they were looking at.

[Faily]

Kon!

Thanks again for co-GMing this with me, for thinking of lots of awesome ideas, and being a great help in brainstorming all the plots we improvised along the way.

[Hatoful GM]

Awww, thanks! You were a pleasure to AGM for. I just hope I was able to ease the burden. Let the record show that Faily definitely did the lion's (fox's?) share of the work!

[Silas Myles Pearson]

Mmm, not really. I'm afraid that exploration improv is probably where I'm weakest; I'm more of a dialogue guy. I think the names you found were a random easter egg for Faily "Jedi Rey + Kylo Ren". A ship that I don't favor, incidentally! Anyway, that's something for me to work on.

Drascovina did keep her word. She went to the temple, understood nothing, and left. Oh, and she asked the lemurs what they thought they were looking at.

Okay, I thought that was probably the case. Still it was a neat thing to look into.

Also going to have to work harder to bring Drascovina to the light side it seems. One day she light actually smile.

[Hatoful GM]

Hey, Drascovina smiles all the time!

Now, if you want her to smile because she's being nice, or through happiness that's not at someone else's misfortune/paying deference to her, yeah, that's another matter.

[O'vala Aeser]

Any NPCs that you felt like didn't get enough spotlight?

[Hatoful GM]

Mmmm... not really. Corvin had a few more mysteries to him, and I had a bit planned for the vision with both him and Chriala that ended up not happening. But really, I think that everyone got enough time in the spotlight, and I had a fun time portraying all of them!

[Esla Tor]

Once again, I feel like everyone has already touched on questions on my mind. Thank you for GMing and your hard work, as well as having me!

If you're willing to share, any challenges that came up when it came to running this game? At the very least, any sleep lost, work lateness or nights at home?

[Hatoful GM]

Once again, I feel like everyone has already touched on questions on my mind. Thank you for GMing and your hard work, as well as having me!

If you're willing to share, any challenges that came up when it came to running this game? At the very least, any sleep lost, work lateness or nights at home?

Thank you for playing! I'm glad you were here!

An interesting question! I would say that the challenges were not different in type, but rather in volume from playing in a game. When I'm working having trouble with a post, I sigh, I pace about, I grumble... all of which makes my wife a bit concerned. When GMing, a do all of those a lot more! This time, I also got to startle her with yelling "OHHH SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT" when I came up with what I felt was a really good idea.

My tendency to be a people pleaser is something I just lean into as a GM, so that wasn't too much of an adjustment, either. I mean, normally when playing, I have a problem with "ugh, I don't know if I want this for my character, but the other player seems to want it, so whatever" from time to time. Not really having a character makes that easier.

Overall, it's been fun! But I'm excited to be returning to playing again, too.

[Ares Pax]

Coo

[Hatoful GM]

Coo

Coo indeed, Ares. Coo indeed.

[Ares Pax]

The coo wars. They were best of times, they were the darkest of times.

Greatly enjoyed your NPC-s, though didn't interact with Corvin and Chriala as much as I would have liked. Orgus Dad was very fun though, and it fit you a lot D

[Esla Tor]

Very insightful, thank you for sharing! I think you did pretty well!

[O'vala Aeser]

Heh, any regrets not playing in the game as a player? What sort of youngling would you have played?