[Amber] Player Contributions

Panjumanju · April 10, 2015, 01:46:45 PM

Players of Amber Diceless sign up for any silly contribution they can to come up with those extra points at character creation, and for me running the game this has been some of the most fun. Some of my favourites have been:

* Trumps drawn by my unemployed animator friends.
* Journals of poetry, with the poem reflecting each session.
* Some guy volunteered to bring pop to each session. (He realised later it was going to start adding up, and we all chipped in.)

What are some interesting player contributions you've seen?

//Panjumanju

Artifacts of Amber · April 12, 2015, 11:21:23 PM

Only had a few unusual ones.

Had a player who couldn't draw but did 3-d drawings and took pictures playing with overlays and such. Not impressive now days but this was 12-15 years ago were it was not nearly as easy or common. I still use some of his drawings for reference to day.

Another player had Logrus, shape shifting and Abyssal powers and was a little insane so her journal's could be her normal character or her Logrus side and it was always fun to find out who I was reading from week to week.

And as an aside I always found the rules for contributions sort of front loaded and uneven, length of campaign always determined if they were a good investment or not. So I made the rules change you got points when you gave me something or did something so you decided if you wanted to do it week to week and some players felt inspired every week some once in a while some gave me three different contributions one week and none the next. the obligation went away and made it a fun thing again.

PS - I can't draw crap and I always do a journal cause I like them so for more points I would make trumps from photo copies or pictures I found on the net, since I didn't actually create them I had to make 5 or so to count as a contribution but I had several unique backings and made them front and back laminated. Still have them still use them.

Panjumanju · April 15, 2015, 10:00:26 AM

I always liked the player contributions for drawings when the player "can't draw" or at least think they can't draw. You get such amazing, imaginative stuff from people who feel they have no artistic talent. It's usually much more interesting than the work of artists.

//Panjumanju

sir brad · June 08, 2015, 11:16:07 AM

Had a friend who was a LARP'er also worked in theater, he developed quite a wardrobe that got re-used in productions and other games, also props, it was fun to see how his latest costume was developing when we played every few weeks.

an other friend worked in his company's print shop and developed campaign stationary, when we where coming back off of a brake we would get invites and recaps in the post, also printed and bound a campaign magazine with a lot of other contributions.

had one player that set up a BBS that mutated in to the mailing list and was about to become the campaign web page when we drifted apart.

one of the girls wrangled the S.O.'s, organizing date nights and weekends away to placate our girlfriends so we could "Play an other one of those stupid games" all we had to do we make sere we had a whole in out scuduals to do what she'd planed and front the cash.

RPGPundit · June 10, 2015, 12:55:47 AM

Those are all quite creative. Probably the most impressive contribution I ever got in any of my campaigns (which featured a lot of artistically-talented players over the years making some great trumps) was when one player made what amounted to a 50-page setting sourcebook for his character's personal Shadow.

sir brad · June 10, 2015, 01:35:20 AM

You should have seen us at a "Full Dress" session, everyone would be there dressed as their characters (even those playing Cross-Gender), if necessary fake beards and latex Facial Appliances, at times some of us wondered what loony bin we'd escaped from.

on the Make-up dates sometimes us guys would double and get dragged aside for advice from our wing-woman, more than one relationship was saved or at least kept on life support thanks to her.

RPGPundit · June 12, 2015, 10:53:06 PM

Quote from: sir brad;835868You should have seen us at a "Full Dress" session, everyone would be there dressed as their characters (even those playing Cross-Gender), if necessary fake beards and latex Facial Appliances, at times some of us wondered what loony bin we'd escaped from.

on the Make-up dates sometimes us guys would double and get dragged aside for advice from our wing-woman, more than one relationship was saved or at least kept on life support thanks to her.

Crazy!

Panjumanju · June 18, 2015, 12:07:15 PM

I must not understand the "fully-interactive" way some people play Amber.

Ed Greenwood lives near me, and we were talking about a game of Amber he played years ago at an Amber con in the States The session 'climaxed' with one guy stripping naked and being strapped to a car in mid-winter. The cops were called, and of course the cops had no idea what a 'roleplaying game' was, and Ed & co. only manged to argue their way out of it as a "Canadian test of fortitude against the snows" or some such.

Now, I have absolutely no idea what kind of Amber playing would actually lead to someone being naked and strapped to a car, but I do hear stories like this. And I wonder.

//Panjumanju

sir brad · June 18, 2015, 08:21:36 PM

Me either, as far as we went was sitting around the lounge room dressed as our characters as we played.

RPGPundit · June 22, 2015, 12:43:07 AM

I've seen some people run Amber in a way that is semi-LARPish.

Mind you, I've never seen that culminate in someone being tied naked to a car.

Panjumanju · June 22, 2015, 03:59:03 PM

Quote from: RPGPundit;837600I've seen some people run Amber in a way that is semi-LARPish.

Mind you, I've never seen that culminate in someone being tied naked to a car.

It must have been an epic-level player contribution; somebody desperate to get themselves out of bad stuff. How far would your players go for just 10 more points? Tied up naked to a car in winter far?

I suppose some people take their player contributions to the next level.

//Panjumanju

RPGPundit · June 27, 2015, 03:36:28 AM

Quote from: Panjumanju;837654It must have been an epic-level player contribution; somebody desperate to get themselves out of bad stuff. How far would your players go for just 10 more points? Tied up naked to a car in winter far?

I suppose some people take their player contributions to the next level.

//Panjumanju

LOL! Not sure if I'd allow that in one of my games.