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Pathfinder RPG (2nd Edition) Pathfinder RPG (1st Edition) Starfinder RPG

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GameMastery Guide / Player Characters / The Life of a Party

Gathering A Group

Source GameMastery Guide pg. 64
There’s an important step between creating characters and having that first adventure: forming an adventuring party. Unless your players have discussed connections between their characters in advance, you might find yourself with a disparate group of individuals seemingly unlikely to work toward the same goal. This can prove an extremely daunting task, and may require some quick and clever improvisation, though experienced players are likely to try and make the job easier for you by responding receptively to potential common interests. The less handwaving a GM has to do, however, the stronger a story feels. To help a group deal with the often-awkward first encounter, the following options aid in transforming a group of strangers into a cohesive adventuring party.

Shared Past

Source GameMastery Guide pg. 64
One of the easiest ways to deal with the first time characters meet is to make it their hundredth time. Working with players to create characters who know each other from the start alleviates much of the hassle of trying to entwine them with one another. Characters may be childhood friends, students of the same master, or relatives who have shared countless experiences before the adventure even begins. Working with the group to create a uniting factor makes explaining why the characters are in the same place at the same time straightforward. Knowing one another doesn’t have to mean the characters are friends. Passing acquaintances, respectful peers, or even longstanding rivals might be shoved together by circumstance.

If it seems too implausible for every character in a group to know every other member, or a shared background element seems illogical or can’t be decided upon, having even two or three related characters goes a long way toward bringing the entire group together. Two or more groups of PCs coming together, or a larger group meeting an outsider, decreases the number of factors the GM needs to wrangle to bring the party together.

The shared past method can also work well beyond first level—just because a PC never mentioned an old acquaintance, for example, doesn’t mean she doesn’t exist, and more than one replacement character has come searching for her recently deceased sibling, only to pick up her sister’s quest where the late adventurer left off. Shared pasts also provide an excellent means of introducing villains with a connection to the PCs, making the adventure a personal vendetta from the very first encounter.

Shared Goal

Source GameMastery Guide pg. 64
Perhaps one character shows up at the entrance to a recently uncovered dungeon looking for her missing niece, and soon after a robed figure also approaches the entrance tracking down a kobold who stole his master’s book of arcane research. Both need to clear out the same dungeon, so they might as well work together. It’s the PCs’ objective, not their history, that brings them together in this case. While such happenstance can easily stretch credulity if numerous adventurers show up at a site all at the same time, chancing upon a character or another group with a similar destination or goal can be made to feel natural if it’s done thoughtfully. Unlike the shared past method, the characters must learn to trust one another over time, providing ample opportunities for roleplaying as characters feel each other out and create friendships and rivalries.

In Media Res

Source GameMastery Guide pg. 64
Few things energize a new gaming group more than sitting down for their first adventure and immediately being told, “Roll initiative!” Novels rarely begin at the most boring part of the story, and neither should adventures. Starting the party in the midst of an ambush on their caravan, fighting a fire at their inn, imprisoned in a dungeon, or hearing screams from down the hall begins the adventure immediately. The characters might already be aware of each other, but it’s their reactions to the event facing them that initially draws them together, giving the GM a starting point from which to weave a lasting connection.

As stirring as this method can be, it risks taking a measure of character control out of the players’ hands, as it assumes prior actions, and can be especially frustrating if a player doesn’t believe her character would be involved in the situation presented. Thus, it’s often helpful for the GM to include the players in a measure of the setup, perhaps asking each member to come up with a reason for why his character might be in a specific place or be interested in some event. They don’t need to know how the GM plans to start things off, but they’ll already know why they’re around when the excitement begins.

Flash Forward

Source GameMastery Guide pg. 65
By far the easiest way to get characters together is to skip past the introductions and straight to the adventure. Having the players decide upon how the characters met, develop a few connections or rivalries, and determining what shared goals they already have allows a group to forgo the introductory period. While this glosses over many nuances of character motivation and potentially memorable first meetings, it also means that the GM can start an adventure at the first encounter of the adventure and start the story moving forward from there. This method tends to work best for one-night adventures, where specifics of characterization and motivation prove secondary to the excitement of the game, but can also be useful for groups where players are keen on weaving an elaborate group backstory.