GM Theory - Ideas to help run RPGs

MAKING MYSTERIES

The biggest problem with these is that GMs too often figure out one thing about their mystery that is, indeed, clever, but not enough to run a whole mystery from ("It LOOKS like the butler did it, but really it was the cute girl.") This results in Game Masters who refuse to give out any information because if they tip their hand at all, you'll solve the mystery and solve it all at once. And then you get a bad case of the head scratches as the GM constantly drops deliberately obtuse and cryptic hints, the players have no idea what to do with it, and then the GM starts complaining that the players aren't "figuring it out" even though he really can't give them anything to go with.

• Create layers. Several layers.
• In each layer, have several related mysteries:

• Each mystery has several components, so you flesh out those components, and give them some sub components.

• Approach the creation of layers in reverse:

• Start with the big reveal
• then work your way back to the smaller mysteries.

Using our one liner above as an example, ("It LOOKS like the butler did it, but really it was the cute girl.") two things stand out.

First, why would we assume the butler did it? Perhaps he WANTED us to assume he did it. Why? Perhaps he believed his son did it, and wants to protect him. There's a sub mystery right there. But how can we further develop that? Why would he assume his son would do it, and how can we make this less obvious to the players? Perhaps his son doesn't KNOW who his father is. Perhaps he believes the murder victim is. And perhaps the murder victim was going to screw the son over and when the Butler discovered things, he tried to cover it up, and when that didn't work, is trying to frame himself to protect his son (who didn't even do it. Won't he be relieved?)

What else? Well, why would the girl kill the old man? Maybe she was in love with the son and he spurned her. Perhaps she's much more spoiled than she let on, and so she was trying to talk the murder victim into writing the son out of the will (which explains why the Butler was afraid his son would flip out), and when that didn't work, got pissed and killed him, and then tried to frame the son (which further concerned the butler).

This gives us a slew of material to work with, mysteries within the mystery that lead us to greater revelations. First, we try to figure out who killed him: We can afford to give them plenty of clues, several of which will point them to the Butler. But further investigation will suggest the butler is covering up for the young man, and then it turns out that the young man is, in fact, the butler's illegitimate son. Revelations! It was all this adopted heir! And he killed him because he was being written out of the will! Except certain parts of the story don't add up, so before the heroes can wrap it all up, they realize the prim and cute girl was the one trying to persuade the victim to change his will, and that she'd tried to have a relationship with the boy, only to be spurned, and then bam, the final pieces fall into place, and we have a heckuva memorable mystery.

The same premise can apply to anything: What's the secret of the ancient manuscript? Where does the tomb of the final templar lie? Who is really behind the cattle mutilitations of New Mexico?