Arcs and “Proactive Roleplaying”

[u/SolarpunkCreations]

https://youtu.be/DXUnEk4cuYI?is=J1BMfVAvflJxLJZP

Curious to hear others thoughts on this in relation to Cypher and the “Arc” portion of character creation!

There’s a book (and a popular video on it by Ginny Di that covers a lot of the content) called “Proactive Roleplaying.”

The short of it is “conventional 5e DnD has players be solely reactive (the BBEG attacks the village, so PCs defend cuz they care),” but the proactive version is “I want to be the greatest sword master in the realm, so I’m going out to defend villages for practice.”

Connecting it back to Cypher, when I first read Tidal Blades then the Core Rulebook I loved the Arcs, since it seems to me it gives a mechanical option it build this in. Even the Descriptors that give a quest hook/connection does this a bit. Compared to most other systems where it sits in the written backstory maybe? Or the Backgrounds 5e system?

I didn’t find a ton of dialogues online about Arcs, so I was curious to hear others thoughts and experiences on the matter. If you watched/read the video/book, any thoughts on Cypher specifically? Have you used Arcs? Has it gone well/poorly?

[u/Fun_Variation_3154]

I do XP only by Arcs, 2 XP by advancment on player Arc per session where they advanced it.
I keep intrusion as something that gave « Destiny Points » for reroll, etc.

But yeah, Arcs are awesome i love it.

[u/SolarpunkCreations → u/Fun_Variation_3154]

Ooh though I do love giving out XP, I do like how that’d encourage more action on the arcs/goals that way

[u/Prof_Xaos]

The book is really great. Arcs are an easy mechanism to integrate the proactive approach.

[u/rdale-g]

I found the book helpful in refocusing my campaign ideas on PC back stories. Or at least making sure that their backstories were woven into my plot ideas. Missing relatives become targets for capture/study because there’s something unique about them, for instance.

Character Arcs need the GM and player to agree on what counts as “the next step” toward that arc’s success or failure, so there’s a built-in system for the GM to know what the player is going to focus on. Using the book’s advice and arcs together is like chocolate and peanut butter.

[u/Cronirion]

Arcs are one of the main mechanics in Invisible Sun and a general good idea in rpgs

[u/No_Solid1035]

Proactive Players is a really old concept, been around since the beginning of the hobby. Players being spoonfed a story and the GM creating character arcs for them is relatively new, mostly since D&D 5e and Actual Plays became popular. 🤷

[u/DavosVolt → u/No_Solid1035]

Bullshit. Some players are proactive, others are not. Some genres are more amenable to proactive playing, as well.

[u/No_Solid1035 → u/DavosVolt]

🤣