Sandbox Campaign

I’ve been writing quite a bit on Triumph & Despair this week, most of it hiding on the back burner of my ‘Drafts’ folder waiting to be soon published. An emerging theme has been gelling with the topics I’ve been writing about, and which you dear reader shall soon see. I want to see Star Wars Edge of the Empire played as a sandbox style campaign.

Specifically, I want to develop House Rules and additional resources that allow and encourage Galaxy Masters to create:

• an unbound galaxy that exists independently of the Crew
• have the players 100% free to ignore the ‘plot’
• a constant impetus for exciting exploration
• mysteries within the galaxy that surprise even the GM
• a system of reward and progress that goes beyond XP
• catalysts to create the basis for compelling stories
• relief from being the solely creative player every game session

These qualities can be used already to describe some of my favorite games, such as the Star Control series, FTL, and the West Marches concept. The realization has dawned on me that Triumph & Despair has unwittingly become a great resource and starting point for creating a space-exploration based sandbox roleplaying game campaign, through the use of adventure catalysts in both the Edge of the Empire Alphabet and the Rogue Events series of posts. Keep a look out in the coming days for posts tagged ‘sandbox’, which will focus more narrowly on the basics necessary to realize the greatness of a sandbox style campaign and on ways that we can mitigate the pitfalls and weaknesses of such a game.