Lunchtime Poll #28: Retroactive Continuity
This week’s Lunchtime Poll (which may well be the last, as they don’t appear to be getting much traffic) is inspired by the retcon discussion on the 20×20 Room.
Rather than debate the merits of ret-conning, let’s go for a case study. What’s your most memorable bit of retroactive continuity, good or bad? What, if anything, would you have done differently?
One bit of retcon that turns up for me occasionally is the Dilemma of the Lost Character Sheet. If the character sheet is well and truly gone, the player has two options; scrap the character entirely (not usually a popular option) or recreate the character from scratch (all kinds of potential for abuse). More often than not, I’m inclined to let a player re-create a character, but the new version has to pass my inspection. It seems to be the least objectionable option, and yet somehow, it seems unfair to the other players, who have been responsible and kept track of their important pieces of paper—especially because my games are very character-development-oriented. Unfortunately, I have yet to find a better solution to the Dilemma.
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June 1st, 2005 at 11:19 am
I know I owe the last one, but I think I’m otherwise up to date.
June 1st, 2005 at 7:10 pm
But the last one is supposed to be late!
June 2nd, 2005 at 5:22 pm
Hey, I did this one!
We likes the Lunchtime Polls, we does!
June 3rd, 2005 at 8:27 am
Take copies of each player’s Character Sheets as they come in. That way if theirs goes missing, there’s another copy to be had, and thusly all abuse is avoided.