A Musical Adventure

[thereviewer]

So this has been something that was tossed around a couple of times around the forum and it's honestly something I'm surprised Doctor Who hasn't tried to pull off on TV yet in full; a musical adventure.


I have one that I'm planning now, but I figure anyone can share their ideas here on how they'd run their own musical adventure.


The plot of my adventure involves my PC Character's Time Lady encountering the sadistic Scorchies who are amplifying their powers to force a planet to sing and dance until they literally work themselves to death. The scenario has a variety of parodies of musical movie/show songs featured including songs from:

Rock of Ages (my all-time favorite Broadway show and yes, I do like the movie and hold no shame whatsoever)

Moulin Rouge

Hamilton

West Side Story

Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark

Beauty and the Beast

The Return of Captain Invincible

Rocky Horror Picture Show

The Music Man

The Book of Mormon

The Blues Brothers

Just to  name a few.

Share any musical adventures you might've run or any ideas you'd have for running one!

[misterharry]

I'm curious how you'll go about this. Is it an idea you've mentioned to your players or are you going to spring it on them? Will they be singing the songs themselves or are you preparing tracks to play at the appropriate time? And will you have an in-universe explanation for the songs?

[thereviewer]

Jul 29, 2018 11:00:27 GMT misterharry said:

I'm curious how you'll go about this. Is it an idea you've mentioned to your players or are you going to spring it on them? Will they be singing the songs themselves or are you preparing tracks to play at the appropriate time? And will you have an in-universe explanation for the songs?

misterharry,


I've discussed with my player about the idea of doing a musical adventure. While she won't sing anything, I'm going to get a list of songs she'd prefer her character to sing that fit into the overall story of the adventure. I will be singing most of the other parts with some background music to help. Basically my plan is to use the same method that was used in the musical comedy drama show Blackpool, where the actors sung with the music being played off-camera. Though I have another friend who's agreed to be the singing voice for my PC's character. 


The driving force behind it being that at this point in our game, my friend will be out of the Time War having used a Chameleon Arch to hide herself until sometime after the Thirteenth Doctor has recovered the TARDIS. My player at this point will have picked up a companion from Modern-Day Earth whose life was falling apart until he met her and she took him across the universe inadvertently making herself more attractive to him (kind of think what happened with Amy at the end of Flesh & Stone). However, when my player tries to bring him back to Earth (as she obviously doesn't want a relationship), her TARDIS gets caught by the Scorchies who end up drawing her to the planet where they've amplified some kind of device to force people to sing and dance until they've literally worked themselves to death (hence the in-universe reason for the songs). Throughout the adventure, my PC and her companion both realize that the companion is worth keeping around with my friend's PC and that all he needs is the girlfriend who was about to dump him which he left behind on Earth after she was used to create a duplicate for a Nestene/Cybermen alliance and survived only for the companion to run off with my friend's PC.

I hope this answers your question. Feel free if you'd like to give any suggestions.

[misterharry]

Even though I'm not a huge fan of musicals, I think a musical adventure is an intriguing prospect. It's just not one I've actually GMed or played in myself - I don't think I've ever had the right group of players confident enough to sing in front of each other. I have to say I love the Scorchies, and they're a great way to set a musical adventure up!

One of the issues you'll need to decide on - and I know you're already aware of this - is what happens during a song - does the story continue, do you allow actions, if so how do you describe what's happening, etc. I'm no expert, so others may have their ideas to share. I can think of a couple of possibilities (and there are probably loads more) and I think you just need to choose what to go for and agree it with your player beforehand.

I'd say you need to set an accepted convention for the songs. One such could be that while a song is taking place, no real action can happen - by real action, I mean anything significant that requires dice rolls or progresses the plot. The song in effect suspends actions while the PCs and NPCs circle around each other, dance or strike poses or whatever, just like in a lot of musicals. In this case, the characters might be trying to do something, but wait until the end of the song before you roll dice and determine the outcome. Personally, this is the one I prefer.

Alternatively, you could allow one action at the end of each verse or two (depending on how long the song is going to be). This allows the story to progress and maintain momentum, but could cause the song to become disjointed. This one is probably easier if you've the song playing in the background rather than you and/or the player singing it.

As I say, there are probably many more ways you could do this. But the important thing is to settle on what will work for you and your player, so you have this established in advance.

[thereviewer]

Jul 30, 2018 15:50:36 GMT misterharry said:

Even though I'm not a huge fan of musicals, I think a musical adventure is an intriguing prospect. It's just not one I've actually GMed or played in myself - I don't think I've ever had the right group of players confident enough to sing in front of each other. I have to say I love the Scorchies, and they're a great way to set a musical adventure up!

One of the issues you'll need to decide on - and I know you're already aware of this - is what happens during a song - does the story continue, do you allow actions, if so how do you describe what's happening, etc. I'm no expert, so others may have their ideas to share. I can think of a couple of possibilities (and there are probably loads more) and I think you just need to choose what to go for and agree it with your player beforehand.

I'd say you need to set an accepted convention for the songs. One such could be that while a song is taking place, no real action can happen - by real action, I mean anything significant that requires dice rolls or progresses the plot. The song in effect suspends actions while the PCs and NPCs circle around each other, dance or strike poses or whatever, just like in a lot of musicals. In this case, the characters might be trying to do something, but wait until the end of the song before you roll dice and determine the outcome. Personally, this is the one I prefer.

Alternatively, you could allow one action at the end of each verse or two (depending on how long the song is going to be). This allows the story to progress and maintain momentum, but could cause the song to become disjointed. This one is probably easier if you've the song playing in the background rather than you and/or the player singing it.

As I say, there are probably many more ways you could do this. But the important thing is to settle on what will work for you and your player, so you have this established in advance.

misterharry,

Thanks for the advice. I think I might have a combination of both versions. I might start with the PC/NPC's just posing out of nowhere for a few of the beginning songs and then once the Scorchie's plans are made clear, I'll allow actions at the end of each verse, mainly because the PC/NPC's won't know what's going on until near the end of what would be Act I. Thanks!

[starkllr]

For advice/inspiration, there are some genre shows that have done musical episodes that you might steal plot ideas or structure from:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - "Once More With Feeling"
The Flash - "Duet"
Star Trek original series novel - "How Much For Just the Planet"
Farscape (not musical episodes, but they totally mess with the format and you could steal from these especially) - "Revenging Angel" and "John Quixote"

[thereviewer]

Oct 8, 2018 15:55:00 GMT starkllr said:

For advice/inspiration, there are some genre shows that have done musical episodes that you might steal plot ideas or structure from:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - "Once More With Feeling"
The Flash - "Duet"
Star Trek original series novel - "How Much For Just the Planet"
Farscape (not musical episodes, but they totally mess with the format and you could steal from these especially) - "Revenging Angel" and "John Quixote"

starkllr ,

I have seen both "Once More With Feeling" and "Duet." Both of which are inspirations for my adventure and share a number of elements from. I also took some elements from Batman: The Brave and the Bold's musical episode; Mayhem of the Music Meister, but I tried to make it an original story about my PC and her soon-to-be companion having had a misunderstanding wherein her companion found himself loving her, despite her not realizing that he had been developing a crush on her. The idea is to make them both learn from the experience. The companion learns he still has a shot with the girl he originally loved who is still on Earth, and my PC learns to give her companion another shot at traveling with her and to try and help him mend his relationship with the girl on Earth.

I have not, however, read "How Much For Just the Planet" or seen Farscape's "Revenging Angel"/"John Quixote." I'll try to check them out when I can.

One other big inspiration I drew from when writing this adventure was the musical comedy/sketch group known as Geekenders who have done parody musicals for Jurassic Park, Back to the Future, and even Portal 2 (even though they never made a Portal 1 The Musical)! Their musical adaptations often parody a wide variety of genres from Disney, to Rocky Horror Picture Show, to The Music Man, to Cabaret, to Next to Normal. I highly recommend looking them up on YouTube and watching their Back to the Future and Portal 2 musicals which are both funny, well preformed, and have witty dialogue. I'll give you an example from the Portal 2 Musical (make sure to watch the one from 2017) when Wheatly goes insane and sings "I'm Here Running the Whole Machine" parodying The Princess and The Frog's "Friends on the Other Side";

WHEATLEY:

Now you, you little three, I don't want to waste my time! You're always in my face! (To Adventure Core) You're bragging makes me furious. (To Fact Core) And most of your facts are spurious!

FACT CORE:

They are ALTERNATIVE!