Sunday 1 November 2009

Moving this site

I am going to move this site to one of my own. The problem is that the government of the country I live in does not like Blogspot and so it is usually blocked. Sometimes I can get through, but not reliably enough to warrant staying here. I will try and make another post to mention my new site when I get it running and can get through again.

Saturday 5 September 2009

Narrative Responsibility

Seeing as how I seem to have found a way to use blogspot despite the wobbly giant's best efforts to stop me, I will use it while it is available.

Somewhere on a disk that I haven't found since the move I started writing a post about where the responsibility for developing the narrative in a role playing game lies. Seeing as how I can't find it I will deliver the essence now and maybe add the details later.

Most games squarely hand narrative responsibility to the GM/narrator who in many cases is almost solely responsible for what happens as the story unfolds. Sure, the players (through their PCs) affect the story and can to a degree determine the outcome of individual situations, but it is really the GM that decides the direction of the story as a whole. This is not necessarily a problem as someone has to have a vision of where things are going, but if the GM has also done all the world creation (or taken it from a book) then where do the players have input?

I want to move away from supreme GM control to a more collaborative narrative building experience. I want the players to do more than just tell me about their character background at the start of the game. I want them to tell me about important people in the world. I want them to come up with influential organisations, famed artifacts and great legends that can ll be part of the game.

In game, while I will still hold the reins, I want the players to be having more input than just directing their characters. I want them to describe things that are important to them or their character. If a player is playing a holy knight on a quest, then when they reach the city he (the player) describes the church, inventing details as necessary. In character he can also tell us about the cardinal as the characters are on their way, giving me (the GM) clues to play the Cardinal when the group meets him.

That's it for now. I am going to expect my players in future to have more invested in the game than just a character. Is this reasonable? Well I know it is, but I am really just asking for opinions. Derek's Balance of Powers game (done with Mutants and Masterminds) had lots of these elements. I was just a player, but I invented the main antagonist for the whole first story arc. I felt very connected to the game.

Wednesday 2 September 2009

Saffron Play Thread

You have been examining an ancient masterwork that has come into interpol's possession. For two days you have been pouring over it trying to discover if it is real or an almost perfect fake. The job is frustrating because interpol want results fast and at this point you think it will be days before you can be sure, unless you perform a procedure that is potentially damaging...damaging only on a scale that an expert would ever notice, but still damage.
It has been a long day and you are walking back from the subway station to your house in Woodland Heights when you notice that a guy that got on the train near your work, is walking up the street behind you on the other side of the road.

Sunday 19 July 2009

Legion Play Thread

You have been lurking near the home of a man you suspect to be one of Feng's Lieutenants, hoping to over power him and use him to infiltrate Feng's inner sanctum. The home is in Aquifer Heights, a nice enough neighborhood on the border of the city and the suburbs, comprising mostly of 5 and 6 story buildings. You have drifted into the lobby and found the man's name ( Jimmy Chen) on the list of appartments. He lives on the third floor.

Tuesday 14 July 2009

Go For Sound

I ordered a few M&M books from Amazon and yesterday got an email saying they were shipping from the US rather than the UK and that the delievry time would be 2 more weeks, which meant that if they shipped the package when they sent the email it would arrive 2 days before we leave for China. If they wait a couple of days however...

Surprise surprise, a package just arrived with the Book of Magic and Instant Super heroes for M&M. The main rulebook (which I don't own a copy of) is the one being sourced from the US.

I am currently getting into the play by post happening in the thread below. I am also waiting for a few replies from other people to start off their play threads. I am still happy to accept other ideas and start new play threads as well. I would even be happy to let other people run play threads here.

So if you have a play thread it will slide down the list, but it will still be active, even if it has been archived.

Thursday 18 June 2009

Nemesis Play Thread 1

You set the centrifuge spinning with the vial containing the drug called Demon Blood to prep a solution for analysis and head on over to Brewers Hill. It is a cool evening, overcast and windy and you reach the precinct house just as the last of the red is fading from the sunset. The desk officer lets you through and offers you a coffee from the machine behind the desk.

Wednesday 3 June 2009

The Day After Ragnarok

This is a Savage Worlds game and it looks very interesting.

Tuesday 2 June 2009

Mary Sue experience

I posted this on the arrpeegeedotnet forums in the "Best and Worst Mary Sue Characters Run By GMs" thread. I post it here because otherwise all I will do is complain.

The worst one for me was with a GM (called John) who lived on the same street as me. We had taken to playing Role master set in Middle Earth, because the GM was totally obsessed with all of Tolkien's books. The game started out quite well, as sometimes he ran really good games, but in the second session he introduced us to an elf that was to travel with us. The elf, he told us was a chance for him to have a character in the game, because at the time there was nobody else (I was taking a few months off running games) running a game.

The first fight we got into we realised that the elf was just way to powerful for us as he totally destroyed our opponents. We didn't say much about it though because we hoped it would be a brief interruption and there was also no other game available. Over the course of the session the fights got tougher and tougher until we were really on the periphery watching the GM play with himself*. He still kept asking us what we would do on our turn and we still kept doing stuff that was largely ineffectual.

I managed to end it all by bringing up the problem in character...well kind of in character. We were in a massive fight, but not really being very successful. The GM's character was fighting a pair of trolls, while we attempted to help by being swatted aside by them and getting under their feet. On my turn I got some parchment, string and ink out of my bag. Next turn I wrote the name of the GMs' character in really big letters on the parchment. On my next turn I found a stout stick and with the string, attached the parchment to the the stick like a flag. On my last turn, which was the last turn of the game, I ran around behind the GM's character waving the flag and cheering for him.

The GM put his dice in his bag, collected his books and papers and left in a huff without a word.

*intended

Sunday 31 May 2009

Play by post

I have decided that I am going to run a game using this blog as the forum. It is going to be a street level, supers game set in a not too distant future earth city. Street level means that while you will be super powered compared to a regular person, you do not have the big flashy powers you might see in an X-Men or Justice League comic.

I would like you to fully flesh out the character's personality and motivations. It is good to know why he became a costumed vigilante and what drives him to keep at it, but I'd also like to know what his beliefs and opinions are in general. What does he think of the youth today? What does he think of the war on terror? What does he do for fun? Who are the most important people in his life

The world has supers in it, but they are uncommon. About 1 in every 10000 people has some form of super power, with less than 10% of those having the real big powers like flight, energy blasts or bullet resistance. Powers come from all manner of sources: random flukes of genetics, magical items, exposure to chemicals, alien experimentation, advanced science, extreme physical training or mystic study, plus many others.

One group of Powerful heroes is called the Watch. Their leader Stalwart seems almost indestructible, flies as fast as a fighter plane and once caught a crashing airliner and carried it safely down to a vacant block. The other members seem to be at the same level of power as him; there is a Telepath called Telos and a Speedster called Slipstream as well as a few others that are not as famous.

The watch has fought an alien invasion as well as three powerful groups of super powered villains this year alone, but they seem to busy to do anything about the rising gang crime on the streets below them. That's where you come in.

I am going to have some concepts driving the narratives and they are loyalty/betrayal and salvation. Think about how those will affect the character you build.

Lastly, if a few people get on board, I want you to make your characters as an established super team, so keep that in mind as well. I hope some people will go for it. If you need more to work with let me know. We can discuss ideas here or you can email me if you want clarification. It might be fun and all you will need to do is check in a few times a week to keep the narrative moving.





I have used the masculine pronoun here for two reasons:
1. he/she looks cumbersome
2. I am a 'he', so it is how I think.

Wednesday 27 May 2009

Encouraging a different kind of roleplaying

I wonder what the best way to get people to play their character is. What I mean is that so often gamers just play themselves with a sword and shield, rather than developing personality and motivations for the character. I find myself doing this as well. Unless I spend the time to really make up the character of my character, I am just playing an archetype with my own personality.

I fell into this trap again this week. Derek starts his third story arc on Saturday, for the Supers game that we have been playing on and off since late 2005. I made up a cool wizard and when we sat down to play test him last night in a solo game, I realised that a cool wizard was all he was. Sure, I had thought about his background and had a pretty good idea of where he learned magic, but apart from his desire to stem the inevitable demon invasion, I had no idea what drove him or even who he was.

Luckily we had that session last night, because otherwise I would have been stumbling around Saturday's game not knowing how to be in character. I still haven't worked it all out yet, but I at least now know that I have to work it out. Personality.

Being in character means more than putting on an accent and speaking like you are in an Elizabethan drama*. It means actually trying to put yourself in the shoes of the character you have created and this is something that a lot of gamers do in a lackluster kind of way. The best examples of this often come from religious characters.

The player creates a priest of the god of justice and thinks about how to play the character and then homes in on the religious side. Easy. A very straightforward style now comes from that player, as all his character’s decisions are based on the will of the god of justice. All of his interactions with the other characters are scornful of their perceived failings and his choices are easy because they are predetermined. This is all fine if you are prepared to settle for predictable, lackluster play.

The priest I have described is only remotely real. While I’m sure there are historical instances of the man devoted wholly to his god, there are many times that number that are devoted to their god while retaining some semblance of personality. Interesting characters have quirks and flaws. Rounded characters have desires and prejudices. The priest of the god of justice I described has none of these things because the player took the easy road when figuring out how to play him.

From now I am going to expect my players to fully develop their character before playing. I want to know about their quirks, what frustrates them, what they hope for, what they fear and a host of other things that will flesh out a character so that it is more than an office worker** in chainmail.

*unless you are in an Elizabethan drama.

** that is not aimed at anyone.

Monday 25 May 2009

If I believe in the theory of game styles...

does that mean that people bringing different styles of play to the table will have expectations that don't match? If expectations don't match then I would expect that problems could occur. Maybe people wouldn't get into it if the style was wrong. I thought maybe I might list the people I have gamed with and then what style I would assign them.

Gamist - Goal orientated
Narrativist - Story focussed
Simulationist - Realism focussed

I decided to go with what was floating around rather than use the names I invented (The 3 Rs) because I had another look and they were basically the same.

Monday 18 May 2009

What is gaming style?

Style is a word in the English language. There are different interpretations of many words and this I think may be one such word. So what does style mean when applied to a pen and paper role playing game? I have my ideas, but I won't chime in and bias anyone else. The person who prompted me to start this had better bloody get involved here. I suppose I am implying a threat there.

Sunday 17 May 2009

Morden Is Saved By Mysterious Strangers

Games day was a success. Most of the players enjoyed themselves (one was bored and played his DS) and they managed to save the town. The game itself needs some more tweaks, but I might see if I can make the needed changes and hang onto it to use it again.

The party investigates the barracks:

IMG_1387

Fighting orcs in the streets:

IMG_1394

Friday 15 May 2009

The town of Morden

Something mysterious is happening and the Patriarch of Sullus that went to investigate has disappeared.

IMG_1381

Luckily a group of adventurers is about to arrive, otherwise the locals would surely be doomed.

Tuesday 12 May 2009

Games day on Sunday

On Sunday I am running an all day (10am-5pm) game to end the year for the school gaming club. I am expecting between 7 to 10 high school students from both parts of the club to attend and I'm sure they will bring a lot of tempting junk food.

I have decided to go with a Home Brewed Table Top Fantasy Role Playing Game or a HBTTFRPG. Last night I was testing the system on the kitchen table with Derek and found a few gaping flaws with my rules set. So tonight I am going to patch it up and send it back out against Derek on Thursday or Friday and see if it floats this time.

I am quite happy with it overall and am looking forward to the game with the kids.

Wednesday 6 May 2009

What specific genre would you love to play?

I was thinking about what kind of game would I like to run for the next group I game with and of course that really depends on how many players there are and (possibly) what they want to play. I say possibly there because if there are lots of players available I can build a select group that want to play the game I want to run. At the moment I think I would like to run on of two specific* genres:

1. Street level Super Heroes in an Iron Age style. What does that mean for me?
The Super heroes themselves have no powers or at best powers that are fairly minor. Maybe they are stronger or faster than normal or even have powers like faster healing, low level telepathy or enhanced senses. There is definitely no flying, energy blasting or bullet resisting.
The stories are gritty and dark with no clear distinction between good and evil. Motivations are often more personal and heroes often share traits in common with villains.

2. Space Opera with Hard Science leanings. What does that mean for me?
There are powerful factions (could be governments or races or both) vying with each other for supremacy in a galaxy teaming with alien mysteries and super advanced technologies. Society has evolved but is recognizable in some areas, while totally different in others. Science is bent to allow the game to take place on planets in different planetary systems (faster than light travel), but it is not broken in the style of Star Wars or Star Trek; Aliens are not all humanoid English speakers and ships in space don't maneuver like aeroplanes.

While thinking about this, I wondered what I would really like to play. I have enjoyed lots of different genres, but would have to say that the one I would like to play the most would be a space opera like my second example.

What would you love to play?


*I say 'specific' because I want more than just 'Supers' or 'Science Fiction'.

Wednesday 29 April 2009

Dungeons and Dragons edition changes

I was wondering why 3.0 changed to 3.5. Was it a marketing thing? Was it because they wanted to power up some things and power down others? Was it something else? I remember reading something about balance issues, but I can't remember. Does someone know?

It might help me understand why I abandoned 3.5 after a while.

Saturday 25 April 2009

Game options for people stuck in 3.5

If (like many people) you refuse to go to 4E D&D, but look at what is available for 3.5 and see a logical endpoint because there is no support for it anymore the you can always try Pathfinder

Not that I am going to play it, but I downloaded the free beta copy (over 400 pages of goodies) and already found a few ideas to adapt to my other games.

Thursday 23 April 2009

Role Playing games and so on

I am starting this blog to chronicle my experiences with and thoughts on Pen and Paper Role Playing Games or RPGs* and even though I have another gaming blog, I have found that it was being taken over by Table Top Wargames.

What games am I involved with?
Currently I am running a fantasy game for the 9th to 12th graders at my school. There are seven kids in the group and they have really been enjoying hunting down an ancient evil that had found its way back to earth. They recently manage to kill it, or at least they thought they had; they just found out its not dead. For the system I used Mutants and Masterminds and it worked very well.

I am leaving the country for a new job in July, so I have been giving the kids a chance to run games to get used to it so that someone can take my place next year and so soon one of them is going to do a Super hero game using Necessary Evil, one of the world books from Savage Worlds. I'm looking forward to it because it is fun to play alongside the kids and I love Supers games.

I am running a fantasy game for a bunch of my mates using the Song of Ice and Fire Role Playing Game or SIFRP. It took a bit of adapting to get it to work (I had to invent a system for magic) but the mechanics of the system work well and diminish that all too common moment where the character falls flat in an area he is a specialist in because the player rolled badly.
My group are currently hunting a Wizard and had tracked him to a trading town (where he had become quite influential) and confronted him. That was where last session ended; well Alex did kick the door in as Mike was climbing one of the walls as Derek looked on aghast.

Lastly, Derek has been running a Supers game that has been an on and off thing for years. 'Off' because he did spend a year and a half mostly living in the USA and we also had a complete change of players at one point; I am the only original player from 2005. Colin moved back to the States and Paul moved to Switzerland. At the moment I am finishing off my new character, as my last character died saving the world at the end of the last story arc.

In other recent RPG developments i bought the player's guide to Hellfrost today and am very impressed with it. I would love to run it or play in it and I can just imagine a person in Sydney who it would suit right down to the ground. Derek had a look at it today and made appreciative noises as he flipped through it.

*I make that clear so I can link back to it when a certain person decides to make jokes about Rocket Propelled Grenades.