Ravenous Role Playing

Back in the early 1990s, I had a couple of roommates, and one of them went back to California for a six week visit with his old friends and family. My other roommate and I decided to create our own role playing game and see what we could come up with while the other was out of town. We came up with some basic rules, basic stats, some spells many skills, and all of the other parts that go into making a role playing game. We thought we had done quite well, but we never had a chance to playtest it until the missing roommate came back into town.

We we broke out the notepads, pencils and dice we found quite a few flaws with the system. The list is really too long to go into here, but I’ll share the most hilarious one with you.

Some setup: There are hit locations in the system, and we decided that each location would have its own hit points to reflect the fact that an arm could be disabled before a person goes down for the count. We also decided that we didn’t want people to track overall HP along with locational HP. It just seemed too cumbersome. All good thoughts, but the end-result was, well, flawed. Any experienced gamer out there will see the problems right away, but we were too close to the project to notice.

The end result was a system in which a character could have their arms and legs cut off without suffering any form of death. Only if the torso or head were destroyed could someone die. Yeah. Not quite right. We didn’t give up, though. We went back to the drawing board and revamped the system to keep the hit locations, but make HP work more logically. In the end, we came up with a decent system that we actually played for about a year.

I’ve recently revisited the system on my own and totally rewritten it with a new method of approaching the dice rolls. I’ve put lots of time and math into the game to make sure it’s fair and balanced, and I think it’s a good one. I hope to get my current group into the game in the near future to see what they think of it.

Losing Control

Mike makes some great points in his post about rules, rulings, control of the situation and what it takes to have a little fun at the table. It’s hard to summarize what he said without repeating his words, so I’ll just encourage you to visit Sly Flourish and check it out.

Idea Paralysis

The post over at The Spirits of Eden asks a great question, “How do you come up with your next campaign idea?” The post made me consider how I come up with my campaign ideas, and some of the comments to the very short post are worthy of checking out as well.

Dungeon Design 101

Daniel LeBlanc’s guest post over at Dungeon Mastering has a great system for coming up with dungeons and their designs. Yes, there are some random elements in there, but I’m OK with that. Usually, I have a point to each dungeon, and I design around that point, but I leave out the “extras” that could make things just that much more fun. This method will help introduce those extra elements and make things more fun for my players.

Worth More Than Gold

I’ve really never been a huge fan of the CP/SP/EP/GP/PP method of doing banking in D&D. I accept it because it’s an easy system. There are many better systems out there that more accurately reflect history and modern times. I won’t beat you over the head with the details here since the crew from The Bone Scroll has already done such a great job explaining different methods of doing coins.

The Evolution of the Dungeon Encounter

Wimwick’s opening “scene’ to this blog post made me laugh so hard my co-workers thought I had lost what little of my mind I have left. Even if you only read the italicized opening, do yourself a favor and head over to see what is said about designing better dungeon encounters.

I watched Zombieland on Monday night, and it really inspired me to run a game in that setting. I know that many people would see the iconic pose captures as a graphic novel snippet, but when I saw the various encounters the characters went through, I found them to be more role playing related than graphic novel related. The four main characters were definitely a role playing group drawn together by common goals, and they were so distinct and different that I could see individual influences on their creation, just like PCs in a typical role playing game.

There were a plethora of skills and backgrounds used in the movie. Most of the skill checks seemed to be combat related, which fit wonderfully with a role playing session. While we all enjoy making a group, interacting with NPCs (go Bill Murray!) and having those simple conversations while on long trips, most role playing sessions seem to revolve around the next fight. In the movie’s case, the fights were wonderfully done, and I wonder if there’s going to be a sequel to the movie. It was just done so perfectly that I could see a second one coming about in the near future.

Now, the quandary I have is this one: What system to use? I really don’t like d20. I never have. Not enough skills to pick from. D&D 4e is obviously out without massive modifications and at that point, you may as well make your own system. This leaves some modern and/or generic systems to use. I could see Top Secret S/I as a possible game system. GURPS and Hero are in the mix as well. I could even see MechWarrior being used, but retrofitted to make it work in a modern world. Twilight 2000 anyone? That would most certainly fit, I think.

What about the folks out there? Gaming system recommendations for Zombieland?

PS: I know this isn’t a true adventure hook, but I was so, well, hooked by the movie that it seemed to fit for a post along these lines. If you’re curious about the plot, scenes and world of the movie, I highly recommend going to see it. Just keep the children away from it. It’s way to gory, gritty, realistic and adult for the wee ones.

While running a Vampire: Dark Ages game many years ago, the group came across a mentally, emotionally and physically broken human child. The child had been part of a Baali conversion cult, but ended up being rejected as too weak to be claimed as a vampire. The boy became a vital clue to the group for tracking down the Baali culties and vampires. The characters managed to get the boy to talk and talk he did! I became so close to the boy’s psyche and brokenness in my preparations that when it came time to role play out the child’s anguish, pain, warped mentality and horrors he had seen and experienced that I actually broke down and cried while screaming in a high-pitched voice like the child did. My intent was to not get that far into character, but it just felt so natural to me that it flowed well. (Perhaps that says a little too much about me, eh?)

The players around the table actually got so concerned for me that they broke character and asked me if I was doing OK and used my real name in the process. It took me a few moments, but I snapped out of the broken and battered head of the boy and managed to compose myself. It was at that point that the players realized how powerful and evil the Baali were. They prepared extra carefully and applied additional caution when attacking the evil cultists on their home turf. Because of my method acting, I feel they were much better prepared for the encounters and, therefore, had a greater level of success against the Bad Guys than they would have otherwise.

It was also a great deal of fun to scare the bajeezus out of the players sitting around the table.

I apologize for missing the Tales from the Table and Adventure Hooks for the past couple of weeks. Life has seriously caught up to me, and I’ll honestly say that this blog is the lowest of all of my priorities. I hope that things will lighten up in the near future to allow me to return to my regular posting duties here.

Without any further delay, here’s my Friday Five for this week:

6 D&D Convention Tips for Players
6 D&D Convention Tips for DMs

These two links go together because, well, they just do. Here are 12 great tips (6 per side of the GM screen) on how to be a better player/GM at a convention. Honestly, I think all of these tips apply to all RPG situations, not just the helter-skelter-paced gaming sessions you find at conventions.

Couple of neat finds…

NewbieDM was kind enough to find some precious gems on the ‘Net for all of us to use, and I felt like they should game more exposure through linking to them. Go check his site for the neatness that he found.

World Building 101: Here There be Dragons…

I love the series of articles about world building that D20 Source has been publishing and I hope they continue. This one is about mapping and the logistics involved in creating quality maps. I’m not talking about artistic ability, using a CAD-based piece of software or a hex-mapper. I’m talking about how to logically place things next to each other and in relation to one another. No mountain (other than maybe a magically created one) stands alone and is there just because it is. There are always reasons for mountains to exist, and those reasons usually change the surrounding terrain for hundreds of miles.

Ashes to Ashes, Death to Life

Scott Wallace has some interesting thoughts on bringing characters back to life and how it’s usually done in a fantasy setting. I found the read quite enjoyable and I think you will to. Go check it out.

What? You want to Sleep here?

As a player, I have to say that it’s been really, really rare that I’ve wanted to build a campsite in the middle of a dungeon. I’m always the advocate of a careful retreat to a safer place in order to setup camp and get some much needed rest for my character. Of course, not everyone follows this rule, and make camp in some of the strangest (and maybe even dumbest) places. Check out what ChattyDM has to say on how to mess with players that pick poor spots to camp out and get their beauty rest.

Hack and Slash vs. Titanic Struggles, or the Goblin Massacre and Giant Slaying Approaches

I love this post because it breaks down combat into fighting lots of little guys (goblin massacre) or one large, tough opponent (giant slaying.) The maxims outlined in this post are so very true to almost every RPG combat session. It’s challenged me to change the way I approach setting up encounters to see if I can come up with some alternate and more exciting methods for throwing Bad Guys at the PCs.

World Building 101: Organizing your Organizations

Where would people be if they had no place to hang out and no one out there with common interests to hang out with? Probably at home watching American Idol. Organizations are the heart and soul of every great nation, and without them the world would be very flat and boring. Use the knowledge freely given by Brandan over at d20 Source and make your worlds a more lively place!

Uniqueizing Your Campaign

I’ve rarely liked it when a GM uses goblin stats and changes the name of the monster to “Snarglepuffs” or something like that. I link to this post, so that I may give my dissenting opinion. There are classic tropes in fantasy, science fiction, horror and every other genre. When you use a common item and decide to make it “unique” by giving it a strange name, you’re really doing nothing more than lying to your players about what they are facing. Yes, I know that they shouldn’t be meta gaming, but there are other, and better, ways to fix meta gaming problems other than to lie to your players and give them false names for the monsters. If you’re really so desperate for uniqueness in your game, then start making new monsters that you can give your own names to. This is much more preferable to renaming a standard goblin to something else.

The Almighty Player

Muahahaha… Every rookie GM thinks they are in control of the game, but they rarely realize (until it’s too late) that the players are really the ones that are in control of where the game goes. I had a GM for a single session that tried to railroad the entire group into a castle to force us to fight our way out. He was so heavy handed about it, that I fled to the sewers and hid from the goblin invasion there. He was so miffed that I found a way out that he simply declared, “You catch a disease in the sewers and die a few hours later before you can do anything else.” I shrugged, packed my dice, went home and never went back to that particular game. He thought he had taken my vast control of the game away from me and was shocked when I refused to return next week with a new character. Another anecdote along these lines. We talked Nat into running a game once, and she ran a fine game for a few sessions. Then she suddenly stopped and said she was amazed at how little control a GM really has and she didn’t like it at all. GM’ing isn’t for everyone (but I still asset that everyone should do it at least once.)

The circus has come to town along with all of its animals, clowns, jugglers, acrobats and other performers. Unfortunately for the town several of the more dangerous animals have escaped from captivity and are now roaming the town. The ringmaster of the circus hires the PCs to gather the animals and return them to their cages. Of course, the circus wants them back alive. Meanwhile, the town has put a bounty out on the animals that are wreaking havoc in the town and wants them dead. The PCs are in a race against others to capture the critters before they are slain.

Warstories: The imploding campaign

NewbieDM poses some great questions and thoughts about what causes campaigns to implode and self destruct. He has lots of great points in his post, and I suggest all DMs and players read his post in an effort to keep their current campaign from imploding… or detecting that it’s about to and it’s time to walk away from the game and start a new one. I know that I’d rather lose a current campaign over losing my current gaming group. The self destruction of a campaign can quickly lead to the same thing happening for a group.

No More Nation Building?

Ah, the days of PCs building their own nations, merchant guilds, church hierarchies and such seem to be long over. That’s too bad. For me, it always brought on a whole new level of challenges when my powerful warrior that could slay even the mightiest balrog with ease built a castle and took over some lands. Now he couldn’t slay the problematic peasants with disdain. He had to actually listen to their problems and find an amicable solution. Sure, he could slay the peasants, but then his taxes would dry up, and he’d no longer have funds to keep his castle staffed. Then he’d just end up a lonely old man sitting in his stone barricades waiting for the next adventuring party to come along and try to wipe him out. I miss those days. I wonder if there’s  a way to bring that back into modern gaming?

How to avoid developing a campaign that only appeals to you

Chgowiz has five points of advice that he’s freely given to every GM out there to encourage everyone to run a game that all (or most) players will enjoy gaming in. It’s a quick read, and I suggest everyone to take a gander.

World Building 101: Populating your Campaign World

NPCs are the backbone of every campaign. Period. Without NPCs there would not be shopkeepers, adventure hooks, villains to conquer and allies to side with. Brandan over at d20 Source has quite elegantly broken down NPCs into types according to the role they play in the campaign and how the GM should treat those NPCs in his preparation and during play time. I’ve added this link to my bookmarks (as well as highlighting it here) because it’s such great advice.

Oh I’m Sorry, Is It My Turn?

I’m guilty. I’ve done this. I hate doing this. I hate it when my players do this. I tend to blame the players when they lose track of their turn, but honestly, if I am not engaging them in the combat, then it’s mostly my fault. Yax has some great words for GMs and players alike to help them keep combat fun enough for all to enjoy.

Many thanks to Terry Brooks for inspiring today’s adventure hook… and apologies to him if he’s upset that I’ve blatantly stolen from one of his fine novels and adopted the idea for my use.

One of the PCs enters a contest to win a “Magic Kingdom” and has won the grand prize! The entrant decided there was no way to win an actual kingdom of magic, and just wrote it off as an advertising gimmick until a representative of the prize staff arrived with keys to the castle, a deed to the lands and directions on how to get there. The PC then calls up his favorite friends (presumably the other PCs in the game) and takes them on a grand adventure from the mundane world to a world filled with faeries, unicorns, magicians and more!

How will the modern-day men and women of the world handle being exposed to the magical creations of this other land? Do they have magical abilities of their own that are dormant in the mundane world? How will the people of the magical kingdom accept their new king and ruler?

What game system would work best for this hook? GURPS/Hero are the obvious answers. Any others? I may actually take this hook and develop a campaign based on it, but I don’t know if I could talk my players in playing themselves.

Back in high school, I ran a fairly length Top Secret S/I game. The game started out as your typical spies for Orion vs. spies for the W.E.B. and everything moved along quite well until I bought the counter terrorism source book. I don’t remember the title and I’m too lazy to run down to my office to pull it off the shelf. Regardless, it was a great supplement, but it was not a good fit for the current campaign. Well, I didn’t care. I had spent my hard earned money on the book, and I was damn well going to use it.

It lead to the end of the campaign through a TPK (total party kill). All my fault, too.

What happened was the terrorists in the source book were geared towards demolitions, combat and stealth and not much else. The Orion spies were equally potent, if not more so, but they had spread their skill selections out across things like driving, flying, diplomacy, carousing, stealth, B&E, combat and a multitude of other things. While the PCs were very powerful spies, they just didn’t have what it took to take out the Bad Guys that were solely built for killing people.

I’m still very happy to own the book (I actually own every book published for Top Secret S/I), but I wish I had saved it for a different campaign with different characters that were intentionally built to be the combat specialists required to do counter terrorism in the modern age. To the GMs out there, learn from my mistake. Just because you bought a book, you don’t have to whip it out midstream in a campaign and incorporate elements into the current game. Sure, you can do that, but do it with more intelligence than what I used back in my youth.