11.16.05
Last nights game took on a cerebral tone. We picked up with a short recap of what had happened the week before (in the last few moments of the game), and immediately went about wrapping up the cliffhanger. Null who has broken away from the pack to dominate the game, was hanging in the air, falling into the unknown. Tsubo, was doing her best to avoid the same faith, and “Sam Jackson” was pondering his options. Having found their objective, the players were now being pitted against a complicated and dangerous trap, which included the floor collapsing. And, before they even had time to recover from that the trap was not fully sprung. As three rail cars came “Michael Baying” through a wall, tumbling and flipping over, and towards them.
The group survived again in Null’s lead, but with a hint of team about them. And while last week we talked about maintaining the reality of your game. This week and next I hope to talk about teamwork.
Let’s go back to Dungeons and Dragons again. You got a LOTR formula going on. Take a bunch of unique talent people and put them together to take on some challenge, hope they compliment each other. A thief can steal and look for traps, he’s like having your mine dectetor/burglar/hacker around. A Bowman can do ranged strikes, they can not only reach out and touch someone, but they can do it fairly quietly, and fast. Is your team beating a hasty retreat and trying to score a ride? Let the Bowman cover you. Do you have to take out that guard on the rooftop, but you need him to fall to his death onto a balcony, not four stories down and in the bushes? Call your bowman. Who is going to get into the melee and really soak up the hand to hand? Well your swordsman, or Paladin may lead that strike, but you will likely all participate in it, and who is the great equalizer, sometimes the most powerful member of a group? The Mage (or Psychic).
A team does not comprise a group of people who all suck each others dicks and cuddle afterwards. A good team brings their A game, develops a good sense of Groupspeak, and they eventually learn to coordinate things well. Keep the weakest member safe, the strongest members become battering rams, and the surgical members “helicopter” –proverbially speaking- around the combat, guarding the rear,distance fighting, and helping to coordinate things.
Do you hear me Tsubo? Playing to the reserve is a role. If you’re at the back of the bus being quiet and see the monster and don’t say shit, you aint worth a damn. But if you are covering the rear eh, you become an asset. So many reasons why your character plays well at the rear, but you gotta turn weaknesses into assets to the story, it’s possible but has to be thought out.
And, Sam Jackson is your character telepathic? If not we should talk eh.
11.09.05
I wrote this for last weeks game but never got a chance to post it….
Last night’s gaming went pretty well. We kicked off earlier then usual, though somehow it still felt like it took us an hour and a half to get going. T Dog was ripping to go. Luke was a bit mum, but in a better position to start than last week, and Sam Jackson kept running me around the house looking for shit for him.
No sooner do I sit down and Luke is like “I don’t have any dice either….”, wtf? We get Luke some dice and then we worked on getting started.
I can definitely say that no matter what game you play your beginnings are always the same. You have to get the group together, and this is a labor. Each player has their own goals, and then they have the goals of their character, and integrity is the first goal. It just so happens that players always play characters who take no shit, but they of course have a wheelbarrows worth to dish out.
We did pretty good. I had skipped the “You meet in a bar” arc, and went straight for “A disembodied voice commands you to fight evil” approach. Thankfully the group didn’t ignore that suggestion and waste the game tine dissolving into arguments about why they should dissent. So much time can be devoted to the each character wanting to set up the foundation for their legacy, and their need to get in character (the way they want to), that some potentially good games never get past that all too real conflict of bringing people together.
Our third game was all about the dungeon crawl. Equipment is necessary for survival. Yesterday’s selection of gear came from a pawn shop. So there were ample weapons and surplus crap to pick from. And when the team was offered stuff a light bulb went off over their heads, and they just started grabbing shit. Sam Jackson acquired the least amount of stuff, which was a great version of refrain or chutzpah, but that makes a game interesting. Luke and T Dog went to town and got real http://www.bananatoys.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=B&Product_Code=NTCasey" target="new"> TMNT “Casey” with their selections.The characters spent sometime coping with their anxiety and then they started to outfit themselves with weapons and supplies. I played ”Q”. to help them out. And it gave me the opportunity to apply realistic convention to a make believe game, and let me tell you bub, its harder then it sounds.
The players want to have stuff and be able to do things, and when you constrain them with gravity and realism they balk, but that’s just cause most players err on the side of their character. And it’ my job to keep the special effects and cartoon physics in line with what works for the story. Some stories have no perspective on the real, and they lose a certain anchor towards fueling the imagination. Like in Dungeons and Dragons (which we are not playing) you very quickly have to deal with the reality of your booty. If you find a lot of silver and copper pieces, you drag them around till you find gold. You drag the gold till you find jewels, eventually, your characters stop caring about the fiscal value of monetary things, cause eventually they get the holy ghost and inevitably the game becomes a quest. If you didn’t deal with the reality of that weight, the characters would just fight and live with bags of coined money tied around their backs, convinced they could carry it all around.
A good role playing experience can only be compared to watching a good movie. Exaggerated violence, cinematic action, and pitting your wits against an adversary, or problem, can be a pretty powerful medium What’s so interesting about roleplaying games is that they can feel real, even be mundane, and then can get all Die Hard 3 on you. In a game your character can take a beating that employs http://soap.chattablogs.com/archives/flash/tetka.swf " target="new">ragdoll physics and then survive it. Applying levels of reality to a fantastical game can work to raise the energy and suspense. When your character can do anything they get bored. If you constrain them and watch them succeed over true adversity that can be fun.
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