I've been thinking long and hard on this question, well before today's posting date.
It's a simple enough question and yet my answer has not only changed several times, it may not mesh with some of my previous answers from questions earlier in the month.
I know what I want for next year but not how to achieve it.
I want what I used to have, what I used to be capable of.
I want a campaign with a good number of players - say 6 to 8 - that explores an open ended, challenging world/setting.
When I say 'explores' what I mean is:
- Players are encouraged to delve into their characters' thoughts, feelings, and backstories
- Their characters are encouraged to interact with and investigate the setting itself
- The PCs are welcome to pursue their own agendas in conjunction with their fellow PCs and the situations presented (the 'Adventures' if you will).
In addition and of paramount importance to me, is the concept that the PCs are not superior to the common folk of the setting to an extreme degree. By this I mean I don't want to run Superheroes or a game in which the PCs are all the best of the best, incredibly capable, action movie star level individuals from the get go.
I'd love - LOVE - to see people start small and build once again. I find myself missing that one old school element of the PCs being relatively ordinary folks in a fantastic world faced with extraordinary situations. A game in which a Farmer might someday slay a Dragon or a run-of-the-mill Starship Mechanic may eventually save the universe.
The campaign ideas I discussed in the Day 16 entry may or may not lend themselves to these ideas easily.
The Orville definitely features the captain and crew of a exploratory starship that aren't the best of the best their fleet has to offer. At the same time, the structure of such a show and setting means PCs are limited in their ability to forge their own path.
A Wild West setting, especially one with just a touch of the supernatural, fits the bill rather nicely. Player Characters would be adventurers living on a dangerous frontier with civilization as they know it and opportunities for wealth and glory just beyond the horizon.
Giant Robots? Well...super fun but not really how I would run that or how that would work with what I am talking about here.
Since Science Fiction remains where my heart truly lies, I'd love to get back to a grand, starfaring, space epic but perhaps not Traveller. I feel like I have visited that universe enough to hold me over for a while.
What are my obstacles in achieving my goal?
First, my groups. Each is different, and all great people and gamers, but they don't really share this outlook on gaming. They want to start awesome and who can blame them? Who doesn't want to be awesome? My pal Dave said (more than once) that if we played more often he wouldn't mind starting off 'smaller' but he doesn't want to have to wait a year before his character is a mover and shaker who kicks ass. Since we tend to play roughly once a month, I get where he's coming from. Kinda.
See, I get tired of our campaigns after a while when we start at a higher power level. Before long I lose interest and it becomes harder to challenge the PCs. OK not really, you can always find ways, but it just seems less satisfying to me. Personally I feel that if we started lower, the campaigns would last longer.
Second, a lot of it is me. I have become too impatient and yet too easy on the players. I've lost some of my touch over the years. I'm very disappointed in myself. I am still a good GM I think, but I used to be great. To run the kind of game I want to run next year, the kind I am describing here, I would need to be great again. I don't know that I know how to get my mojo back.
So in conclusion, what I want next year is the perfect campaign, with the perfect group of players, that i will GM perfectly.
What could go wrong?
AD
Barking Alien
In case you didn't know, August 25th is a very special day for me. It commemorates the first time I ever played Dungeons and Dragons back in 1977, introducing me to the wonderful world of RPGs. I have now been gaming for 41 years. Wow.
Looking ahead to 42 years and beyond...The game that had the biggest impact on me in the last year is definitely Star Trek Adventures by Modiphius Entertainment.
.As someone who has run a great many RPG sessions in the Star Trek universe over the past three decades plus, I pretty know what I want out of a Star Trek Role Playing Game.
When Modiphius' Star Trek RPG was announced I was initially very excited. A new Star Trek game! How awesome! It has been so long (or at least it felt like so long) since there had been an official RPG that the mere fact was was being published was enough to get the juices flowing once again, in spite of my feelings over the dismal J.J. Abrams films.
This new game would ignore that continuity in favor of a Next Generation focus, while covering all the various main canon eras. Hurrah!
I was invited into the playtest and also asked to submit a pitch for a adventure to be included in one of their future products. I was super-jazzed...and then I read the playtest rules. My heart sank as I found the Modiphius game not to my liking. In truth, I found it very difficult to comprehend. It lacked many of the details I would expect a Star Trek game to have, while adding over-complicated rules for some aspects of the game.
Needless to say I lost interest and enthusiasm for the playtest and submitting material. I would stick with the Last Unicorn Game*, still my favorite version of tabletop Star Trek RPGing and one of my favorite games of all time.
Then the oddest thing happened...
Some months after the game was released, my friend Keith, who GMs our Wednesday night Google Hangouts game, decided to give the game a trial run.
He ran several sessions over Hangouts with a handful of players including myself. One fellow had played the game before and when we (both the other players and Keith) ran into a question or a snag, this guy was able to help us out.
Once I'd played the game I suddenly understood many of the mechanics that had confused me in the playtest. I also grasped that this game took a somewhat different approach to Star Trek than its predecessors had. I quickly started liking it, then loving it.
I bought the PDF of the Core Rulebook and gave them game a thorough read. Once I felt I had a solid lock on the system, I converted the Star Trek campaign I was running with Dan's Group - Star Trek: Prosperity - over to Star Trek Adventures with the promise that I would switch back to LUG Star Trek if we didn't like this version better.
As it turned out, Star Trek Adventures was perfect for the group and the campaign. It was amazing how much smoother things ran. Everyone in the group felt Star Trek Adventures' mechanics were a bit simpler and more intuitive. It also has some crunch in all the right places, adding more depth to the combat and action scenes than I expected.
We are still running Star Trek: Prosperity (not in its third year) and Star Trek Adventures is definitely working for us. For a game I initially did not like at all, I am very impressed by how the final product turned out. It really challenged my preconceptions regarding the balance between simplicity and crunch and even how I view my favorite setting in relation to gaming.
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Barking Alien
*Last Unicorn Games' ICON System Star Trek Role Playing Game is still my favorite Star Trek game. Why? Well, it's not so much for the rules but the feel that the rules convey. To put it more clearly, if I want a relaxed, fast paced Star Trek experience I will go with Star Trek Adventures every time. For a more in-depth, heavy role playing, simulation of people living in the Star Trek universe type of game, LUG Star Trek's greater range of options and more detailed mechanics are my preference.
Hmmm.
So many.
Really, it's hard to know where to start.
You'll notice that my answer to the previous question had me listing a dozen or so games that are not D&D, Pathfinder, Numenera, nor any of the more popular generic systems like Fate or Savage Worlds.
It does my heart good to know that Modiphius Entertainment is doing well with things like Tales from the Loop, Star Trek Adventures, and others. I am happy to see so many Kickstarters for really neat RPG concepts get funded, such as Golden Sky Stories' supplement Twilight Tales and Derek Elhmann's Oddity High.
I like RPGs. Lots of RPGs. Lots of RPGs that are different from each other. I've compared it in the past to eating your favorite food three meals a day, every day, on and on and on. I love Sushi and Burritos but I could eat either Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner for the rest of my life.
I want to see more games in general get greater recognition. I want to see blogs other than mine discuss Mekton. I think games for kids like No Thank You Evil and Faery's Tale Deluxe deserve a lot more attention. Who is discussing Masks, Mutants and Masterminds, or Villains and Vigilantes regularly?
Do a Google Search for 'Dungeons and Dragons Blog' and see what you get.
Now do one for Star Trek RPG Blog, Champions Blog, or Pendragon Blog. You'll find some stuff surely, but the number drops considerably.
Bottom line, I think a great many games deserve greater recognition. I think part of the fun of this hobby is trying different games in different genres and seeing what the differences are. It's an amazing thing to be able to spend a year fighting super villains and defeating a cosmic menace and then the next trying to survival a post-apocalyptic wasteland.or on a far off alien planet. See if you can come out on top of a Games of Thrones and then take a break to enjoy the cream pies and anvils of Toon.
So many games deserve a second look. Give a few you haven't looked at before or in a while a chance. Boring old D&D will still be there when you get back.
AD
Barking Alien
Hang on...
By play I'm going to assume you mean Gamemaster.
Sadly, there are very few GMs in my gaming circles interested in and willing to run the games I want to play in and fewer still who run them well.
Now before anyone gets a burr in their boots, I am not saying that there aren't a lot of very talented GMs around my way. In fact I know a few really great ones. Unfortunately for me personally, most of these guys don't have much of an inclination to run the games I wish I could play in. Those that do, well, the execution is kind of hit and miss.
I'd love to play Star Trek as a player again. I love Star Trek, I love running it and I definitely like playing it. Star Wars, oh man, that would also be a ton of fun. Giant Robots! Damn. I haven't played in a Mecha game in so long I barely remember when the last time was.
Ars Magica with a Folklore flair, Faery's Tale Deluxe, Golden Sky Stories, Ghostbusters, Hunter Planet, Men in Black, Paranoia, Gold and Silver Age Superheroes (especially pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths DC Comics), Teenagers from Outer Space, Toon, or even classic Traveller...if I don't run these they don't get ran.
Now I'm depressed.
Which game do I hope to play again?
Anything but the same old thing.
AD
Barking Alien
Are we still on systems? Geez...
Non-dice system don't really appeal to me.
With a few exceptions they almost seem less intuitive and more cumbersome than game mechanics using dice.
It's not that I've never gone diceless but usually when I have I've also gone system-less for the most part. If I'm freewheeling it in some kind of interactive story exercise sense then I'm going to go full improv and not worry about rules. Of course, that isn't really playing a game is it.
And there in lies the great paradox; I don't want the rules to get in the way of my friends and I telling a cool story but I definitely want there to be rules and dice or else its just anarchy. It's role playing but it isn't really a game.
OK, to answer the question I would say I really like Golden Sky Stories. It works really well even though there isn't a dice system and the mechanics aid in giving it that Studio Ghibli/Hayao Miyazaki feel.
I also really like Castle Falkenstein but to be honest I liked it more for its setting and presentation. I wish it had more traditional mechanics.
I've always wanted to like a dice and playing card combo, such as you see in some indie Wild West games but they rarely work perfectly or get the feel just right.
AD
Barking Alien
