Stories, Rules, and the Game
Where Do We Go from Here?
I read and reviewed my old posts. Strange experience, some pride, some cringe, but they’re all mine.
There’s a clarity that comes after you read something you wrote a while ago.
So here are my takeaways:
I want to create the game I want to play, and I want to write the game that I want to read.
There is a tension between the two, but these are not mutually exclusive goals. A great example is Ultraviolet Grasslands by Luka Rejec. My favorite part of that game focuses on the locations, encounters, and characters, but it is not a standard RPG text that lists all the NPCs, places, and problems, that you have to study as a GM in order to run it. Luka uses tables with imaginative entries (part of the technique he calls “anti-canon”) to suggest encounters and problems to the GM. Another great example is the work of Kevin Crawford, who also uses tables to prompt the GM to create their own setting, or to detail it even if he has defined part of it. I was focusing too much on the process, and some of what I wrote was dry, and I knew it, because it was difficult to write.
The game I want to play is a campaign of 6-20 sessions played over a few months to a year.
I want to write two types of games: Settings and scenarios. The settings would be set up as “anti-canon,” with an overview of the setting, some established facts, but, mostly, creative, descriptive tables whose items cannot all be true. Again, Ultraviolet Grasslands is an inspiration in this. The scenarios would be written more like Call of Cthulhu scenarios: The bad guys are doing something on a timeline, and if you do nothing, they win.
The Amazing! Warehouse will be a setting, and Godkillers, already written like a Call of Cthulhu scenario, will be expanded and revised in a second edition.
About the rules…I was too infatuated with diceless play. Dice make things easier, so I’m going back to dice. I am not sure which system I will use. I like a lot about the Cypher system from Monte Cook Games. Focusing on descriptions as part of character generation is cool. I like the focus on “cyphers” — one-use items. But there an awful lot of extra stuff in that rules set. How much can I cut? I also like Kevin Crawford’s combination of old D&D rules, Traveler-type skills, modern D&D feats, and a couple unique additions of his own. But he has some extra rules too.
Whichever system I use, or if I create my own, I am sure of one rule: When a character would “die",” they change. Death can be that change if the player agrees, but otherwise, the character sticks around, albeit in a changed state. I think I’ll detail that for my next post, because it’s a rule you could use in any game.