DAY 21 - SIMPLICITY - CHALLENGE - FEAR - MOTIVE
Whoops… totally missed day 20… ehhhh… not going back…
You’re kind of getting raw, stream-of-conciousness, drivel with some of these… sorry… with so much other stuff going on, I don’t really have time to polish them much. Maybe if I actually remembered that this was a thing in august and looked up the prompts BEFORE august happened and started to work on them then or making notes… I don’t know. I’d like to use the prompts to DRAW a picture one year - like Inktober… but none of these have really struck me as something I could come up with .
I like to use the K.I.S.S. principle - KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID. I’ve mentioned this many times over the last week or so of posts - while I used to love details and tables, these days I greatly appreciate a measure of SIMPLICITY in any system I use, that keeps the action/narrative moving along and not getting hung up on details and looking things up. Role-playing, I feel is best when it focuses on the characters being able to tell their story - and, ideally, an interesting one or one that is fun for them.
I guess there are some that would suggest where is the CHALLENGE in making use of practices like “fail-forward” - where critical rolls or key events or clues are not held back by a bad/failed dice roll. Failing said roll just means static is introduced - you do find the thing, open the door, but something happens that makes the mission a bit harder or there will be some sort of consequences down the line.
I like to use devices used in tv and comic and novel and movie storytelling as inspiration - the heroes (player characters) rarely ever DIE, unless it’s central to the plot that they do so - like the characters whole motivation was to do a thing before they die or the character is noble and willing to sacrifice their lives that their side may prevail over the antagonists.
Even TPKs can occur - TVs and movie end with all the characters dying - maybe at the end of the series or show - that can wrap up a campaign or story arc - and possibly be a springboard to a new campaign, The MOTIVATION for the next generation to take up the cause and avenge those who went before them and fell to the ultimate ever. But it shouldn’t be and ignominious death at the had of a band of wandering monsters that happened to get a few good rolls and the characters shocked on a few of their own…
Do RPGs HAVE to be “CHALLENGE”? Some might like that, but I don’t thing they have to. There are plenty other games and activities available to those that want them from video games to crosswords and sudoku to non-coop boardgames and CCGs and competitive miniature games…
For me, at this stage in life, I’d like my RPGs to be about having FUN with friends - or at least like-minded individuals (you could say FUN is my MOTIVE for playing these days?) and NOT come down to how well you were able to design a totally optimized character (or party of characters) within a given game system or come down to succeeding at critical dice rolls or personally being able to figure out the GMs deceptively difficult and convoluted riddle or puzzle that they’ve ensnared you in.
Keep it simple, keep it moving forward, have fun.
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I agree with pretty much everything you wrote here. KISS, Fun, Keep things moving forward, and the whole idea of tv/comics and such and not needing everything to be "to the death". I like games that allow things like miraculous escapes from death, or adding that sort of thing into a game myself. Not necessarily without consequences, but not so much as to bog things down too much either. Like games where if a character is out of the fight they may be captured (leaving open the possibility of a rescue mission or escape mission), or left for dead, or other possibilities. Of course, it's all a matter of taste and what each person finds fun. :)
ReplyDeleteI hear ya! In terms of miniature gaming, I think one of the biggest problems is terminology. In so many miniature games, when a figure is removed from the table, they are referred to as "killed", suggesting that that figure or unit is DEAD, when that wasn't all THAT common of an outcome - far more are injured or otherwise in capacitated. I try to use the term "out of action". The weird thing is games that in the combat rules section refer to people being removed from teh table as killed or dead... but when they bolt on a campaign system - you roll to see what their injuries were!?
DeleteOn game I really like is Force on Force - where combatants are down? or out...? I can't remember the term, but they can no longer participate in combat - and aren't even removed from the table they just lie there until someone checks them and, odds are, they've been injured and will need a casevac. But you can't just leave them, someone has to stay with them - sometimes if a medic is the one that checks them, if their injuries are very minor they can be patched up on the spot and returned to play.
I like Neil Thomas' 1 Hour Wargames - because it dispenses with moral - you just roll for losses... those losses could be dead... or injured... or fled the battlefield in terror... or they just stopped particilating and possibly escorted injured to the rear - could be anything, the only thing that matters is they are effectively out of action.
I like that the new kill team has dispensed with morale rules - it is a short, violent encounter between two small forces. I'm not sure what the terminology they use is, not having read the actual book yet, but figures removed from the table, regardless of whether it was due to shooting or close combat, don't have to be "dead" they could have been injured or fled or whatever. You made a shooting attack, they are no longer participatin gin this battle was it because they took a bullet in the head and ARE actually dead... did it go through their leg and made it so they can't walk any more and are having to crawl out of the action, or did it whizz by just a little TOO close they lost their nerve and bolted - unclear, have to find out at the end of the game when you roll for "survival" or whatever to determine the outcome.