"Dear JB" Mailbag #33

[Dear JB #32 is still sitting on the draft board and might remain there forever...it was dumb, my response (only half penned) is sprawling, meandering, and...probably...dumb as well, the result of writing in the middle of the night after a couple of gin & tonics. In the meantime, I actually received an email from a reader asking for some JB advice...he gets the #33 stamp]

Dear JB,

As a referee, I'm always trying to improve my game, but I feel as though I've hit a plateau and don't see a clear path to improvement at the moment.

Here's my current situation. I run first edition AD&D (very nearly) by-the-book. My setting uses real world geography, some real world mythology / folklore, and a tiny bit of real world history. For the rest, my setting follows what is implied by the core rules, that is, the guidance on "The Campaign" described in the DMG pp. 86 - 93, random encounter tables, cosmology / alignment rules, and so on. I'm pretty satisfied that my players are digging this approach and I know that I am. I have 7 active players ranging in age from mid / late-twenties to early sixties. I've lost one player to the complaint that this style of play is "too mentally taxing," but I've gained two players who had only played in narrative-style 5e games before, and found the challenge of this style rewarding. I run three sessions a month, and have canceled 2 of the last 18 scheduled sessions for a lack of players able to join.

Because we follow the time-keeping rules in the DMG, "it is best to use 1 actual day = 1 game day when no play is happening," in particular, two things about the game are markedly different from games I've played in and run that do not follow those rules. First is that the players make a point of returning to safety before the end of each session. No smart player wants his character to be holed up in a dungeon or camped in a dangerous wilderness for 5 to 12 days before the next session, as his odds of survival would not be high. This facilitates different groups of players and characters playing from one session to the next. It also completely mitigates the negative consequences of a player unexpectedly missing a session that one might suffer with a freeze-time time-keeping approach. The second effect is that there is considerable "downtime" for the characters. Two of my players use this time scrupulously, two of them are spotty in taking advantage of it, and the other three mostly waste it. It has worked out exactly as Gygax suggested, "The latter tends to bring more true-to-life quality to the game, as some characters will use precious time to the utmost advantage, some will treat it lightly, and some will be constantly wasting it to their complete detriment. Time is yet another facet which helps to separate the superior players from the lesser ones."

We also follow performance rating / training rules, and each character not only gets a 1 to 4 rating for each session, but also for each downtime period. If no orders are received for a character in a given time period that garners a 4. On the other hand, a player who issues orders which take care of necessary business like convalescence, equipment purchases, money-changing, &c. or which advance the character's own goals, like information gathering, a cleric building an orphanage, &c., he earns a 1 for that character that period. Ratings of 2 and 3 only apply to partially ineffectual or nonsensical orders. One way in which we deviate from the rules (and there are very few) is that since the rating is about player skill, and players have multiple characters, the average of all of a player's characters' ratings apply as the multiplier to all of his characters' training time (and therefore cost) in order to gain levels. The seven players currently have average ratings ranging from one player at a perfect 1 up to 2.8. These ratings are posted on the campaign web site to help foster competition and attention to skillful play.

All of that set up is maybe more background than necessary to get to my real "dear JB" question. There are a lot of NPCs doing a lot of things in the setting and most of the players have visibility into much of that activity, collectively, though there are many things some players know about and others do not. It's an interesting and dynamic landscape from my referee perspective, but most of the players aren't really paying attention to it. My two strongest players are, but the other five don't seem to know what to do with it and one of those has even demonstrated not paying attention to his own past orders and results in choices he makes in subsequent orders. I'm concluding that I'm more in love with my setting than my players are, and that I'm failing to provide what most of them need to engage deeply with the setting. I have a lot of shortcomings as a referee, perhaps chief among them that I do no acting, funny voices, and almost no first-person NPC dialog. My presentation is as dry an experience as looking at a chessboard. I'm not sure that those are the shortcomings that make the game less interesting for my some of my players, but I have too many shortcomings as a referee to list. Maybe without sitting at my table it's impossible for you to really comment on my situation exactly. I'm hopeful though that you've experienced a table that this description of mine resembles and might serve as a model for suggesting what I'm missing or doing wrong. Or maybe you have ideas for how I can test the table to figure out what I might be doing wrong. Soliciting direct feedback has been only a little bit fruitful.

Doing Something Wrong

Dear DSW:

Since I haven't sat at your table, I will take you at your word (i.e. that what you've written is wholly accurate) and draw my conclusions from there.

The crux of your worry seems to be that:

"...I'm more in love with my setting than my players are, and that I'm failing to provide what most of them need to engage deeply with the setting."

despite also stating that:

"I'm pretty satisfied that my players are digging this approach and I know that I am."

along with evidence that your players are enjoying themselves: 6+ months of regular play, low turnover, good attendance...plus relatively high scores in "performance ratings," especially considering that part of their grades are based on downtime participation (!!). To me, this would all seem to indicate that your players ARE engaging with the setting on a consistent basis (albeit some are more deeply engaged than others). 

Here's the thing, DSW: You (the DM) are always going to me more in love with your setting than the players. And it is a GOOD thing that you are; if the creator does not love their creation, they will lack the energy needed to care for, develop, and grow the setting, without which there can be no game.

[yes, there can be no game without the game either (i.e. without the rules, system, etc.); however, we are already taking as a "given" that the participants wish to play D&D. Once the game is decided upon, the setting is the next thing of greatest importance]

A clear barometer of your satisfaction with your campaign is going to be measured by how much you enjoy the setting, regardless of the players' love of and engagement with the setting. If my players are wildly crazy about GhostBusters, and wish to play in a setting that resembles the film franchise, it really doesn't matter how much I want to please and appease them...I will run out of steam (eventually) because, deep down, I have no interest whatsoever in running such a game.

This is a truth that every vocational DM must eventually come to realize. 

And it makes no never mind if you do acting, funny voices, first person dialogue, etc....if this is the "price" of player engagement, then your players are looking for a different game than what you are running; these things are unnecessary to the play of the D&D game (certainly with regard to the 1st edition AD&D version you are running). My daughter loves it when I or someone else at the table does "funny voices" in an entertaining fashion, all but clapping her hands...however, she's not there for the performance, it is simply icing on the (adventure) cake. Granted, she doesn't know any different (her handful of forays into 5E were with a adolescent DM who was still doing dungeon crawls, not soap opera play), and veterans of narrative-style gaming might have different assumptions...but, then, your players continue to show up even without that jazz, right?

Now, here's the part where you (might) say:

But, JB, I get all that. What you're NOT addressing is that five of my seven players aren't engaging with the setting the way the other two are. I'm afraid that my DMing may be too dry for them, that they might (eventually) check out...like one player already did...for being too "mentally taxed" for the amount of "fun" they're having. What can I do to help them care more for the setting they're exploring?

DSW, it may well be that...so far as engagement is concerned...your players are already at the limit of their capability.

Some people just want to play; some people just want to have adventures. This is, of course, what D&D is at its heart: a game of fantasy adventure. Some players just want to swing a(n imaginary) sword and collect (imaginary) treasure. They are there for the rush, the thrill of adventure. For the challenge. "Can I make it out of the dungeon (alive)...with a fat payday?" Pushing those limits -- hopefully surviving, sometimes dying -- is what gives them their jollies. As much if not more so than the bonds of friendship and camaraderie around the table.

And while there's more to D&D than that...the building of castles, the establishment of kingdoms...for some players, adventure is enough. The 'high' is enough. They're not interested in living in the world; of sowing their own seeds of creation in the fertile soil of the setting you've created.

Adventure happens when players choose to engage with situations that you, the DM, create and provide. You write that there are "a lot of NPCs doing a lot of things in the setting," but that by itself doesn't make situation. Just because Baron BadGuy is oppressing elves in the township doesn't mean the paladin PC is going to jump on his charger and ride to battle. Just because the players hear rumors of an approaching orc horde doesn't mean they're going to organize the villagers into some sort of fighting force...they may simply decide to jet. 

For the campaign to satisfy the players, they must have a high degree of autonomy such that their choices and decisions matter (i.e. are consequential). So you can't force the issue. However, a BTB 1E campaign has an exceptional method of motivating players already built into its system: the need to pay the bills. Upkeep costs will absolutely eat up the PCs' treasury, forcing them to go out in search of adventure. You are then (as DM) given the golden opportunity of extending situation to them like a helping hand to a drowning person; little more is required (save the art of couching the situation in such terms that it doesn't seem the risk is too far out of reach, nor the reward too small for what is being asked).

But downtime activity? Building orphanages, gathering information, etc.? For players to want to engage in that type of play requires one (or both) of two things:

A) a player who is REALLY into the fantasy setting already (not your average D&D player),

B) an obvious benefit to the activity in question.

And obvious to you (the DM) does not automatically equate to "obvious to the player." It's not enough (for most players) to say, hey, the Grand Druid and his entourage are coming to town to celebrate the Solstice. Who cares? What's it to me? says the (majority of) players. What are the benefits? Where's the profit in it (literal and/or figurative). 

Some players are more invested in particular schemes for...well, for reasons that can come from any number or variety of circumstances. The paladin is tired of wondering about the alignment ramifications of leaving all these goblin orphans alive (after killing their parents in battle) and wants a place to stash them and turn them into "polite members of (human) society." Whatever. Some issues (and some situations) will appeal to some players, some won't, but that's NOT REALLY YOUR WORRY. You want the players to have autonomy; you want the players to be able to refuse situations you offer. As a DM your job is to keep offering them situations, and then working out what happens when one finally grabs their attention.

And it IS a "job;" one you do out of love (since there's no way anyone's compensating you sufficiently for the work you put in as a DM). Which is why it's so important that you love your own setting. The more you enjoy 'playing in it' (i.e. world building) the more situations you're going to dream up that you can offer your players. Eventually they'll find something that sparks their interest...regardless of whether or not your delivery of the situational information is "dry." Create exciting situations, and it won't matter how much (or how little) enthusiasm is in your voice. Fact is, if you're excited, it will come through in your communication.

Okay. Two more things:

First off, I want to address incentivizing players, especially with regard to "performance grades." I don't use these myself, though I don't fault anyone who does (I've used them in the past)...still one has to understand their practical purpose. Just as training is NOT about "sucking money out of players," but (as I've written before) about controlling the pace of the game, performance grades are NOT just a way of "evaluating" players. Rather, they serve to condition players' behavior in a way that meets the Dungeon Master's vision of game play.

The performance grades are entirely arbitrary and open to DM interpretation: what you, as a DM, consider to be 'right and proper' behavior for a thief or ranger may be VERY different from what I, as a DM, believe. Performance grades provide a "stick" with which to spank players who aren't meeting the DM's expectations, aiding all players in aligning expectations of play with a singular vision. If I want my fighters to throw themselves into battle with foolhardy abandon, I can penalize the ones who play a more cautious game by cutting their advancement time by a factor of two to four. "Don't want to play right? Watch Bob's character advance three times faster than you!"

However, I'm of the opinion that punitive measures aren't as effective at motivating players as are positive rewards ("carrots"). They can even cause players to rebel outright. 

[I still recall my days playing in a friend's Marvel Superheroes campaign and how we dealt with the "kill someone, lose all Karma points" rule: we simply said, fine, we'll play with zero karma (at which point my friend/GM instituted a "negative Karma" rule which, likewise, did nothing to disincentivize us from killing folks)]

I am not suggesting that your use of performance grades, both in active play and downtime activity, is somehow preventing your players from engaging more readily with the setting...clearly, your whole point of using them as you are is designed to encourage them to engage more deeply. I'm only saying that "negative reinforcement" is (generally) not going to motivate someone as strongly as positive incentives...especially if I (as a player) simply play a different PC while my under-performing character is locked in "training jail." 

Finally, it may be that everything you're doing is JUST FINE. When it comes to skill training of any sort (and Dungeon Mastering is a skill), the dedicated practitioner will, at times, come to a place where their skill "plateaus;" many books have been written on the subject. Most of what I've read indicates that plateaus are a period of integration and consolidation...you may have reached a point where you are simply refining and sharpening the ways and methods of running the game that you've acquired over months (or years) of play. The length of time that a person remains in such a plateau state (despite consistent applied effort) varies not only by skill and individual, but by perception...because of our "diminishing returns" we see a lack of progress, until enough time has passed that we can look back and see just how far we've come. This is the path of mastery for ANY skill (not just Dungeon Mastering)..."breakthroughs" always come faster and are more noticeable at the beginning of our journeys. What you may be seeing as a "rut" may simply be the "journeyman's grind" and, while frustrating, may be really nothing to worry about.

If YOU enjoy running the game, if YOU are in love with your setting, then just keep plugging away. In the end, everyone at the table (including yourself) is responsible for their own investment in the campaign. You can't worry too much about the players' engagement; instead, focus on your world building (developing the setting, creating situations) to ensure they have something with which to engage.

Sincerely,

JB

You Do You

Man O man. Finding something constructive to write that isn't condescending or belittling is tough some times.

Life's been challenging lately. I won't get into it. "Busy." That's the usual word thrown around Ye Old Blog. I've been busy. Let's leave it at that.

Played some Marvel Superheroes RPG for the first time in...mmm...35 years? Thereabouts? Diego and Maceo wanted to give it a try. I explained (to Diego) the main issues with the game: A) it doesn't do 'granular,' and B) character creation is EXTREMELY random. Like, really, terribly so. Even with the various "fixes" found in MSH retroclones like Faserip and 4C Expanded (both of which I own) the thing is, well, a train wreck. Ah, well.

They made characters...terribly crazy, random, over-powered characters...and immediately decided they'd prefer to be super-villains and kill people. Whatever. I ran them through the final encounter of Day of the Octopus and basic (heroic) instincts took over...they were trying to save innocent bystanders and defeat the giant robot. In the end, they were (barely) successful and had a great time and decided they preferred being heroes and agreed that...yes, actually, their characters were trash, incoherently themed, and randomly thrown together. I am currently rewriting the game myself to rectify its chargen issues, because it's not a bad little game.

[I will say this, however: despite its problems, MSH is an EXCELLENT piece of game design, incredibly fun and functional and quite possibly the best thing Jeff Grubb ever did, design-wise. It is SO WELL DONE, it is perhaps the game that BEST MODELS THE SUPERHERO GENRE...so long as you are content to use existing Marvel characters in the existing (in 1986) Marvel universe. The game deserves its own...very long...blog post]

But that's a minor side-note in gaming. Marvel...still...doesn't hold the same long-term appeal as the (Advanced) Dungeons & Dragons game. It's just a lark...a palate cleanser. 

Aside from being "busy," I haven't been writing blog posts lately because there's so little I want to say. Or...maybe...there's SO MUCH I want to say and don't know the proper way to do so. I know that a lot of what I want to say will go over like a ton of bricks (which, is to say, won't go over at all). And why should I waste my time?  

Who was I just reading the other day? Oh yeah: this guy. After a bit of a hiatus, he decided to start a new D&D campaign 'round about October of 2022, using the Fifth edition rules. In December, he posted his thoughts on 5E, writing in part:

I have to say that I really like how D&D has evolved into a solid ruleset that is 5e. The 5e rules pretty much cover just about anything that may come up in the game. Earlier versions relied upon the DM and players to customize and build upon the somewhat vague rules. This left the game open for tons of home-brewed customizations. Having had to add quite a bit of customization to my Swords & Wizardy campaign of a few years back, I have to say that I like not having to have to do the heavy lifting on finessing the rules and balance of the game. I was able to do back in the day but I was no expert. It involved quite a bit of time that I no longer have. I want to sit down and run a game and 5e has all the rules covered.

[he also praised the "flexibility" of the game, its emphasis on "role-playing" as opposed to "hack-n-slash," and the backgrounds being great for helping players "focus" on their characters. Furthermore, he found the classes and races to have been "well thought out"]

By March, the blogger had changed his tune completely, stating his campaign was the least fun thing he'd run since 1993. "5E D&D is just not that fun to run," he stated. The characters are "too powerful." There is no "thrill, suspense, danger." The game is "over bloated with rules." He finds the game to be "not inspiring."

As of June, he's decided he's going to do some sort of streamlined, craptastic rules-light game like Tiny Dungeon or EZD6. Garbage role-playing, in other words. Because WotC/Hasbro has ruined D&D for him.

*sigh*

GusL, a pretty bright guy...is writing posts about the (stupid) "maxims of the OSR." For no good reason that I can ascertain. There is nothing productive in perpetuating these myths and fallacies. They are not teaching people how to play D&D..."old school" or otherwise. They're obfuscation. Just...smoke and mirrors bullshit. So fatiguing to see this same stuff hashed out, over and over again. Probably sound too harsh towards a fellow blogger. Apologies. I've been dumb like this plenty of times. 

Oh, here's another tragedy from last month: the "issue" of sharing "spotlight" in OSR games. My goodness, my Guinness. Just what is the state of Fantasy Adventure Gaming these days? 

Or is this just the state of blogging? Perhaps. But, I hesitate to state that people have run out of useful things to blog about. I think that...maybe...it's just that the things one wants to write about (that could be actually useful) seems too banal, too devoid of sensationalism ("click-bait") to warrant consideration of effort. Maybe.

FOR EXAMPLE: a few weeks ago, we discovered that several kids in the neighborhood meet for a regular D&D game on Thursday evenings (same night as our weekly block party). Sofia and Diego were ecstatic at the chance to join a regular table...even if that table was playing 5E...just to be able to get together and throw dice with fellow enthusiasts their own age. And I was in 100% agreement that they should do so. Because playing RPGs with peers, outside the (more than cursory) supervision of adults...and learning to navigate group dynamics in such an activity...is an important piece of development. A bit like team sports for the brain.

The D&D group, especially the 13 year old DM, were as excited to have new players as my kids were to play. Because of summer travel and activities, they've only had the chance to attend a couple sessions (D. is playing a half-elf paladin while S. created an elven druid), but they've had a good time. Mostly (there are some problematic issues with the DM's younger brother...similar issues to what I remember having in my youth as a DM with a younger sibling...that can add a sour note), and they appreciate 5E for the game it is: a different game, with different rules and nuance. Their DM (Harrison) is young but competent enough: knowledgable of the rules, and running his own campaign which appears to consist of a small town and a local dungeon or two. Serviceable youth play, perfectly suitable for kids of ages 9 - 12, like my own.

Do I have any interest in running/playing 5E? Nope. Do I fault these kids for playing the current edition? Nope, not at all. Do I bemoan them "playing wrong" or some such BS? Absolutely not...these are kids, playing kid D&D. I know "kid D&D;" I played it myself as a youth. LOTS.

Other than the fact that 5E is a generally poor edition for discovering the greatest form of Fantasy Adventure Gaming (i.e. intensive, long-term, experiential play), my biggest criticism is one of accessibility (i.e. it's harder to learn the rules as a newbie then, say, reading a copy of Moldvay's Basic book). In this particular case, that latter criticism ain't an issue: both the DM and the players know enough of the rules (and have played enough) to make the game work. And at their age, they are already having plenty of intense, experiential play just by the nature of their youth and the newness/novelty of the game at hand. "Long-term" means something far different to a kid not yet out of middle school compared to a man who will be turning 50 come November. 

Different from what most adults (I'd think) would consider satisfying play.

But, then, gamers aren't "most adults"...or so I'm told. I'm not sure I believe that. The parents of these neighborhood kids are NOT gamers (at least not of the FAG variety) and most of them have never played these games. They're just glad their kids are enjoying non-screen activity and having somewhat healthy social interaction (so far as I can glean, none of them play any team sports, and most...if not all...are homeschooled). Some of the parents have even suggested they might like to try playing some D&D themselves with an adult Dungeon Master to run the game (*hint*hint*).

*sigh*

What is wrong with people these days? I mean...scratch that, I know what's wrong with people (at least on a large-ish scale). The same things as have always been wrong, just translated to a different time and space and circumstance from our ancestors (although with a bit less bloodshed and starvation). Me running D&D games for people...or teaching people how to play or expounding on the internet my personal perspective/philosophy on gaming and life and whatever...isn't going to make a damn bit of difference. People need to want to go out and do it themselves...just as with everything in life. 

I mean, all the information is already there for the thirsty folks seeking knowledge. 

But maybe it's still too hard to find? Okay, I understand that's a ridiculous (or coddling) thought; on the other hand, I can see that I have something in the vicinity of 2,500 blog posts here alone, few of which are "on-point," MANY of which have bad/wrong/false info (that has since been updated in my own mind), and none of which bear much semblance to any sort of organized curriculum. Such are the wares offered by an untrained, hack-writer like myself. I mean...look at this meandering post I've been trying to write for the last two-three days! Garbage.

[and that's withOUT wandering tangents about playing golf or Cobra Kai or the Seattle Mariners]

So, let's try something a little different (ugh...how many million times have I typed that phrase?). Let me try to give a blueprint...a very straightforward, somewhat succinct plan...outlining my current (August 2023) thoughts on "How To Play D&D." Because there isn't a good book on the subject...just a gazillion some-odd people flailing around in the darkness, spouting pithy axioms, platitudes, "wisdom," and blah-blah-blah OR being clueless wannabe searchers after sparkly unicorns of "good play."

Such a series of posts will (probably) change absolutely nothing. That's okay. At least it will be ONE, hopefully solid paradigm that folks can follow, should they be so inclined. For those NOT so inclined: 

You Do You. And I promise I am sending much love and prayers out to you and yours. Have a ton of fun. 

This is going to be something for the searchers who are tired of searching. That's it. Maybe it's something that I'll print up and publish some day. Maybe; a pamphlet to give to my kids for when they're a little grown or something. Yeah, it's admittedly kind of a stupid task to set for oneself...but bloggers got to blog, amirite?

And here's the thing: everyone and their mom know how to lose weight, right? Something like "eat less, and exercise more?" Maybe pay more attention to nutrition, cut out the fatty, sugary, starchy stuff and focus on the veg, whole grains, and lean proteins? Blah, blah, blah...and yet people are still fat asses. Despite having a blueprint for healthful living for, like, decades (centuries?). 

D&D is a bit more mysterious than that. 

The girl's doing a soccer tournament this weekend (the boy's tourney is in two weeks). The mother-in-law is in town for dos/tres mas semanas. The complications with my mom's estate continue. And school soccer season (when I need to put on MY coach's hat) is right around the corner...looks like I'll be handling two teams this year. So many, many things.

But I'm going to try, folks. I'm really, really going to try to get my shit together, and get something helpful typed up. So that I don't have to hear (or read) any more complaints from people about their (various) issues with Dungeons & Dragons. Or, at least, if I DO hear/read such things, I can point them to a link with some concrete answers. 

For those folks who have neither complaints, nor questions...who are "fully enlightened" when it comes to D&D, in other words...for you lucky people: You Do You. And enjoy every moment of it. Please. 

Okay, that's enough for now.

Revisiting Old Haunts

Sunday. Our last day of Easter vacation (kids are going back to school tomorrow) and I, for one, am a little sad for it to be coming to an end. It's been enjoyable for the whole family, despite not really doing much of anything...I think the kids really needed a break from the "grind" of clock-punching for school. All of us are a little more slack these days...the wife even said she's not looking forward to her office reopening (she's been working from home since last February), and I'd imagine there are a lot of folks who feel the same after adapting to the amorphous Covid-induced limbo of "shelter-in-place."

One thing we didn't get to, though, was much gaming. Sad but true...the boy had a full schedule of sports this week (soccer Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday; baseball on Wednesday; and then both a baseball game AND a soccer game yesterday).  Today he's sleeping in...giving those poor legs a rest...but the last couple weeks of the soccer season look to be equally as busy as it continues to overlap with the Little League (and my daughter's first season of LL is slated to start in a week as well). Seems he may have finally been "called up" to a higher tier in soccer (that's the reason for the extra practices)...just as he was getting ready to chuck the thing in frustration. For me, I'm just happy I can watch my kids play in sunny weather. Yesterday was a beaut of a day (and the boy went 3 for 4 with two runs and an RBI as the leadoff hitter...what a stud!).

D&D. I think we'll be playing some D&D today. Need to exercise the "mind muscles," too.

However, while I have the minute to type, I wanted to blog a few words on my superhero side project. Even though I haven't been gaming this week, I have been designing like a bit of a madman. Even done a bit of writing, though most of that's going to need changes. Thing is, I've been tweaking my whole concept, and while I still like the idea of a game focused on the "superteam" I find I need something altogether different for play-testing. Because the fact is, I don't HAVE a "team" of players to draw upon.

But it's not just that. This week, I've found myself going back to an old well that I abandoned far too soon. Specifically I've been revisiting my old DMI (Deal Me In) game system and Legendary Might (my supers version of DMI). Last tinkered with circa 2015, there were a lot of reasons I set the thing aside:

• a lack of "robustness" in game play and character generation
• lack of system for incorporating human elements to contrast with super slugfests
• need for a modified card play mechanic to allow character effectiveness without "breaking the bank"
• need for a more abstract combat system, incorporating power usage and comics/film "violence"
• need for procedural systems that create more than just fight scenes

A lot of these things are interrelated (duh) and while I had ideas for them, they also represented a lot of work (brain sweat) that I just couldn't put together back in 2015, mainly because I was dealing with the upended life and culture shock of moving to Paraguay (not to mention a new baby). Game design in general (for yours truly) was being "backburnered" in those days, and it's not all that surprising I let the thing get all dusty and forgotten on Ye Old Laptop's hard drive.

Stuff happens.

Welp, I've cracked it out of storage and started hammering away again. And with the steady diet of superhero fare we've been ingesting this week (old X-Men films, the Falcon/Winter Soldier series, the old Fantastic Four movies, Guardians of the Galaxy, the entire two seasons of Agent Carter)...well, it's no wonder really. I've got heroes on the brain.

And, astounding as it might seem, it feels like I'm making actual progress (at least, from a design perspective). Much as I was enjoying my MSH-HU mashup of design, the system was feeling far too wargamey for the genre...and the more I wrote, the more I found myself filing off...or amputating altogether...systems that were too specific, and not abstract-y enough.

Because...well, look. When you try to model comics with reality-based specificity (say, something like GURPS, or Champions, or DC Heroes), you find yourself running into all sorts of problems because neither comic books, nor films, give a rip about emulating "reality" UNLESS it is in service of storytelling. How fast is the Flash? As fast as he needs to be. How strong is the Hulk? As strong as is necessary. "Reality" only matters when it makes a decent plot point (like Flash vaporizing himself by pushing past the lightspeed barrier). The laws of physics have never applied to Superman's abilities...only the laws of a "good story."

Yet we know that not all superhuman abilities are created equally. Spider-Man and Luke Cage are plenty strong, but they can't do what Thor or the Hulk can do. Many comic book characters have an agility the equivalent of an "Olympic gymnast;" but even in gymnastics, some Olympians are better than others on a given day (that's why they give out medals). There are super soldiers and there are super soldiers but there's only one Captain America, and it's not really about the shield and costume. 

Going psychotic...as predicted.

Trying to model these things with specificity in a game is a fool's errand. Which is why games like Jeff Grubb's original MSH and Simon Washbourne's Supers! do such a great job: they embrace the abstraction inherent in the genre. Of the two, I think Grubb has the better design, but it still falls down in three areas for me:

• too much randomness/lack of coherence in character generation
• too much procedural fiat rather than direction in adventure design
• too much "wargame" inherent in the game's logistics (in some ways more "board game" than RPG)

[although the last is somewhat corrected in the Advanced MSH system (doing away with the "area" system) it ends up falling prey to the too much specificity pitfall inherent in other games of the genre]

And it's still a pretty darn good game...probably the best for its genre of any I've read/played. At least, so far as system design is concerned. Which, of course, is why I was looking at a streamlined version of MSH for my own system as recently as a couple weeks back.  It just does a lot of things right.

But Legendary Might, especially in its current incarnation, has (I believe) great potential. And its design is all mine, for a change...not drawing from (or knocking off) some other designer's hard work. That has immense appeal to me, a dude who's made most of his money piggy-backing off concepts pioneered 40+ years ago. For that reason alone, I'd like to make the thing work. No, I'm not the first person to use playing cards as a randomizer, nor am I the first to use cards in conjunction with narrative structure...ain't saying that. But the Deal Me In system is still mine, and the way I'm using it NOW in this game...well, it's kind of exciting. 

I kind of want to play-test it. Sooner rather than later. Maybe today, instead of D&D. Maybe.

Happy Sunday to you all. Hope everyone has a good week going forward. Thanks for taking the time to read!

: )

X-Men, X-Fan

Mmm...coffee.

Sunday night, the family watched the first (year 2000) X-Men film. I'd been wanting to do this for the last week or so, figuring it was time to introduce the kids to the whole concept of the Marvel "mutant." They, of course, had been resistant, preferring to watch Agent Carter or re-screenings of the various Avengers films, but Sunday I finally got my way. Of course, they ended up digging it...mutants are fun, after all.

For me, I was reminded of all the reasons I dislike this particular film franchise. I haven't blogged about it much (at least, not that I remember...and I'm too lazy to go searching through my back posts at the moment), so guess what? Here it comes:

First, my relationship to the films: I've seen the original two movies multiple times. I didn't LIKE the first one, but I enjoyed it (for reasons I'll describe below), and there were parts of it that definitely begged for revisiting from Yours Truly. The second film I found to be better done and more enjoyable (probably due to cutting of clunky exposition necessary in a first film), and is probably my favorite of the franchise. The third film I found pretty bad/dumb: I've only seen it once. The fourth (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) used a story arc retcon that I hated in the comics, but was still "okay" right up till the end when it turned pretty detestable...at that point I vowed never to see another X-Man movie in the theaters.

However, I broke this promise when I went to see the next film X-Men First Class with my wife (who is a fan of the X-Men since she was a kid).  I found the premise to be interesting but the show wasn't great...mostly bland and un-memorable. This one killed the X-Men for my wife and I've never been to another theater showing of the film. We watched The Wolverine (the next installment) on cable TV, and it was so terrible I swore off the franchise all together. 

I skipped Days of Future Past. I watched Deadpool (free on cable) because so many people told me I had to see it, that it was so good at lampooning the genre, that it was so funny and irreverent and better than the last few movies. I thought it sucked. The last 20th Century Fox mutant film I watched was a small part of Apocalypse, on TV, while drunk, when the family was out of town and I was hanging with my brother and he wanted to watch it. I dozed off during the movie, finding it both badly done and boring.

For me, the franchise got very old, very fast. It was so much a "one-trick pony" that it was simply disappointing on a fundamental level...far more so than the MCU. Just as the mutant-themed comics turned me off over time by shifting focus to their most popular character (Wolverine) the films badly stumbled by A) over-milking the mutant prejudice theme, and B) over-focusing on Wolverine and all his issues...when for me, the joy, the beauty of the X-Men comics was never found in these things. 

See, I was an X-Men fan back in the day...and from a young age. While my elementary school days was a more eclectic collection of comics, in middle school (extremely formative years for Yours Truly) and early high school it was all mutants, all day. X-Men, X-Force, Excalibur, New Mutants...these were the comics my friends and I collected. These were the comics we had to pick up, that we pooled our money to buy, that we swapped and shared. We played a LOT of Marvel Superheroes RPG in those days, and much of our gaming was informed by the stuff we were reading in X-Men comics...despite the fact that there wasn't a single mutant character in our campaign (that I can recall).

[our campaign world didn't contain any Marvel properties at all...it was our own version of "Earth"...and the game being what it is (we were using the Ultimate Powers Book, of course) there were too many interesting character choices to have simple "genetic mutants" infesting our game]

I quit reading X-Men sometime around the early '90s, before I graduated from high school (class of '92) and maybe even before that (I moved on to Silver Surfer about a year before going on a semi-permanent hiatus from comic books). I remember being bemused...and then disgusted...about the Wolverine solo series. Wolverine was a cool character...one of my favorites even...but enough to hold his own series? Doing what? Stabbing folks? He was a bit character with a fairly specialized skill set (as were all the characters in those days)...I had issues where all he did was shovel hay with a cowboy hat and drink beer with Kurt; he never even ranked "team leader" for most of the run! Anyway, it was about that time I stopped buying single issue comics, so it appears I wasn't the "target demographic" the publisher was aiming for.

I realize now, that my experience with X-Men more-or-less coincided with the Chris Claremont run (1975-1991) on the series. 16 years on one title provides a lot of coherence of vision, not to mention a whole lot of story lines, most of which have been completely ignored by the film franchise...despite being the things that made the series "beloved" to fans that grew up with those comics....

I know, I know. "Cry me a river, JB. Wah-wah-whine." Once again I'm bitching and moaning about 'nostalgia' and ignoring the fact that things change. Uh-huh, yep, sure: things do change; I get that. When I started this blog, I didn't even have kids...now my oldest is 10 years old and playing D&D. I am well aware that I am prone to being mired in nostalgia, lost in the past. I've seen Cobra Kai (great series, by the way)...the irony inherent in its protagonists is not lost on me. But listen folks: what are these film studios trading in, if not the nostalgia of an aging fan base? Why not create new and original story lines, or new and original characters? Changing characterizations of existing characters (Cyclops and Storm especially) or changing storylines to fit characters that weren't in the original storyline (Magneto's "Brotherhood of Evil Mutants" predates the involvement of most of the X-Men that appear in the first film) doesn't seem to be the way to go when pandering to a fan base.

Though perhaps the filmmakers felt people would be grateful enough just to see their comics on the big screen? Not a terrible hypothesis...it originally worked for this fan (until it stopped working).

*sigh*

Monday night, the family watched X2: X-Men United and, as I wrote, I enjoyed it more than the original. It wasn't that it was more like the comics of my youth; instead, it was a matter of already understanding the filmmaker's vision and so, rather than being put off by disappointed expectations, I could simply relax and enjoy what the product was: Hugh Jackman hogging the spotlight and stabbing people. Teen romances that never were in the comics. Magneto and Mystique featuring prominently. Cyclops and Storm relegated to weaksauce bit parts (with less meaningful screen time than the cameos of minor characters). The bad juju about the evils of bigotry. Etc.

Ah, well...my children liked both movies (they preferred the second of the two) and there are far worse "changes" in the world. The Seattle Sounders' uniform this season, for example: purple and orange?! What in the everloving name of F is that all about?! Holy blankshow, Batman! 

[and, for the record, I would welcome changes in some areas. The season's only just started and the Mariners are already under .500 for, like, the 25th straight year. Crapola]

*ahem* Anyhoo. I suppose that's about all I have to say on the subject (for the moment) except that, as I chip away at my latest attempt at superhero RPG design, these movies are indeed on my mind and in my memory...especially as I look for something that illustrates the genre as presented in cinema. That's really the key thing (for me) to remember: it's not about how "disappointing" a film may be as an homage to the comic book, it's how well it works as a serial story in and of itself. Because in the end (assuming this game ever gets written), it's really not about emulating the intellectual property of Marvel (or anyone else), but about helping the GM/participants create their own "super world," just as my friends and I did in the past. And as we used X-Men comics as an inspiration, I would fully expect younger folks to use the movies in the same fashion.

Times change.

As one last aside, I have to say I think it's especially interesting that Disney has managed to recover the X-Men rights, and am extremely curious to see how/if they will incorporate mutants back into the MCU. If it were up to me, I would reboot the whole thing, without regard to the original franchise films. Treat all that stuff in the same way as Claremont treated X-Men prior to his takeover in the 70s (i.e. fairly unnecessary). We've seen plenty of example reboots in film (the many Batman franchises, Spider-Man, the Hulk, etc.) so why should be any compulsion to tread the same sorry-ass missteps made by 20th Century Fox?

But of course they will. The X-Men movies made a ton of money and the film industry as a business has shown itself to be both unimaginative and ever-chasing of past success (*double sigh*). 

All right, that's about enough for a Wednesday. 

Any team that FEATURES Wolverine
(the ultimate non-team player)
ain't no "team." Sorry filmmakers.

OH, WAIT: I almost forgot that today marks the 20th wedding anniversary of my wife and I. I am a very blessed and fortunate man to have such a special person share her life with me. Without her love, it is quite possible I'd be even more curmudgeonly and ranty than I am. Thank goodness she's strong enough to hang in there!

Okay, that really is enough.

: )

A "Heroic" Interlude

Folks who read through my back posts containing the "review" tag will find very few as relates to RPGs or gaming in general; instead, most of these are reviews for various films and television shows I've watched, most (all?) of which could be called part of the "geek" genre (science fiction, superhero, fantasy, etc.). It's been a while since I've written one of these reviews, but it doesn't mean I've stopped watching this kind of thing...just means I've stopped blogging about it.

But the fact is I've probably watched more "geek media" since the pandemic started. Not necessarily because we've been shut in (that's part of it, though) but because my kids are older now so some of the shows we previously skipped with them have been rewatched. And (often) rewatched multiple times.

The last month or so, that's been Marvel stuff found on Disney Plus. We streamed the Wanda-Vision series and now we're watching the weekly installments of Falcon-Winter Soldier as well as the previously cancelled Agent Carter (which none of us saw at the time it was being made. Too bad...it's excellent.). Along with the old Chris Reed Superman and Avengers films (including Black Panther, Doc Strange, Iron Man, etc.), and the multiple viewings of DC's Wonder Woman films, I've been steeped up to my eyeballs in the cinematic superhero genre. 

[the family also enjoys the old Adam West Batman TV show on occasion...still a hundred or so episodes yet to be streamed!]

I have not seen the most recent re-edit of Justice League, so I can't comment, but my taste in superheroes probably does run along a more "Disney-fied" vein. Heck, I enjoyed WW84 quite a bit...for me, it was reminiscent of the Wonder Woman I grew up with (in TV, cartoon, and comics)...campy and fun. My kids liked it a lot less than the first film (because they love the WWI stuff), but I just can't get behind a WW with a sword and shield, getting all stabby like a Greek hoplite or something. Give me more magic lasso any day of the week. 

*ahem* But that's DC stuff, where the power levels scale way off the chart of plausible (remember when Superman reversed time in that first movie?!) and I'm still (mostly) a "make mine Marvel" kind of guy. 

And, man o man, do I love love LOVE the Captain America stuff. The Falcon-Winter Soldier is right in my sweet spot for the genre. As far as "lore" goes, Cap has some of the best, and Falcon, Bucky, Zemo, U.S. Agent (!! Shout out to Wyatt Russell who is, like the perfect casting choice! Can't wait for him to turn psychotic!) just really gets me cranked. It's just such a cohesive bunch of comic book gobbledy-gook with plenty of Marvel soap opera mixed in to this idealistic concept set against the shady backdrop that is the military-industrial complex. 

*sigh* I could gush on-and-on about all these characters (and Carter, too! She's part of the whole Cap stuff), but I will spare my gentle readers. However, I will say that all this "hero stuff" has inspired me to once again look at the idea of running a superhero game (see Trey? You're not the only one!) and Lo And Behold the system I've been looking at most recently is NOT the B/X-based system sitting on my design board but (rather) the old Marvel Super Heroes RPG from TSR...a game I "gave up on" some decades back. I'm tinkering with it at the moment, especially with its universal FEAT mechanic, finding ways I could scale it down AND up at the same time.

[hmmm...that last bit probably makes sense to no one but me]

Unfortunately, as usual, I'm a bit pressed for time so all explanations (if any...sheesh I'm bad about this stuff) will have to come out in a future post.  What I do have time to say, at the moment, is the following:

• I think (I think) that, for me, the super hero comic book as a source of "lore" and as a genre may be a dead one. I just don't care very much about "the ongoing story" because most of it is just...eh. Let's just leave it at "I don't care" but ESPECIALLY I don't care about all the new "hero teams" that have been created over the last 20 years (mixing various heroes and villains like a Wild West version of NFL free agency with no salary cap). Just. Don't. Care.
• I think the cinematic MCU is fairly coherent and is a good model to try emulating. Trey, over at Sorcerer's Skull, started doing an analysis of cinematic supers (how they differ from their comic counterparts) and I think that's a pretty good place to start.
• Some may detest the light-heartedness and camp that creeps into these films, but I enjoy much of it, not least because it's too hard to take the genre uber-serious. While I appreciate the new DC films since (and including) Nolan's Batman trilogy, there is something I find very pretentious about using grim-dark to tell stories about characters in tights and/or hot pants with silly code names. I like that the actors take the material seriously, but the writers and directors (i.e. the filmmakers) needn't do so. Damn. Have some fun with it! 

And these three bullet-points I think are my new jumping off place for my own private Super-verse. A core "bible" of titles that doesn't play mix-and-match hell for "innovation." A downplaying of four-color costumed shenanigans with lower power levels (though still powered). And a willingness to not take the thing too serious, to allowing humor and the occasional eye-wink to show up.

The supers genre doesn't (generally) make for great "art," but it can still be fun, escapist fantasy. The same could be said about RPGs.  But I have to say that the more I consider the genre, the more differences I find from the D&D genre, and the more I feel I want to escape from systems that build on D&D's design tropes. Jeff Grubb's MSH was a far cry from the opus of Gygax and Arneson, despite some similarities (ability scores, power classes). I kind of want to go back to that well...I think there's still water there. 

All right. Later, gators.

Lone Wolves

Two of the games I picked up the other day were Fantasy Flight's new Star Wars games, specifically the basic boxed set for The Force Awakens, and the many-hundred page hardcover Force and Destiny. I'll have more to say about these in a later posts, but one thing that disappointed me about the FFG books is the lack of character write-ups; there are no stats for the likes of Obi-Wan Kenobi or Darth Vader, for example, even though they're featured prominently on the cover. Likewise, unlike prior licensed SW games (West End and WotC) there's no supplementary books to purchase that include these stars of the Star Wars universe. I semi-interrogated a game shop employee yesterday regarding this, and the explanation was...well, a bit less than satisfactory. For me, such write-ups are important in terms of figuring scale for a system...as well as I like to see how a system models a specific intellectual property in game terms.

[and, yes, I realize I'm one of those people who likes to rip on character write-ups. I still appreciate a starting point for analysis. Especially in a non-level based game like F&D, it would be nice to get an idea of how much XP goes into making an "old geezer Kenobi," for example]

Anyway, after finishing the Luke Cage series, I started looking at the old Marvel Superhero RPG write-ups for the characters in the show (and the other MCU titles also) just to see how close they came to modeling the powers and stats of their comic book counterparts. Some of these I have available to me, some are available from various fan sites on-line (Jessica Jones, as a comic book character, was not published till after TSR had closed down their original MSH line). While they're all pretty close, there are definitely some differences...and since I prefer the show-versions, I thought it would be fun to do my own write-ups based on the characters' portrayals in their respective series.

I've offer the following for perusal to the interested, presumably people who'd like to run an old school MSH game in the same grim and gritty style as the MCU. Keep in mind that Marvel does NOT due "granular" very well, especially at the lower power levels...but MSH is a lot faster (and less legally dicey) to use for write-ups than Heroes Unlimited (my "go-to" game for granularity).

Luke Cage (as "Power Man") and Daredevil were originally published in the 1984 adventure module MH4: Lone Wolves. Even thought this was written for the "basic" Marvel game, the write-ups changed very little with the advent of the Advanced game. As such, my write-ups should be considered compatible with either version of the classic MSH system.

***

DAREDEVIL

Matt Murdock, Altered Human

Fighting: Incredible (40)

Agility: Incredible (40)

Strength: Good (10)

Endurance: Excellent (20)

Reason: Good (10)

Intuition: Monstrous (75)

Psyche: Good (10)

Health: 110

Karma: 95

Resources: Typical (6)

Popularity: 13 (Good)

POWERS

Matt is blind, but he has trained and developed his remaining senses to such a degree that he has may operate far beyond the capability of a normal human. He may sense individuals by their smell and heartbeat, even through the exterior walls of a building and can sense objects by the way air passes around them. While being blind limits Matt in some ways (he cannot see color or read signs, for example) he is unaffected by effects (like darkness and flash attacks) that hinder others. He wears special body armor that provides him with Typical protection against physical attacks while not limiting his movement, and he uses a collapsable fighting staff made of Incredible strength material.

TALENTS

Matt is a licensed attorney and possesses the Law talent. He is trained in the use of Blunt Weapons, and has extensive Martial Arts training (the equivalent of A, B, and C in the Advanced game).

***

JESSICA JONES

Altered Human

Fighting: Excellent (20)

Agility: Good (10)

Strength: Remarkable (30)

Endurance: Incredible (40)

Reason: Good (10)

Intuition: Remarkable (30)

Psyche: Excellent (20)

Health: 100

Karma: 60

Resources: Typical (6)

Popularity: 4 (Poor)

POWERS

Jessica has some small (Poor) degree of Invulnerability, reducing all damage received by -2 column shifts. She also has the power of Flight (also at Poor rank), which she describes as being "more like controlled leaping;" however, Jessica prefers regular terrestrial means of getting around, for a variety of reasons.

TALENTS

Jessica is a skilled, licensed detective and has the Detective/Espionage skill. She has also received training in Resisting Domination and has developed a discipline of mental exercises to strengthen her will against possible mind control.

***

LUKE CAGE ("POWER MAN")

Carl Lucas, Altered Human

Fighting: Excellent (20)

Agility: Good (10)

Strength: Incredible (40)

Endurance: Remarkable (30)

Reason: Good (10)

Intuition: Good (10)

Psyche: Good (10)

Health: 100

Karma: 30

Resources: Poor (4)

Popularity: 11* (Good)

*Luke has been accused of a crime he didn't commit. If he is cleared of the charges, his popularity will increase to 21 (Excellent).

POWERS

Luke's hardened body provides him with Remarkable protection against physical attacks, the equivalent of steel or reinforced concrete. Against energy attacks, his protection drops four ranks to Poor.  His accelerated healing allows him to heal as if he possessed Incredible endurance.

TALENTS

Prior to his time at Seagate prison, Luke was in the Military and possesses this talent, though he dislikes and avoids using guns. He has received significant training in boxing, giving him the equivalent of Martial Arts B in the Advanced game.

[minor characters and villains...including Wilson Fisk ("Kingpin"), Claire Temple ("Night Nurse"), Trish Walker ("Hellcat"), Frank Castle ("Punisher"), Elektra, and Misty Knight...may be updated in a later post. Maybe. Lots of other stuff to write about, too. Popularity for all characters determined based on the rules provided in the Advanced game]

Mutants Rule

Earlier this week (Monday? maybe) my son and I finished watching the last episode of The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes animated series. Ye Old Netflix suggested another show we might like to watch: Wolverine and the X-Men animated series. As it is (like Avengers) rated TV7 and (also like The Avengers) lacks the "FV" ("fantasy violence" tag) I figured we could give it a shot. My son understands superheroes and cartoons are just fiction, after all.

Welp, we haven't been disappointed. The boy digs it (he now says the X-Men have been added to his favorite superhero teams which previously only included the Avengers and "the Superfriends"). He does continue to refer to it as "The Mutants" ('Papa, can we watch The Mutants while we eat lunch?') which would probably have been a more apt title, if (perhaps) not one with the same cache.

[though "cache" is a relative term...I see the name "Wolverine" in a title these days and I'm pretty immediately disinterested. I reached my saturation point with little, furry guy some years back]

Anyway, the show's not bad, if a bit disjointed and grabass, story-wise (compared to tight story arcs of The Avengers). At least the characters and plots are recognizable to Yours Truly. And in addition to be a good model for teamwork, there's a nice message of tolerating others and their differences which allows me to justify my child's exposure of the program.

And from a gaming perspective, it's starting to percolate some inspiration in my brain.

The "gamers ADD" thing is a tired subject for blog posting, but it's no revelation to long-time readers of this blog that "game designer ADD" is a much more serious topic...in that flitting from project to project is a sure recipe for not getting shit done. Now, if I was a big company with a staff of writers and designers, this wouldn't be an issue: I'd hand off ideas and concepts to staffers and just oversee the development of "products" [anyone see my recent post about "entering a new phase" as a publisher? This is a taste of the direction I'm ruminating on]. But at this point I'm not a "company;" and multiple inspirations are dangerous de-railings when it comes to completing projects.

It is what it is.

The part that's got me thinking is the whole post-apoc, (anti-)mutant war, sentinel-filled future those X-Men folks always seem bent on preventing. The idea of such a future was a good and interesting one when it first came out in the comics...taking the mutant analogy for the Civil Rights movement (and general history of prejudice and intolerance in this country) and ramping it up in combination with the themes one finds in the 1984 film The Terminator (dudes from the future traveling back in time to prevent a war with "the machines"). Actually, the Days of Future Past storyline predates Terminator (1981), but the later storyline involving Nimrod and Rachel Summers physically traveling back in time was in 1985 and feels a bit derivative (to me). ANYway...

That's a lot go giant robots.

In 1987, TSR published MX1: Nightmares of Futures Past for the Advanced Marvel Superheroes RPG. MX1 isn't really an adventure module; instead, it's an entire campaign setting placing PCs in the dystopian future where the machines (the sentinels) have taken over. Most of its 36 pages contains information on the world, the sentinels, equipment, antagonists, procedures for searches, and a sample internment camp, as well as special (new) rules regarding popularity and karma use in the setting. Only the last 4 or 5 pages contain adventure ideas and possible scenarios. It's really a toolbox to run your own guerrilla war against giant robots in a dystopian future setting. Later TSR offerings MX2 and MX3 were straight "adventure modules," but ones set in the same campaign setting.

MX1 is interesting and has lots of good, useful information but, in my opinion, doesn't do enough to tweak the original MSH rules for compatibility with the rather dark and gritty setting. For example, there's no changes in character creation to insure appropriateness (i.e. a tightly themed setting could easily devolve into an ordinary cosmic weirdness/kitchen sink game MSH is prone to do). Normally, "appropriateness" isn't an issue as MSH does a great job of modeling the exact same weirdness found in the Marvel universe circa the early to mid-80s...but MX1 would probably work best in a "standard" MSH campaign wherein a PC hero group makes a (temporary) foray into the future to save a blighted alternate timeline.

A more manageable take on the "mutant hunted apocalypse" was suggested by Dennis Laffey in his recent Gamma World/Marvel mash-up campaign that uses Mutant Future as its base system. Dennis has been busy of late with a new baby and his ongoing Chanbara project, so I'm not sure if the campaign is still up and running, but the idea of using the Gamma World system (or, rather, the BX version of the GW system) is a much better starting point for grim-dark future than superheroic, narrative re-writing, nobody-can-die system that is MSH. Still not a perfect fit for the original concept of the setting (the war machines of GW far outclass the mutations)...but then, Dennis isn't trying to do the original concept. His campaign's apocalypse is inspired by the concept, but the campaign world is a far more primitive one (I use the term in a good way), more akin to the easy savagery and general weirdness found in Thundarr the Barbarian.

B/X is a good choice for gritty...I wish Dennis would publish his house rules for the campaign. But it's not quite what I want. A civilization that's already fallen (the default setting for GW) is one that's more about heroic survival in the wilderness and building a new community/civilization. I want a heroic quest to SAVE the civilization BEFORE it falls. But I still want gritty. Hence the need for a new game.

See? This is why I'm a fan of multiple game systems rather than the proponent of the "one-size-fits-all" universal RPG. If I actually pursue this inspiration (and start writing up notes), it will be the THIRD superhero RPG I've started since May. Well, third for which I've done substantial work...one was already a "work in progress." But all have different themes, settings, and styles of play. My street level game (heavily inspired by the Daredevil net series and my favorite Marvel small-timers) utilizes some narrative mechanics, explores a "closed system" (with a definitive endgame), and also attempts to run GM-less. My "hero team" game draws its inspiration from the Avengers, Justice League, etc., makes use of my updated DMI system (previously demo'd as Legendary Might), and focuses on cinematic supers action, as opposed to the comic book style and tropes.

But this would be something different. You're not harnessing your rage (a big theme in my low powered game) to "clean up the streets." You're not blowing up buildings in an attempt to save the Earth from alien empires and high-tech terrorist organizations bent on world domination. Instead, you're battling a World Gone Bad, in which humans have turned on each other (and continue to turn on each other) under the sight of their gigantic robot overlords. I kind of like the idea of different character classes (limited to, say, mutants, cyborgs, normals, and genetic experiments) with separate power suites and leveling to represent how experienced your resistance fighter is.

"I eat mutants like you for lunch."

On the other hand, how much mileage can you get out of fighting giant robots again and again and again? Would anyone be interested in playing a Terminator-style RPG fighting against the machines and "Skynet?" It feels more like a board game...or perhaps a video game...in which there'd be an actual objective, "get-to-the-end" target to obtain. Wipe out the bad mecha, return to normalcy (or, at least, the possibility of rebuilding the world that was lost). Is that enough for an ongoing RPG?

Maybe not.

[see the game Bliss Stage for ideas of running an RPG that focuses on the relationships and mental stability of survivors fighting a war of resistance against hopeless odds in a post apoc future; similar mechanics could probably be adapted if you wanted a more character exploration-style version of this concept]

Anyway, I don't really have time to start another project, so the question is probably moot (though one I'll continue to mull over). Too many other things to work on, including the post-apoc revamp of Cry Dark Future (which will NOT be turned into a supers game, thank you very much). Then again, if I had the right collaborator....

More on this later. I've got to put the kid down for his nap.

Old Heroes Never Die (No, Really)

Yes, "Superhero Week" continues here at the ol' blog.

I spent a few minute again this morning watching the trailers for the new Captain America movie on the YouTube. Boy, do they get me revved up!

I've written before that Cap is one of my favorite superheroes...maybe my favorite of all time from the Marvel comics universe. Well, Daredevil's up there, too (even the Ben Affleck version).

[*sigh* I thought of writing a Top Ten List of Superheroes this morning, but then realized how utterly ridiculous that would be...there are so many, old and new, that there's no guarantee mine would even be "set in stone." And what would I be basing it on? Writing and artwork? That varies across the length of a series. How the hero is portrayed in film? Varies by actor and director. Based on which powers I'd like to possess? No way! THAT list would include characters like Wolverine, Silver Surfer, and Green Lantern...none of whom would fall into my list of "favorite" superheroes. At least not these days]

Even though Cap is one of my faves, I've owned very few of his comics over the years...like maybe one or two. Not that I haven't owned comics that included Captain America...Avengers, of course, Marvel Team-Ups, Secret Wars (the first series anyway), etc. Cap is a character who really stands out when working with others...not because he isn't badass in his own way, but because he gets to demonstrate more of his intangibles: his leadership, his idealism, his ability to inspire and mentor.

Still, I stopped buying comic books with any regularity back around 1990, and those were mainly Silver Surfer or Dark Horse imprints, not the Marvels that would feature Captain America. The last Cap-featured comic I purchased was probably around 1985 or '86. Maybe even earlier than that.

However, I've had the chance to visit some of the later comics, thanks to my old high school/college buddy who is (possibly) a bigger nerd than I am. No, he doesn't play role-playing games (or even computer games), but he has the largest collection of comics, Legos, and toy paraphernalia of any adult I personally know. He's loaned me a few of his trade paperbacks for Captain America, allowing me to follow some of the story arcs of the last 10 years (give or take), and that's why the trailers for the new film getting me so stoked: without a doubt the Falcon and the Winter Soldier are (other than The Ultimates reboot) the two best things to have happened to Captain America since I was a kid.

[yes, I realize that Cap and the Falcon were a team back in the 1970s, but this was before I was reading anything other than Golden Key comics...during the 80s, I just didn't see Falcon that much, and it was only after he got thrown back into the comic that I saw what a nice pairing they made]

Please O Please keep the name "Snap"

I'm not a huge fan of Snap's re-conception as "Bird Master;" sometimes less is more with superheroes, and I was plenty satisfied with his low-powered heroics. Why must you get your Cosmic Cube in my peanut butter? But I am totally on-board with him as a super-secret agent-of-SHIELD dude that appears to be the situation in the new film.

[for folks who haven't seen the latest trailer, here's a link]

And Winter Soldier? Other than being just about the coolest Marvel villain since before Apocalypse (who ruined O-So-Much for me)...well, folks should know by now how much I love tales of heroes falling to the Dark Side and then getting a shot at redemption, right? Add that to my passion for cyborgs (which I've blogged about on numerous occasions) and you can see why WS is in the top two or three Marvel baddies of all time...for me, anyway.

[there will probably be some spoilers in the following paragraphs, so consider yourself warned]

Winter Soldier does something that few plots in the comic book do...he emphasizes the age (or rather agelessness) of the comic book character. When the writers of Captain America decided to bring Bucky Barnes back (Cap's original WW2 sidekick) they had to figure out why he would still be spry and kicking ass after so many decades. Cap, of course, has the Super Soldier Serum running through his veins that makes him (apparently) as ageless as any mutant, but Bucky was just a young, highly competent "masked man;" how would he have survived decades to come back and haunt his former mentor?

Thank goodness for the comic trope of periodic cryo-freeze!

Thing is, I like the idea of the aging (or increasingly decrepit) superhero. We watched Pixar's The Incredibles the other evening, and I was once again struck by how entertaining it is to see costumed crusaders transition into "normalcy" (domestic life and the subsequent challenges it brings). Sure, this may be in part because I can identify with it (as I gradually take on more aspects of "middle age" myself)...but the reason we can ALL identify with it is because it does happen to all of us...all of us outside the four-colored world of comic books, that is.

And I think it's interesting to see people who were super heroic...who are still super heroic, actually...deal with those challenges.

The subject of the aging or "past their prime" hero is not a new subject for exploration. Miller did it in his Dark Knight graphic novel, it was explored at length in Moore's The Watchmen, and you can see traces of it in film: the aforementioned Daredevil with Ben Affleck and the most recent Batman film of with Christian Bale show the effects of crime-fighting taking their toll (non-stop Advil consumption and lost cartilage leading to knee braces). But usually, it's perpetually glossed over (or outright ignored) in the genre...Batman being as effective as ever despite a lack of supernatural or superhuman ability.

My recent games...both published and "not-yet-"...have all tried to take into account decrepitude and the toll taken by the adventuring lifestyle. I know that when you're a teen or 20-something gamer, you don't care all that much for these kinds of rules...in fact, when I was a teen playing AD&D or Traveller the penalties for advanced aging always annoyed the hell out of me! I wanted to play a perpetually young/prime of life character in the same stripe as a comic book super or cinematic action hero! But nowadays, that's a lot less interesting to me. I'd rather play a guy fighting his own slowing inertia than a young buck with a randomly required weakness or limitation.

The problem with such rules is the tendency to make them too crunchy or granular, necessitating more record keeping than I (or my usual players) want to track. For something semi-abstract like Marvel Superheroes, you could do something easy like:

Middle Age =  minus one column shift on all actions (-1 CS)
Old Age = minus two column shift on all actions (-2 CS)

[yes, that includes mental-based actions like inventing stuff...why do you think all those battle suits are scratch-built by YOUNG inventors? You lose focus and drive as you age, too]

Of course, experience and wisdom (i.e. the Karma mechanic) can still be used to offset this.

But for crunchier hero games, like Heroes Unlimited or Mutants & Masterminds, age mechanics can be a real pain to incorporate. And it's nigh impossible with more abstract, narrative-driven games like Capes and With Great Power...unless the players themselves want to account for this in their story-telling.

Mmm-mm-mm...I know there are some readers out there, who consider this whole line of thought to be of little-to-zero worth, and not just the youngsters. I can hear one particular person I know, ringing in my ears with "People don't play RPGs to emulate the sucky-ness of real life! They want to escape from these things for the length of a game session!" Ugh...you ARE escaping from the suck, dude! I'm just trying to incorporate a different and (I think) interesting new wrinkle/challenge. Ah, well...it's time for me to go pick up D from daycare. Maybe I'll write about this more later. Maybe.

I might just have to settle back into the writing of my own supers game.

The Need to Achieve

Something in Luke/Fumer’s comment on this morning's post really struck me. He wrote:

I never liked superheroes, especially for RPGs. There’s no inherent power curve in the genre, like fantasy’s peasant-to-hero arc.

Leaving aside discussions on contrary examples (Mutants & Masterminds has a definite “level up” design principle while fantasy games like Stormbringer and Barbarians of Lemuria have made a real push to distance themselves from the D&D paradigm)…leaving ASIDE those discussions, my first reaction to this is “Huh? THAT's the issue?!”

Because if I’m reading this correctly (and Luke can jump in here if I’m off base), it seems like he’s saying there’s a real problem with adapting the superhero genre to the RPG medium because traditionally comic book characters are fairly static in their power structure. A character may be Green Arrow (relatively low power) or the Silver Surfer (off-the-charts power) with little rhyme/reason as to why there’s such a great discrepancy (other than it makes for different styles/types of stories), and there’s little dynamic change in terms of growth/development that occurs. In other words, Peter Parker will never someday become Thor just because he’s had 400 issues worth of adventures.

Um…is achievement a requirement of fantasy RPGs?

I suppose the snarky answer from some quarters would be: It is of the good games. But personally I don’t buy that.

I’ve run and run in long-term Marvel Superheroes games in the past, and with good results. Now Marvel is pretty much the LAST game you want to play if your main interest in an RPG is “achievement.” Unlike say, Heroes Unlimited with its XP/Level based system, the only reward from session to session achieved is “karma,” a dynamic resource that varies based on both the type of action taken (good or bad) and the magnitude of that action. The value earned during a game session can even be NEGATIVE, causing you to face a net loss to your personal karma pool due to your cowardly or infamous (i.e. “un-heroic”) actions. Should your hero actually kill or cause the death of someone in the course of the game session, your character loses ALL accumulated karma. This is especially devastating when you consider the only way to “advance” in Marvel (improve your abilities/powers) is to expend your hoarded karma points…usually in the hundreds or THOUSANDS of points (and acquiring more than a couple hundred karma in a single session is a fairly rare and momentous occurrence).

But as I said, we ran long term marvel campaigns, using recurring characters over a series of different adventures and had a great time doing it. I don’t think ANY of the characters ever “achieved” anything as far as advancement goes…the rate of improvement is just glacially slow, especially if your characters are already high on the food chain of superheroes. But achievement wasn’t the point…the POINT was to run a campaign of superheroes in a world filled with the same whimsy and weirdness as your average Marvel or DC comic title (we didn’t actually use the Marvel characters, preferring to create our own villains/heroes…the X-Men might have been present in our universe, but they were “off-screen” the entire time). And we accomplished that with flying colors, facing super-villain teams and angry deities and voodoo magic and cyborgs that looked like Robocop but carried an attitude like the Terminator. We had pointy-eared aliens in fishnet stockings and Wolverine-wannabes and sentient carrots and rocks (all thanks to the Marvel Ultimate Powers book). There was some drama and romance and lots of unrelenting ass-kicking with plenty of stuns and slams and people getting punched through walls and getting knocked several city blocks back.

[ I think there was an Eternal that could turn people into jellyfish (or jelly sandwiches…that part’s a bit hazy)]

The point was to have plenty of dynamic fun, and achievement played very little part in it. Achieving “levels” does not suddenly open up new areas of exploration…all areas of exploration are open from the beginning. The chance of death and dismemberment doesn’t change from a beginning character to an “advanced” one…challenge is always present and you always have a chance to face it down…provided you and your compatriots keep your karma pools stocked up and ready.

Because so many of us got into role-playing through the gateway of Dungeons & Dragons (or RPGs that were heavily influenced by D&D’s achievement paradigm), there’s a common perception that achievement or advancement or “getting better” is or needs to be an inherent part of the game. But that’s a real fallacy of thinking…I mean, you need to understand where the whole concept came from.

In the beginning there was Chainmail and Dave Arneson’s desire to run a fantasy dungeon delve. Chainmail is a war game, similar to Warhammer: you pick out your forces, each piece or unit being worth a certain number of points. There are soldiers with various armor types and weapons, and there are some “special types” including heroes and superheroes (worth 4 fighting men or 8 fighting men respectively) as well as monsters of a (Tolkien) fantasy nature.

When Arneson was running his exploration/subterranean campaign he needed a system of rules to work out the results of combat between the players and the monsters encountered beneath Castle Blackmoor. All characters used the simple man-to-man combat rules found in Chainmail (based on weapon and armor type) to determine the results of combat. Later, based on the actions taken (and surprising success) of one particular player, Dave decided to promote the player’s character to “hero” status, giving him the fighting ability of the “hero” piece from Chainmail.

As I've discussed before, by Arneson’s own admission achievement/advancement was never the intention of his original dungeon campaign; advancement was tacked on (with good result) only AFTER players had been exploring the ruins beneath Blackmoor for some time and had become attached to their characters. The objective of game play was simply for characters to acquire treasure; the point of his game was to play the game: a game of fantasy exploration. Period, end of story.

Does this make sense? I mean, do people really grok this? Let’s put it another way: a man designs a game of exploration into a dark and hostile environment. The characters the players will play will face “death itself” in the form of fiendish traps and hungry monsters. What would motivate such an individual to do this? MONEY…that greatest motivator of all. The possibility of making a fortune, of becoming rich (by whatever your relative standards are) will compel individuals to do all sorts of crazy things…work long hours forsaking family and loved ones, embarrass themselves on reality TV, take tremendous punishment on a football field or in a boxing ring, betray the ethics and principles they were raised to believe. The promise of wealth will compel people of different backgrounds and personalities to work together towards a common cause.

[which is part of the reason why the paladin class…with its total disdain of wealth…makes so little sense with regard to the premise of the Dungeons & Dragons game]

Treasure hunting is the in-game justification for the player characters’ actions in D&D…at least originally. Not achievement or advancement or “leveling up.” Those things (and land titles, etc.) were a BONUS, a reward for doing what they were supposed to. It’s only the last 12 years that have seen the erasure of this justification (with the de-emphasis on treasure acquisition).

A superhero game should be viewed and approached with the same spirit Arneson originally had for his Blackmoor campaign, at least in so much as Blackmoor had no expectation of achievement. Playing a superhero game is about exploring the life of a person with gifts not given to average mortals…even if those gifts are nothing more than the courage and conviction in one’s belief in fighting for Truth, Justice, etc. ACHIEVEMENT (if even possible) should be a secondary consideration.

After all, does the tide of justice ever, finally, sweep aside the evil and corruption of those who would prey on the weak and vulnerable? Well, we can certainly hope for that to happen in the REAL WORLD…but in the game world, curing the world of all its woes would mean ending the game (and the fun we’d presumably be having by playing). Instead of reaching some end point, the general consensus for such a game would be for players to “fight the good fight,” doing what they could, before hanging up their cape and cowl…or passing over the mask to the next generation of heroes when the time comes.

Now, if you don’t think it would be enjoyable to play a game where you (or rather, your character) has super powers and faces off against the Forces of Darkness, then you should probably be playing a different game anyway. But if you DO like the idea…well, then, why do you need any sort of achievement to be inherent in the game? You have enough to worry about, stopping the nefarious machinations of Doctor Doom or the Riddler (or whomever) without any bother with regard to advancement or improvement or “leveling up.” In my opinion.

Now regarding the other possible beef raised by Luke…namely, the wide disparity of power ranges between, say Daredevil and Superman…well, honestly, that’s one of the things I love about the genre. Intellectually, it’s pretty ridiculous for Captain America to be leading the likes of Iron Man and Thor (sure Cap is a war hero, but Thor’s been THE go-to warrior god for centuries! You don’t think he knows tactics?)…but it sure makes for great copy!

Of course, you have to account for this in your game design. If you don’t, then what happens when Dazzler gets punched by, O say, anyone with a strength class equal to or greater than Spiderman…for example, and single member of the otherwise “wussy” Wrecking Crew? Answer: One dead Dazzler, that’s what. A person with the ability to punch a (small) hole in a tank will inflict devastating injury on any character not made more durable due to their superpowers. Batman, for example. One lucky punch will quite literally “knock his block off.” You want to see the original caped crusader decapitated by the likes of Bulldozer? A guy who Spiderman one-shots without batting an eye?

[by the way, if you DO want to model that kind of super world, you’ll want to direct your attention to Heroes Unlimited…though you might want to divide SDC totals by a factor of five or ten]

In the superhero world, “fortuitous circumstance” tends to conspire to keep the more squishy heroes breathing, and when modeling that world (especially due to the disparate power level between characters), you’ll want to make sure there’s something present that provides that same “safety net.” Or at least, provides the option for folks who like that kind of thing. That, too, is part of the fun. In my opinion.