Tabletop games: let's play them.
By
Ad Astra,
Posted on: 2010-10-13 01:19 in Comic and Hero-Villain Culture
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Eh, I tend to tie the two together, because the backstory can be important for statting your character in a lot of systems. Especially in Changeling. Because of the way powers are tied to the character's history there, I've never had much luck figuring out what I want to play mechanically and then making a character fit it in Changeling. It almost always has to work in the reverse order.
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Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
I never considered backstory to be part of actual chargen, that's more like preliminary development.
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Having Vengeance and Fallout slotted for recharge means never having to say you're sorry.
I'm genuinely surprised that so few people have responded. I thought we were all into tabletop games, but maybe it's just a few of us. I guess John Wick was right when he said that tabletop gaming was dying.
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It's not dying just too much stuff going on. Speaking of which has anyone tried the Castle Ravenloft game?
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Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
I'm genuinely surprised that so few people have responded. I thought we were all into tabletop games, but maybe it's just a few of us. I guess John Wick was right when he said that tabletop gaming was dying.
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One of my regular PnP gaming groups is enjoying it quite a bit. Very story-telling oriented, and perhaps needs an experienced GM who can adapt on the fly. Scripting would not work well in the system, so no "blue hands from hyperspace" to push the characters in a specific direction. The particular gaming group is multi-generational (with two of the players being the GM's daughter and her best friend, both college age).|
Originally Posted by ObiWan
How is the Dresden Files game?
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It also focuses on player interaction from character development throughout. Character creation meshes two or three of the PCs backstories together (via "guest appearances") to give a coherent reason why a motley group of people would be working together.
p.s. MOMC - I think there are lots of tabletop gamers still out there, including a whole subset of those who gamed when younger and are now returning to it with their children who are old enough to participate (besides the group playing Dresden, I am also part of a group that consists of a father, mother, 12 year old, 11 year old, and my husband and myself). For a lot of folks, PnP gaming is a bit of a nostalgia thing. I would offer space at a gaming table for one of the5 groups my husband & I are part of here in Columbus, OH, but they are currently full. I can refer anyone interested in the central Ohio area to other groups with openings.
Altoholic - but a Blaster at Heart!
Originally Posted by SpyralPegacyon
"You gave us a world where we could fly. I can't thank you enough for that."
Well, sales numbers and convention turnouts don't agree. Fewer people are buying tabletop games, and fewer people are going to tabletop gaming conventions. It's like one of those cartoon graphs that's just a straight diagonal line from the upper-left corner, down off the graph, and then into the floor. John Wick was talking about it back at RinCon last weekend, it was pretty depressing, but it means we need to work harder to get new people playing.
His suggestion to get gaming wider appeal is to stop pushing D&D as the "beginner's game". To paraphrase, he thought it was stupid that the flagship PnP game was a five-hundred page tome with about six trillion supplements and if you do not memorize every single one then all your gaming buddies will make fun of you and hog all the treasure. He suggested simpler games, like Amber Diceless, or Toon. Simple games with simple rules. A player will learn how to roleplay eventually if he's ever going to, no matter what game he's playing (yes, even the so-called "advanced" Amber). But if you stick him with a complicated game with complicated rules, that'll turn him right off.
To quote John Wick himself (but not exactly, in fact, it's more like paraphrasing, or maybe paraquoting?):
"A guy wants to get into gaming, so he goes in, and what do we give him? *slams imaginary giant RPG book on nearby table* THE RULES! 'These are the rules and you shall live by them!' That's just stupid, when you could use a game for *airquotes to emphasize pompousness* 'advanced roleplayers*, like Amber? A little sixteen-page pamphlet. *flips through imaginary pamphlet towards audience* One page of rules and fifteen pages of examples and explanations. So, would you rather have *intense both-hands-waving-down-with-palms-vertical-towards-imaginary-giant-RPG-book* THE RULES or *waggles imaginary pamphlet* this?"
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I think it's a great idea and I would gladly join your troop if only I lived closer by. I'm a mostly casual gamer with a recent focus on Magic(tm) the money pit. I've played Warhammer table top games (also expensive!) and tried to get into hero clix (thanks for changing the rules...bums). If anyone is in the New England area please drop me a line and let me know, maybe we can get somehting together.
When there is no room left in Hell, the Dead shall walk the earth.
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There's a difference between creating a character, and optimizing a character.|
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
Here's my basic rule of thumb for chargen:
If it takes over an hour without using a web utility, you're either playing Palladium or you're playing a bad game (and the line between the two is fairly blurry). Or you're pulling from a lot of sourcebooks at once, like, so many that you'd pretty much HAVE to be playing D&D for there to be that many books to begin with. |
In almost all games you can in fact toss together a character in under an hour if you know the system.
In almost all games, however, you can spend WEEKS optimizing a character.
-np
I see myself as witty, urbane, highly talented, hugely successful with a keen sense of style. Plus of course my own special brand of modesty.
Virtue: Automatic Lenin | The Pink Guy | Superpowered | Guardia | Guardia Prime | Ultrapowered
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Or you could take the middle path, one I like to refer to as "the path of the dude who isn't lazy or an insufferable munchkin", which is when you come up with a basic idea of your character's concept, then choose things that support that concept, optimization be damned. Once you're familiar with the system, nothing short of Palladium or the bookstorm that is D&D will take over an hour.|
Originally Posted by NinjaPirate
There's a difference between creating a character, and optimizing a character.
In almost all games you can in fact toss together a character in under an hour if you know the system. In almost all games, however, you can spend WEEKS optimizing a character. -np |
By the by, John Wick condemns D&D's title of the "beginner's game" primarily because it only caters to the optimizer crowd. It's great if you love to build the greatest possible character, but if you want a character that you're emotionally invested in, you're out of luck.
Personally, I'd say the game that does the most for everyone is 7th Sea. There's more than enough material to make character optimization a real factor, while there's also a ton of stuff to get you "into" your character's story, and the rules are fairly simple, for a medium-crunch game. Plus if the new player just wants to go at it without running numbers or coming up with backstory, 7th Sea has easy chargen and a very simple premise with wide appeal you can always turn to for a story-light game: PIRATES! You can deal with mainland political intrigue some other time.
[B]The Once and Future Official Minister of Awesome[/B]
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That's true about 7th Sea. We played for a short time in that system and I really enjoyed it.
And I have to absolutely echo the "D&D is NOT a beginners game" line though. It is NOT. It never was an "easy" game to learn, and I don't think it ever will be because of the sheer amount of STUFF that you can pack into a supplement book.
The system I would have liked to see more of, and what I'd have far preferred the Star Wars license go to instead of where it wound up, was the Pinnacle games "Deadlands" system. I loved it, it was fun, creative, it wasn't so darn anal about the rules... I think it was flexible enough to more adequately simulate the whole Star Warsy realm, rather than d20 or even the plainer d6 system it had before.
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Shadowrun. |
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
Once you're familiar with the system, nothing short of Palladium or the bookstorm that is D&D will take over an hour.
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Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
By the by, John Wick condemns D&D's title of the "beginner's game" primarily because it only caters to the optimizer crowd. It's great if you love to build the greatest possible character, but if you want a character that you're emotionally invested in, you're out of luck.
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How invested in your character you get has nothing at all to do with the game rules used.
Rules are merely a framework. If a player chooses not to flesh out that framework with history, connections, background, breath life into it, well, that's the player's fault, not the rules.
I play quite literally dozens of game systems. I have found this true for all of them.
-np
I see myself as witty, urbane, highly talented, hugely successful with a keen sense of style. Plus of course my own special brand of modesty.
Virtue: Automatic Lenin | The Pink Guy | Superpowered | Guardia | Guardia Prime | Ultrapowered
'tis more about facetime and interest than game system whether one becomes invested in a character.
I can name more than a few D&D characters that I miss playing.
Dawncaller - The Circle of Dawn
Too many blasted alts to list, but all on Virtue.
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Okay, yes, Shadowrun does have a lot of books, you got me there, but the basic premise stands that most well-designed systems allow for fairly quick character creation as long as you know what you're doing. Tri-Stat might be a little time-intensive if you're keeping track of your points in your head.|
Originally Posted by NinjaPirate
Shadowrun.
I reject that categorically. How invested in your character you get has nothing at all to do with the game rules used. Rules are merely a framework. If a player chooses not to flesh out that framework with history, connections, background, breath life into it, well, that's the player's fault, not the rules. I play quite literally dozens of game systems. I have found this true for all of them. -np |
As for the second part, no, you're wrong. To quote the most grating phrase a good friend of mine uses, "You're provably wrong (seriously, what does that even mean)." Other RPGs have mechanics specifically for fleshing out your character. Going back to 7th Sea, there are Backgrounds, the Fate Deck, and some Advantages imply certain character traits. Games like that are catering to roleplayers, rather than, as John called them, "hackers". This makes it much easier to roleplay in a game like 7th Sea than D&D.
Here's a challenge for you: go to the D&D players you know, and ask them who their characters' parents are. Ask them about their characters' lives prior to adventuring. What sort of emotional issues do their characters carry from past experiences? I doubt you'll get many detailed answers that aren't on-the-spot.
Then do the same for the World of Darkness players you know.
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That's not an issue with the system, that's an issue with the players. D&D tends to attract the people who play RPGs to just go out and hit things, other games are more popular with those who want to role-play a bit more (and there is nothing wrong with either option). However you will find players of both types playing all types of games.|
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
Here's a challenge for you: go to the D&D players you know, and ask them who their characters' parents are. Ask them about their characters' lives prior to adventuring. What sort of emotional issues do their characters carry from past experiences? I doubt you'll get many detailed answers that aren't on-the-spot.
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To pick one of your examples from 7th Sea you don't need an in-game "background" trait to come up with a background for your character, in fact if you have them I would argue it actually limits your choices. There are plenty of people who like to both min-max and role-play, for those people having their characters backstory affect thier in game abilities is REALLY annoying. It forces you to either not min-max or min-max your background. A separation of stats and background actually aids role-playing (IMHO) because it means you can make a character you want to play and then decide how they got their (or visa-verse depending on preference) without needing to feel that your choice of background gimped your char or that you style of play forces you into a specific back story.
Though it may very well come down to a "chicken or egg" scenario regarding the 'was D&D geared for number crunchers or did they affect its changes' thing... Don't forget that at its core, D&D was created by number crunchers in the extreme. War gamers =/= role players. While it's possible, certainly, to have extensive backgrounds and information for your D&D character, it's not even remotely necessary.
I do have to say that at least the World of Darkness books didn't continually reiterate the same stuff over and over and over the way Palladium did, and to an extent how the Deadlands and its subsequent releases had. They were worth reading... however, until what, 3rd edition of THAT property, almost all of it was contradictory and I always felt like I was beta testing their books instead of reading a finished product. They definitely cater to role players... and that may be because the one time we tried to get one of our players to make a character, he pretty much started screaming at how the dice "didn't do anything like what they thought they should". The 'curve' on the original Vampire game ... was... shoddy? A patchwork of bad?
Anyway I like my character creation to be reasonably complex, and my game play to be quick and smooth.
Oh - another poorly done but interesting game was Hong Kong Action Cinema. Played that a few times, but the combat system was SO hella-bad unless everyone had reams of notepaper and calculators for determining refresh and heal rates... ugh. But tons of fun in theory.
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I can tell you've never played 7th Sea.|
Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
That's not an issue with the system, that's an issue with the players. D&D tends to attract the people who play RPGs to just go out and hit things, other games are more popular with those who want to role-play a bit more (and there is nothing wrong with either option). However you will find players of both types playing all types of games.
To pick one of your examples from 7th Sea you don't need an in-game "background" trait to come up with a background for your character, in fact if you have them I would argue it actually limits your choices. There are plenty of people who like to both min-max and role-play, for those people having their characters backstory affect thier in game abilities is REALLY annoying. It forces you to either not min-max or min-max your background. A separation of stats and background actually aids role-playing (IMHO) because it means you can make a character you want to play and then decide how they got their (or visa-verse depending on preference) without needing to feel that your choice of background gimped your char or that you style of play forces you into a specific back story. |
Backgrounds in 7th Sea are just that. They are purely story elements for your character to have. They set up events that happened to your character prior to the beginning of the game, which come back as a recurring subplot until such a time as they're resolved. You earn additional experience for taking part in scenes related to your background (a return on the investment of character points you used to buy the background). When the background is resolved, you get some more bonus experience. Backgrounds can also be earned through gameplay under certain circumstances.
A character's backstory should be decided on creation. Having Schrodinger's Past is unrealistic and is one of the main contributing factors in the overall lack of attachment many players feel for their characters. You didn't get to choose your own past, why should your character?
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Sorry MOMC. While a tabletop game is what I have been wanting for awhile, I am in the place where I want to sit around with people and play, not play online. Now, I live in Chico, CA, and if any posters here are close enough, and interested, give me a shout and we will see what we can pull together.
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Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
I'm genuinely surprised that so few people have responded. I thought we were all into tabletop games, but maybe it's just a few of us. I guess John Wick was right when he said that tabletop gaming was dying.
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While I am unfamiliar with 4th Ed. there have always been means by which character backgrounds can be generated in older versions (and Pathfinder). It's just that most people don't use them since they are not necessarily important to running the story at hand. |
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
A character's backstory should be decided on creation. Having Schrodinger's Past is unrealistic and is one of the main contributing factors in the overall lack of attachment many players feel for their characters. You didn't get to choose your own past, why should your character? |
Some people do, after all, play the game from the point of view of a gamer. They just want to play a game, they don't want to be an amateur thespian.
Too many alts to list.
Currently, our gaming group in Seattle is full. 
And Bloodspeaker and I recently introduced them to Betrayal at House on the Hill... oh wow, that went over well. We're already trying to plan when to play it again (when we're not having our regular RPG night - I run Legend of the Five Rings.)
Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite
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Actually I have, unfortunately the campaign never really got going so I never studied the full rules.|
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
I can tell you've never played 7th Sea.
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| Backgrounds in 7th Sea are just that. They are purely story elements for your character to have. They set up events that happened to your character prior to the beginning of the game, which come back as a recurring subplot until such a time as they're resolved. You earn additional experience for taking part in scenes related to your background (a return on the investment of character points you used to buy the background). When the background is resolved, you get some more bonus experience. Backgrounds can also be earned through gameplay under certain circumstances. |
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| A character's backstory should be decided on creation. Having Schrodinger's Past is unrealistic and is one of the main contributing factors in the overall lack of attachment many players feel for their characters. You didn't get to choose your own past, why should your character? |
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Any GM who can't work in the group's backgrounds isn't worthy of the title. If you knew the full rules behind Backgrounds, you'd know exactly what I mean. Especially since Backgrounds are only visited once every few game sessions, on average, typically in-between major adventures.|
Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
Actually I have, unfortunately the campaign never really got going so I never studied the full rules.
That's not a pure story element. A pure story element has no impact on gameplay. By having background grant extra XP it forces the GM to either incorporate elements of your background into his campaign (which he may not want to do) or tell you you can't have a particular background because it won't work with the overall campaign story. Sure it makes sense to decide your character's background at character creation, at the very least it's worth thinking about where do they come from and why are they adventuring. However you don't need rules to do that, as I said in my last post having background be a non-rules based system allows maximum flexibility to come up with a background without impacting your ability to build a character you enjoy playing. |
As to your other point, if your past doesn't have any effect on you in the present, it may as well not be there. Plus, you have to keep in mind that the more the rules talk about a character's history, the more it encourages the player to do the same. Backgrounds are just general ideas, the player needs to come up with specifics. And then he needs to think about what all of that implies. The more the player is encouraged by the rules to roleplay and come up with a fully-realized character, the more likely he is to do so.
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It doesn't need to have an in-game effect to have an effect. A well thought out background influences the character's personality and how they interact with the plot, you don't need rules for that.|
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
As to your other point, if your past doesn't have any effect on you in the present, it may as well not be there.
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| Plus, you have to keep in mind that the more the rules talk about a character's history, the more it encourages the player to do the same. Backgrounds are just general ideas, the player needs to come up with specifics. And then he needs to think about what all of that implies. The more the player is encouraged by the rules to roleplay and come up with a fully-realized character, the more likely he is to do so. |
What the samhell is chargen? o.0
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To-may-toe, to-mah-toe.|
Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
...A character's backstory should be decided on creation. Having Schrodinger's Past is unrealistic and is one of the main contributing factors in the overall lack of attachment many players feel for their characters. You didn't get to choose your own past, why should your character?
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When I make a character, I tend to go for a class, then a personality. Then I usually add in bits and pieces of the background as I go.
In my experience, when I do make a full-on character concept ahead of time, the campaign tends to work in the opposite direction. Then I'm stuck with, say, a gritty bounty hunter working with a bunch of slacker criminals, or a blink dog (long story) in a dense city information gathering campaign.
Tales of Judgment. Also here, instead of that other place.
good luck D.B.B.
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That's a failure at interparty communication. Maybe next time you could talk with the GM and the other players before coming up with your concept.
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Originally Posted by Agonus
What the samhell is chargen? o.0
To-may-toe, to-mah-toe. When I make a character, I tend to go for a class, then a personality. Then I usually add in bits and pieces of the background as I go. In my experience, when I do make a full-on character concept ahead of time, the campaign tends to work in the opposite direction. Then I'm stuck with, say, a gritty bounty hunter working with a bunch of slacker criminals, or a blink dog (long story) in a dense city information gathering campaign. |
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Seriously, I've never heard the term "chargen" before.
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These days, I prefer to leave my character's history a little open ended. If I need some background information during the game that I didn't already think of during character creation, I'll just ad-lib it as I go.
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Originally Posted by Manofmanychars
That's a failure at interparty communication. Maybe next time you could talk with the GM and the other players before coming up with your concept.
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Tales of Judgment. Also here, instead of that other place.
good luck D.B.B.
Everything that you need to know, though, will be on the character's sheet by the time you're finished. It's got a nice flow to it, the only flipping around is involved with reading details about powers or skills.
However, backstory is important enough with my game that you have to have at least read a bit about the society first, before leaping in.
I have a starter campaign that I've made 'semi-pre-generated' characters for. You roll or choose for many things on each, but they're already set up with a bit of background and some have certain features or powers already.
For my part, if a game can't emulate one of a couple different styles of characters I've always had in mind, easily and on the first try, I don't bother playing it. Shadowrun was one such game, there are many others.
Where I am more concerned about play, is in combat or other such things. For me, if your character and group takes a whole night to create with your friends around, that'll leave you another week or few days to think on it before actually playing. Then, actually playing, I don't want to have to sit down for a FULL NIGHT OF COMBAT just rolling dice and waiting for results. To me, that's boring as hell. I'd rather have more exploration and in-character play, to make me feel that my character has been fleshed out more and more. I love rolling dice, don't get me wrong, but when you've got 3 people beating on 5 enemies for 7 hours (and yes, that's happened in a game my ex made) that is simply too much. knowwhatimean?
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