S&S: It's like you read my mind

[Eric J-D]

Hi Ron,

Hooray, I bought Sorcerer and Sorcerer & Sword this weekend and have already read through much of each.  Briefly, the reason for my post is simply to wax rhapsodic about how vital they are for the gaming community.  With Sorcerer & Sword it is as if you read my mind.  Here's why:Back in my very first thread (What system(s) might best facilitate these desires?) over in Actual Play I expressed my desire for a system that would best facilitate strong player use of Author and Director stance.  Now, I know that several great games fit that bill (Ralph, I am going to be sending some money your way soon), so let's not have any jealousy here folks; but since Ron's is the first I've purchased permit me to momentarily gush.

These two texts are simply amazing.  For those of you for whom this is old news, let me simply reacquaint you with a particularly liberating piece of advice that comes on page 13 (that's right, only a few pages into the supplement) of S&S:

The setting is a garment for the heroes to wear, and it will only acquire character, detail, and a heart of its own through the hero's use of it--that is, through play.

This is exactly what I have been in search of for some time, namely  a piece of text that recognizes that all of the detailed, invented histories for any number of campaign worlds are, by and large, just so much bollocks in that they often have no visceral connection to the character and can even impede rather than assist player-character protagonism.

Thank you Ron for having the stones to say this.  I am pleased to place these admirably slim (in terms of page count) volumes in the space once occupied by some seriously "setting bloated" games.

Cheers,

Eric

[Valamir]

(Ralph, I am going to be sending some money your way soon), so let's not have any jealousy here folks; but since Ron's is the first I've purchased permit me to momentarily gush.

No jealousy here.  S&S is well worth gushing over.
Hopefully you'll have enough fanboy gushing to go around ;-)

I was particularly fond of the advice to build the world as you go

[Eric J-D]

Ralph wrote:

Hopefully you'll have enough fanboy gushing to go around ;-)

Have no fear kemosabe (sp.?).  From everything I've read at the site the praise will be effusive.  

Cheers,

Eric

[Bankuei]

I've highlighted some parts of S&S as major things to check back on.

My particular favorite is :"Story Now"

May the world one day recognize that idea.

Chris

Edited to reduce illteracy :P

[Valamir]

Yup, and what really puts the work over the top is the way that when you go back and reread it a few times it all ties together.

Why is building the world as you go instead of starting with a detailed setting recommended?  Simply because that's the way the pulp authors did it?...no, it feeds back into the idea of "Story Now" and if your writing world background, or reading world background, or having world background delivered to you by yet another NPC...then you're NOT engaging in Story NOW.

The section on non chronological play feeds into this.  Progressing in chronological order is completely unecessary to the concept of Story Now.  Pulp writers who got a great idea for a short story for one of their characters didn't care less when in the characters life cycle the story needed to occur.  They didn't set it on the shelf to refer to later when they got to the appropriate point, or say "too bad, windows closed, he's already past that".  Again...Story Now.

It really deserves to be recognized as a gaming milestone.

[Eric J-D]

Excellent points Chris and Ralph.  All I would add is that Sory Now also reorients RPG play toward the thing one would have thought roleplaying took as its starting point (but sadly doesn't all too often)--namely, player-character protagonism as foundational for play.  I agree completely that it should be regarded as a milestone.

Eric

[Andy Kitkowski]

My ass, too, was kicked by this book (The weekend I read it I posted here as well as sent Ron some... strange... publishing ideas*). Many folks have picked up this book for use in other games, and I don't blame them.  I ran a BESM fantasy game (basically ancient Indian myth, ala Mahabharata, with high tech) and a 3-shot D&D game using the concepts in the book.  Much, MUCH fun was had by all, primarily due to Ron's ability to walk you through that "Story Now" concept as well as leaving the world blank for the PCs to fill in.

But friends, the book is a bitch godess as well. For afterwards, when we played a friend's D&D mini-campaign (we rotate GMs, but I'm kinda the primary) everyone had little problems with the execution, the too-too detailed background, and the like.  Once we had a taste of player-driven D&D, it was hard to go back to the old "Here's the world, here's the mods, ake your characters from here and engage in this adventure" stereotype.

I dare say that you'll never, ever, want to attend a convetion game (D&D, other fantasy like Earthdawn, etc) again.

Not that this is a bad thing, though. :-)

* My idea, which I've given up on save for a few "demo sheets" or a downloadable supplement, is a "Director's Cut" of a game: That is, say you print 200 copies of a game- You then go back, and print, say, 10-20 more for friends and enthusiasts:

This new copy is better bound, like WW's "Limited Edition" lines. You include more pages, and you intersperse the writing of the book with what inspired you, things or feelings you were "going for", etc.  Like putting enthusiastic designers' notes in the book.

Kind of like blowing yourself, admittedly, but it'd be fun for a copy meant for friends or peers, to show them where you got your ideas and how they were developed.

[ethan_greer]

Well, after all that time ago when I said I was gonna buy it, S&S has finally made it's way up to the top of my list after many moons.  This thread has served to whet my appetite still further.  I'm off to order!

[Ron Edwards]

Thanks everybody!

Best,
Ron