rpg/board games: blurring the lines

[unheilig studios]

It comes to me that working on my rpg design, elements of a board game keep cropping up and i keep pushing them away.

Should I?

Take Clue, for example. How many steps away from an RPG is it?

Monopoly, even. Doesn't that almost turn into an rpg when the stakes get high and the deals start being made?

Talisman came fairly close to blurring the lines... can they be blurred further?

Can an RPG contain such Gamist elements, and still garner any respect in either industry?

Would a game board be a shocking element in an rpg?

Do I make any sense at all?

[lumpley]

You make sense!

But the answer, as far as I'm concerned, is "design a good game." If that means including board game elements, awesome. If it doesn't, awesome. Either way it's the "good game" part that makes or breaks your game, mostly, not what's shocking and what isn't.

I personally want more good RPGs with more board game elements, so I hope you go for it.

-Vincent

[unheilig studios]

I definately do not want to include any games elements for Shock or Innovation factor. I never do that.

I figure out what i want the game to convey, figure out what elements support that, and cut away EVERYTHING non-essential.

I'm trying to design an rpg where players work against each other, on a backstabbing social/political level, and i'll be damned if i don't keep coming back to Junta-esque and Clue concepts.

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

Sweet!  I get to shill one of my own games.  I recently wrote a 24hr RPG for the Ronny contest.  In it, the PC's taek adverarial roles against one another in a political forum.  It's a 1970's biker game forum, but a forum none-the-less.  As I was writing it, I did feel it was edging closer to boardgame-esque.  But you decide for yourself.  You can download it for free here: http://www.1km1kt.net/rpg/Cutthroat.php

Peace,

-Troy

[gsoylent]

Check out Twilight Creations "When Darkness Comes". It's an interesting rpg/boardgame hybrid horror game. See http://www.twilightcreationsinc.com/wdc/ Kind of shows how blurred the line can get.

[timfire]

I'm trying to design an rpg where players work against each other, on a backstabbing social/political level, and i'll be damned if i don't keep coming back to Junta-esque and Clue concepts.

Do you mind saying what "concepts" exactly you keep going back to?

Also, what "board game elements" would you like to see used in a RPG? We already have a few where players take turns, DnD uses minitures... I guess I'm not familiar with any games that actually use a board... I'm just not sure exactly what people mean when they "board game elements".

[Jason Morningstar]

Another fascinating game is Heroquest from Milton Bradley, which really mashes the two together.  It was designed, IIRC, by Games Workshop, and you've got classic RPG trappings - a referee, a freakin' GM's shield complete with angry Greek god, and character sheets and equipments price lists.  This is all mixed in with a board game, complete with board, playing pieces, and the like.  It's sort of an entry-level stealth RPG.  There are some great rules - for example, when you search a chest for treasure, you either find it, or you don't.  If you don't, a wandering monster appears and attacks you.  Another - as a player, you must declare "I am searching for secret doors" when you enter a room.  If you so declare, you automatically find any.  If you do not, you don't.  It's really quite awesome.  I think you could learn a lot from it. 

I find that I tend toward board-gamey stuff in my RPG designs as well, with cards figuring prominently and, at least in the Roach, severely structured game play and a definite end state and win condition. 

--Jason

[Jason Morningstar]

Oh, and the most recent Game Chef contest had conditions that more or less forced board-game-like components into nearly every entry - check them out!  "Charles the Bald is Superfucked", IIRC, uses an actual board.  Others may as well; memory fails me. 

[Josh Roby]

Can an RPG contain such Gamist elements, and still garner any respect in either industry?

There's respect in this industry?

Perhaps what you mean is "will it be recognized as a RPG by a potential customer" which may or may not be a worthwhile question to ask.  Cause the other option, "some board gamer buys it because it looks up his alley" is... well, that's cool, too.  Don't think of things in terms of sticking to what an RPG "is" -- but at the same time, keep an eye on your product's profile, and how it will appear on the shelf.  The only negative to your profile are the things that don't get exploited to make the product look good.  You can make the board, the playing pieces, the cards, and everything else look cool -- or you could try to "hide" them which will never work and only make you look like you have something to hide.  All of these aspects, however, properly belong in Publishing.

As far as game design goes, use whatever pieces work for you.  If nothing will work better than two halves of a coconut kncoked together to simulate a horse, then use those!

[John Kim]

I recall there was some discussion of playing Paul Czege's My Life With Master with a board.  I just threw together a page explaining the concept, at

Using a Board with MLWM

I think you could do better than what I have with a little thought, but this at least makes two of the three conditions visually clear. 

[Gordon C. Landis]

Clinton's City of Brass also takes steps in the card/board game direction - the custom-card option in the most recent Iron Game Chef competition seems to have brought out a lot of that.  The cards and turn-structure in Under the Bed might also be seen as boardgamey.  I have a "board" in mind for use with SNAP, just to keep the various chips and tokens organized, and character info could be on cards (which could even be "played").  But I'm not sure that really makes it boardgame-like - just using a few tools from that world to make play easier.

In short, like others have said - I'd say use what works and/or seems interesting to you.  How "gamers" are going to react to it is not entirely predictable (I mean, yeah, someone is going to scream "this is NOT an RPG!", but . . . ), and is (IMO) irrelevant to you producing a cool game.  If it's fun/engaging/rewarding, people will play it - and anywhere those people come from is fine.

[rafial]

Thomas Denmark's Dungeoneer is, as sold, most definitely a card/board game (some of the cards are used to build a board), but modeled on a classic dungeon crawl.  In my play experience with it, players are very eager to "tell stories" about what is happening to their characters.

He's currently working on creating an extended/alternate ruleset to emphasize the RPG element, but still use the cards as an essential part of the game.  He's got a beta set of rules at Lulu, and there is discussion at the Dungeoneer web forums

[Blankshield]

Blood and Bronze, my entry into this year's game chef, started as an RPG, and over playtesting has more and more turned into a boardgame with role-play bits instead of an RPG with boardgame-y bits.

One thing to keep in mind is that, if you are including components as per a board game (cards, little plastic guys, whatever), there is a strong expectation in the hobby that the components will be included.  Even Cheapass games puts the cards and the boards into the little white envelope.  So including those kinds of components means you either need to include them (higher costs) or be very very clear that the game needs things that aren't provided.

James

[ewilen]

Hey, Blankshield--do you think people would go for it if you included unmounted components with instructions for assembly? I've found that I get very good results mounting countersheets on cardstock (like comic book backing boards or the boards used to package shirts) and cutting them out with a paper cutter.

[Blankshield]

Hey, Blankshield--do you think people would go for it if you included unmounted components with instructions for assembly? I've found that I get very good results mounting countersheets on cardstock (like comic book backing boards or the boards used to package shirts) and cutting them out with a paper cutter.

No clue.  There are a few folks around here that have done some extensive work in board and card games; using their own equipment.  One of them would be best to answer this question; probably in a new thread so as not to clutter up this one with marketing concerns that aren't directly germane to the poster's question. (Damn.  I went looking for a name, and came up dry.)

thanks,

James