baby pictures -- summary of early RPG experiences, & one real game example

[Marshall Burns]

In this thread I briefly described my history of roleplaying -- namely that, lacking access to RPGs, my friends and I simply made up our own.  Larry Lade asked that I give some Actual Play examples of the early stages, where we merely had an idea of what we were doing and no way of knowing if it was "right" or "wrong."

Those early games are like looking at baby pictures of myself, so what I'm going to do is gloss over those early games and give a description of an actual game that happened at a more intermediate level.  If some of it makes you itch, please bear with me.  We were in junior high.

The first was called "Q":  the Great Gathering, by Rowdy.  It was set in modern times and about a mystical culture called the "Q" who were, for some reason, scattered over the globe where they specialized into smaller groups who developed fundamental differences.  In the game, a new Overseer, rightful ruler of the "Q", has finally appeared after untold years, prompting a "great gathering" as the various "Q" factions flock to him to become a nation again.  Problem is, they've grown so different from each other that they're having difficulty getting along.

Characters in "Q" were defined by their ability in various skills, ranging from the lore and application of herbs to skill with weapons to manipulating other people.  The meat of the skills was the magic, which consisted of 14 elements.  You either made magic by channeling one element--say, Fire, which would produce flame--or by combining them--say, Fire and Earth, which would produce magma.

You also had to pick which "Q" faction, or Order, your character came from, and each had its own special abilities.  For instance, the Children of Ice, who believed in nothing, had developed disbelief into a magical art--by disbelieving hard enough the existence of something, they made it not exist for everyone.

The unusual thing about the game was the resolution system, although I didn't know it was unusual at the time.  The way it worked was, whenever you had a goal you needed to accomplish, you rolled dice, and the result of those dice gave you two options of abilities that you could use.  You couldn't do anything about it except use one of those two options, but you didn't have to worry about failure (unless you couldn't figure out how to use either of the options).

Looking back, that last concept kinda has some potential, and even some other aspects of the game do.  But at the time, we didn't do much about it.  The game always degenerated into our characters beating eachother up.  If someone tried to introduce any degree of story, or premise, or anything other than blowing eachother up with imaginative combinations of elements.  And I was right there at the forefront of it.  I wrote up a grimoire on looseleaf paper in which I listed every possible combination and figured out what it would do.  I believe this sort of behavior could be considered Hardcore Gamism?

The second to be made was Nothing, by Steve.  Nothing was basically a setting and a system of describing characters; no other rules were given.  The setting involved an intricate social hierarchical structure, and what class your character fell in determined his goals, the situations he had to deal with, and even what he had a right to do in the game world.  It had a very dreary, haunting tone to it and sometimes dealt with disturbing, surreal, and/or perverse situations.  The focus was on what these situations meant to the characters, how they dealt with it (or refused to deal with it), how they were impacted by it, and what these things said about who they were as people.

If I'm understanding things right, that game would be best for Narrativist play, which none of us understood, except possibly Steve.  The game was over our heads (we were in junior high, for crap's sake), and no one could get excited about it except Steve, so after a couple attempts at playing, it was abandoned and never finished.  Looking back, that makes me hurt in a place I can't define.  I'd love to have another crack at the game, now that I've matured as a gamer and a person, but it will never happen.


These games were followed by nameless rules-heavy, inconsistent games by me and James, one each, that were poorly realized mish-mashes of fantasy tropes, simply not fun at all, and about which little was worth remembering and even less is remembered.

Then I made another game, called Misadventures in Nowhere, which has been mutated, complicated, simplified, re-complicated, streamlined, reworked, rethought, and overhauled into my favorite unfinished game, The Rustbelt<that

[Larry L.]

Hi Marshall,

This is some interesting stuff. Just to make sure I'm clear, a few questions.

So this Misadventures in Nowhere game you describe, when did you play this? Way back in junior high? Have you been out of gaming since this game?

This game was just you, Gary, Matt, and Seth? Who were these people to you? Just your gaming buds?

[Marshall Burns]

We played MaNw in junior high and high school.  After that, I was pretty much out of the hobby except for a few scattered games of Toon and D&D, and except for continuing to design games (designing became, in itself, a hobby for me).

Gary, Matt, and Seth were just some friends that I talked into playing the game with me.  They were already into the sort of computer games that call themselves RPGs, so it wasn't too hard to get them to play.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Marshall,

I wish I could have seen the early-early ones too.

Here's my question about what you did describe. Clearly, somewhere along the way, you and the others picked up concepts from existing fantasy games, both mechanics ("classes") and imagery ("dark elf", "ogre"). It looks to me as if you picked them up in such a way ... well, as if they were necessary, unavoidable components of role-playing. Misadventures in Nowhere looks like a mash-up of these concepts.

The first description of the Q game seems extremely free of all that. In many ways, you guys were literally inventing role-playing, and it seems to me that it foundered strictly as a function of your adolescence. I can see why you grieve about it now, because it's as if you had discovered a precious, rare animal as a kid, but didn't know how to take care of it.

Am I right in thinking that you and the others encountered published role-playing sometime in between the two? Or perhaps, regardless of when you encountered it first, internalized the published material sometime between the two?

As a final point, I think we should stay away from the Creative Agenda (GNS) talk for a few posts. What you've stated about that stuff is a bit wonky - for instance, nothing about "swords and sorcery with guns and cars" denotes Gamist play, and nothing about "muse about dark and personal reactions to weirdness" denotes Narrativist play. So let's grab a more detailed look based on further posts, and then I'll walk you through the right questions to ask oneself in order to clarify Creative Agenda.

Best, Ron

[Marshall Burns]

Ron:

You hit the nail on the head describing the way we (or at least some of us) thought about those concepts and ideas from existing fantasy games; that they were "how it was done."  Although we had mostly encountered them through video games.  I was an avid video gamer (still am), and I think I was primarily the one who brought that stuff to the table.

Re: GNS, I've read the essays and have been reading the related discussions as much as I can.  I know what *most* of it means, but Narrativist still eludes me.  When I read the "Right to Dream" essay, I immediately had a "that's me, innit" reaction.  But the way I just used the terms in my previous post was, I can see now, very ambiguous (plus, there's always the possibility that I totally and truly have misunderstood the whole shootin' match). 

When I described my play in Misadventures in Nowhere as gamist, it wasn't because of the "sword & sorcery, guns & cars" thing, but because it was very competitive, there was a lot of "I kicked your ass" and "I got the gold first," and the first thing on my mind was "how do I win in this situation?"  Any other type of play got blown out of the water by the constant attempts at one-upping the other players and making their characters suffer (the more gruesomely the better, was how we felt about it at the time).  The setting was just a backdrop that was never really thought about, the characters (in terms of actual characterization) took a back seat. It was more like a war game than anything else.

Does that make sense?


As an aside, the more I think about those early days, the more I wish I had held onto the little rules sheets and whatnot.  That is, the ones from games besides Misadventures in Nowhere.  I have all of that crap.

[Larry L.]

Marshall,

Ron has beaten me to the punch on a couple things. I also am very curious what influences you had which led you to make up your own role-playing games. If you actually made up your own games without prior exposure to published games, this is exciting stuff to see.

When you say video games, do you mean so-called "RPGs" like Final Fantasy, or something else?

Ron's advice on GNS terminology is also wise. Statements like "We were playing VERY gamist" seem rather nonsensical in the context you're using them; it would help a lot if you explained what you actually mean by those. I know you're eager to bust out the lingo, but for now let's pretend like you've never heard the terms Gamist, Sim, or Narrativist.

I'm also interested in some value judgments you're making between some gameplay that is a bit silly and irreverant -- but clearly fun -- and some ill-defined "mature" gaming that you'd rather be doing now. I'm left with the impression you're a little embarrassed by your early game efforts. But I don't see where you have anything to be embarrassed about. These games sound pretty cool to me!

[wreckage]

Dwogres? Robots? Flesh eating owls? Grotesque character death as the driving goal of the game?

That so totally rocks.

-Sam

[Marshall Burns]

Larry:

When I said video games, some of them were "RPGs" (although I despise Final Fantasy and all its Wagnerian senseless bombast), but I was (and still am) especially fond of action/adventure games (from Legend of Zelda to Shadow of the Colossus), and straight-up action games (Castlevania and Twisted Metal at the top of the list).  I had also been exposed to computerized versions of D&D (the SSI goldbox games).
Now, I believe that Rowdy and Steve had played a little bit of Vampire at some point.

The GNS... GNS, GNS, GNS...  I think I've been basically feeling the terms out.  I tend to keep shooting at something until I hit it; if I miss, I realize it, but I don't make any reaction to it, I just keep shooting.  I also tend to not let on when somebody says something that leads to a correction on my part; I'm *very* accustomed to figuring things out on my own, and often loath to let on that I had help in it.  When Ron said "walk you through," I twitched.  But, hey, none of you people should worry about that, that's just my enormous ego.  I seriously am here to learn, despite any kneejerks I might shoot off from time to time.


Okay, now, silly vs. serious -- I don't mean that nonsense is immature.  I love nonsense.  What I meant by maturing as a gamer was that I am capable of playing in more "serious" modes.
Now, I'm embarassed about Misadventures because it wasn't supposed to be so silly.  What I really wanted was for it to be gritty and compelling, and it just came out silly all the time.  Which was fun, but it wasn't what I was trying to do.  (The Rustbelt, the creature that Misadventures evolved into, still contains occasional absurdities, but they tend to be slightly disturbing as well as amusing, in a sort of Burroughsian fashion).

Sam Wreckage:
Thanks   Maybe I should make a game that's *supposed* to be like that.