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In RPG Theory

12/6/2003 Noon: Computer RPG's and the difference perceived
I was looking at a thread from a few months ago 'Computer RP software' http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=8117 I just wanted to raise a few questions to this quote by an unknown mouse.…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Noon, Calithena, Eero Tuovinen, Jack Spencer Jr, anonymouse, Andrew Norris, M. J. Young, Marhault, John Kim, Mike Holmes, Kataphraktos, Endoperez, Thierry Michel.

12/6/2003 John Kim: Anti-my-guy Syndrome
[quote="xiombarg"] One essay is particularly notable: "But I Vas Chust Follwink Mein Character Concept!" by Greg Stolze. In it, Greg posits the "Gamer Nuremburg Defense", characterized by the cry: "Not…
In RPG Theory
Participants: John Kim, Valamir, Jack Spencer Jr, Christopher Kubasik, M. J. Young, RaconteurX, greyorm, epweissengruber, xiombarg, Ron Edwards, Mike Holmes, pete_darby, Gordon C. Landis, eyebeams, contracycle.

12/6/2003 jdagna: Mystery Mechanic: A Clue Bank
I'm about to start a new campaign for Pax Draconis that will focus around a long-term investigation. The players requested the mystery and investigation parts, and to facilitate it, I'm…
In RPG Theory
Participants: jdagna, Andrew Martin, b_bankhead, M. J. Young.

12/5/2003 xiombarg: Social Contract Fodder
As we all know, problems with the social contract of the game are often part-and-parcel with overall social problems. Which is why I found this essay particularly interesting: http://www.plausiblydeniable.com/opinion/gsf.html I…
In RPG Theory
Participants: xiombarg, C. Edwards, jdagna, Ron Edwards, Christopher Kubasik.

12/5/2003 xiombarg: Theory for the Average Gamer
White Wolf recently released the Vampire Player's Guide for Vampire Revised (aka Vampire 3rd Edition). The book is 90% system-free, consisting of mainly essays about how one should play Vampire.…
In RPG Theory
Participants: xiombarg, John Kim, LordSmerf, eyebeams.

12/5/2003 s3kt0r: Superhuman vs. Regular Human Combat Mechanics
I'm in the process of developing a RPG and am getting in a bit of a stick with the combat mechanics. I need a system that allows for superhumanly fast…
In RPG Theory
Participants: s3kt0r, Noon, Andrew Martin, M. J. Young, John Kim, HMT, Marhault, Funksaw, Mike Holmes, Nawara, failrate, happyelf.

12/4/2003 bigsimon: A different take on initiative...?
I'm not sure if anyone has tried something like this before. It doesn't completely get rid of "turn based" combat, but changes it a little. ------------------------- Action Pool Initiative is…
In RPG Theory
Participants: bigsimon, HMT, s3kt0r, Mike Holmes.

12/4/2003 MachMoth: Two, two games in one!!!
In my early days of RPG, I quickly became trained in the art of never letting the party split. It was believed, at the time, that attempting to juggle multiple…
In RPG Theory
Participants: MachMoth, Noon, gobi, C. Edwards, Trevis Martin, jdagna, contracycle, Paganini, Ron Edwards, M. J. Young, Ben Morgan, LordSmerf.

12/3/2003 anonymouse: mechanic: Trouble!
I know Orkworld has this as some foundation of its in-game society and probably mechanics as well, but since that apparently had some super-1337 printrun never to see the light…
In RPG Theory
Participants: anonymouse, Ben Morgan, Ron Edwards, Noon.

12/3/2003 Emily Care: lexicon entry
Hello, I hadn't come across this entry to the RPG Lexicon before. Makes it all seem strangely codified and real to be posted this way. http://harmonies.tzone.org/RPGLex/index.cgi/Threefold Amusingly enough, there is…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Emily Care, Ron Edwards, M. J. Young.

12/2/2003 sirogit: Game Mechanic: Creepy magic
The basic idea is, a player states what his character is doing to activate a magical effect(Which can be anything, even simply activating the effect at will.), and it's effect/if…
In RPG Theory
Participants: sirogit, Mike Holmes, simon_hibbs, Jonathan Walton, gobi.

12/2/2003 Dev: Game Mechanic: the "Wobble" factor
Instead of "success/failure" task resolution, this idea is based on increasing the "wobbliness" or "wonkiness" of certain tasks, while looking for certain dice-patterns instead of numberical results. What's the point?…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Dev, xiombarg, contracycle, Mike Holmes, gobi, Lxndr, M. J. Young.

12/2/2003 Noon: Primal situation
Awhile ago on the RPG.net forum there was a thread on situation and characters by Valamir. It was a rant, but the focus was the players supplying the situations that…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Noon, Valamir, qxjit, Christopher Kubasik, Mike Holmes, Ron Edwards.

12/1/2003 anonymouse: system part: Karmic character design
Sprung from some discussion in #indiegames tonight and simmered for awhile.. A character accumulates Karma over the course of its life. When it dies, its Karma is totalled up and…
In RPG Theory
Participants: anonymouse, Ron Edwards, LordSmerf, Paganini, Shreyas Sampat, MachMoth.

11/28/2003 Thierry Michel: Wishes non fulfilled
There an article by Umberto Eco there, about the death of the printed book. The last paragraphs are especially interesting (to me, at least): Indeed, in a role-play game…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Thierry Michel, pete_darby.

11/27/2003 sirogit: Relationship Map Techniques?
Having a spot of difficulty in making relationship maps that involve the PCs strongly in the story(Even with group created R-maps.) I was wondering if anyone used paticurly effective techniques…
In RPG Theory
Participants: sirogit, Noon, hix, Roy, Mike Holmes.

11/27/2003 Noon: Good cop, bad cop
Recently I had an idea to operate a game at a different level. I thought of almost having two GM's (yeah, nothing new). But in this case one has more…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Noon, Mike Holmes, Michael S. Miller, MachMoth, The Benj, Andrew Norris, Emily Care.

11/26/2003 Calithena: Interesting RPG history link
I got some offline queries about RPG history. Victor Raymond, who plays in M.A.R. Barker's Thursday Night Game, wrote the article at the attached lnik; he hasn't followed it up…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Calithena, Emily Care, Valamir, Jack Spencer Jr, Liz Henry.

11/26/2003 Dotan Dimet: Just Desserts (clarify Reward techniques, please)
Forge newbie ramble. Please bear with me. In The Whole Model, Ron writes: I consider the two most important Techniques to be reward system and IIEE. Now, I understood…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Dotan Dimet, MachMoth, Ron Edwards, M. J. Young.

11/25/2003 Dotan Dimet: Races and "races" in literature and RPGs
Re: the RPG-Orc thing, the weirdest case of symbolic stand-ins IMO was in the Underground RPG, where psychotic superpowered discharged vets (the PCs of the futuristic setting) play a literary…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Dotan Dimet, Ron Edwards, James Holloway.

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Subsequent Topics
In RPG Theory

12/6/2003 gobi: Word Banks / Knowing what a game is "about"
A few months ago, I was listening to music from Ecco the Dolphin 2. I loved that game as a kid, it was one of the few I'd play for…
In RPG Theory
Participants: gobi.

12/7/2003 Funksaw: Sayin' hi.
Hi. This is Funksaw. I was thinking about writing a non-fiction book about RPGs over winter break - so I figured I'd better take a vacation from most of RPG.net,…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Funksaw, Dregg, Jonathan Walton, Christopher Kubasik.

12/7/2003 amper: Best/Most Popular Universal Systems?
I have been wondering lately about indie universal systems--which systems are considered the best and/or most popular out there these days? I've been away from gaming for a while, but…
In RPG Theory
Participants: amper, Bob McNamee, M. J. Young, peejay, Mike Holmes, cruciel, hawklord2112, Dev.

12/8/2003 Andrew Martin: What is "realism"?
I've seen and read a lot of posts on various RPG forums and mailing lists, where the designer of a new RPG states that they wanted the design to be…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Andrew Martin, Christopher Kubasik, John Kim, contracycle, timfire, Thierry Michel, Ron Edwards, Valamir, Noon, pete_darby, Mike Holmes, Jack Spencer Jr, Ian Charvill, ADGBoss, M. J. Young.

12/9/2003 gobi: Percentile probability question...
Say the task resolution is a percentile roll vs. another person's percentile roll, whoever is higher wins. Now consider that it is possible to roll several d10s and only take…
In RPG Theory
Participants: gobi, Dev, Brian Leybourne, John Kim, MachMoth, Ron Edwards, timfire.

12/11/2003 quozl: How do you start designing an RPG?
Shane Hensley talks about how he gets started making an RPG over at http://www.peginc.com/Articles/DeadlandsReloaded/Part01.htm It's interesting that he gets a visual hook before he starts to churn out the text.…
In RPG Theory
Participants: quozl, Dev, Ron Edwards, ethan_greer, Jonathan Walton, ross_winn, Green, M. J. Young, ADGBoss, Jeph, gobi, Mark Johnson.

12/11/2003 Bob Goat: Game Master Sections
What kind of information is good to place in a Game Master Chapter/Section of a core rule book? In our game right now we have rules that apply only to…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Bob Goat, anonymouse, MachMoth, Andrew Martin, M. J. Young, Jack Aidley, ADGBoss, Marhault, Noon.

12/12/2003 timfire: Help w/ D20 mod: Making initiative more TROS-like
I'm not sure how many d20 players/designers the Forge has, but I thought I would ask this question anyway. Inspired by TROS, I've thought about making a mod (or whatever…
In RPG Theory
Participants: timfire, Jack Aidley, MachMoth, Mike Holmes, Andrew Martin, M. J. Young, Drifter Bob, The Benj.

12/12/2003 greyorm: Schizo Exalted
This arose from a discussion over in Actual Play about a Bumpy Exalted Game. Since I don't believe any of this has to do with John's actual problem, I'm starting…
In RPG Theory
Participants: greyorm, Eero Tuovinen, eyebeams, Ron Edwards, Blake Hutchins, Funksaw, Noon, qxjit.

12/13/2003 gobi: How does one go about "reactive" game design?
As opposed to "proactive" game design, wherein the designer gets an idea and develops it into a game, I'm considering "reactive" game design to be the act of trying to…
In RPG Theory
Participants: gobi, anonymouse, John Kim, Andrew Martin.

12/13/2003 eyebeams: Observation on Open-Ended Systems
Just something that;s come up for me lately: In an open-ended system (one where you can acheive many results beyond the scope of the ability of any GM to necessarily…
In RPG Theory
Participants: eyebeams, Noon, Mike Holmes, Walt Freitag.

12/13/2003 hawklord2112: A New take on the Lumpley Principal - or a new application?
OK so i'm going to stick my neck out here since a) i'm at work and a little pressured b) i dont fully understand the principle inthe first place and…
In RPG Theory
Participants: hawklord2112, Jonathan Walton, greyorm, Eero Tuovinen, Paganini, Bob McNamee, M. J. Young, Ron Edwards.

12/13/2003 hawklord2112: Lumpley Principle (split)
[quote="lumpley"]At any moment during play any participant can stop using the game mechanics as written. At that moment, whether the game comes to a (likely screeching) halt or continues, changed,…
In RPG Theory
Participants: hawklord2112, Ron Edwards, Walt Freitag, John Kim, Paganini, greyorm.

12/15/2003 Dev: Best system for Play-by-Post play?
I've noticed (and overheard, from other threads), that certain systems are particularly ill-suited for the time-lag inherent in play-by-post. The one PbP game I ran ultimately broke because I ran…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Dev, Christopher Weeks, MachMoth, M. J. Young, Andrew Norris, mark2v, The Benj, Grex, drozdal, RaconteurX, ejh.

12/15/2003 Pteryx: Four main forms of RPGs (split)
As most of my RP experience has been online in various text-based forms, I hope I can be of help in clarifying the differences between them. From what I've seen,…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Pteryx, Ron Edwards.

12/16/2003 anonymouse: Thoughts on a roleplaying-combat philosophy.
((NOTE: bcook tossed in some gnarly Last Samurai spoilers in his post, so beware!)) Inspiration: M.J. Young in this thread: One thing is that players have to work with contingencies:…
In RPG Theory
Participants: anonymouse, bcook1971, rafial, Noon, Jeph, M. J. Young, xechnao, hatheg-kla, Mark Johnson, Wolfen, Ian Cooper, Lxndr.

12/17/2003 hyphz: Betrayal
In a gamist D&D3E game I've run recently, the players complained several times about being betrayed by either NPCs or environment construction. Hypothesis: In a Gamist/Illusionist game, betrayal of one…
In RPG Theory
Participants: hyphz, Andrew Norris, MachMoth, jdagna, Ron Edwards, Mike Holmes, Noon, epweissengruber, Comte, Troy_Costisick.

12/20/2003 gobi: Off-Balance Resolution: A mechanic looking for a home
A mechanic just jumped out at me over breakfast, but I'm having trouble thinking of a setting or genre in which it would be most ideally suited. It's a mechanic…
In RPG Theory
Participants: gobi, Noon, Bob McNamee, Andrew Martin, Chris Goodwin, Marhault, happyelf, M. J. Young, Shreyas Sampat, Harlequin.

12/21/2003 Endoperez: Advice wanted for a Percentile system
A long time ago, I found free rpg rules system called Knights of Legend from internet. It is a percentile system, and it has main attributes, attributes counted from them…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Endoperez, John Kim, Andrew Martin, Anthony I, M. J. Young.

12/26/2003 gobi: The Fun of Game Design
In response to the What are your goals as a game designer? thread, I'd like to ask slightly different questions. It is often said among big-time movie production crews that…
In RPG Theory
Participants: gobi, Lxndr, M. J. Young, ethan_greer, Palaskar, jdagna.

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