benlehman | De-geeking role-playing games

De-geeking role-playing games

This comes up, maybe, every month or so in the online conversations I follow. "role-playing games need to be less geeky!"

I just wanted to record here that I think that the entire idea is ridiculous for the following reasons:

1) Perceptions of role-playing games by our culture at large are generally positive: that they are fun, but very time-consuming and potentially obsession forming. Which is about accurate.

2) Since, oh, 1996, geeky things have been hella cool. Hello gamers? I know that you live under a rock, unexposed to the culture at large. But srsly.

I'm posting here because I don't want to have to write this same post, like, 80 times only to have it fall (again) on totally deaf ears.

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I find that the habit of trying to make things non-geeky and "cool" invariably makes them lame. What sorts of non-geeky ideas would make RPGs better? Games about badass dudes with dirt bikes who do sweet tricks? Games about XXXXtreme street luge, where all characters vaguely resemble Vin Diesel?

Not to mention the fact that the basic building blocks of a roleplaying game-- books, reading, playing make-believe with your own story-- are kind of seen as inherently geeky. There's absolutely no reason to fight it.

Actually, it's games that deal with real, "mundane," historical (but still heavy-hitting) stuff that I think are a good idea. My favorite examples are Steal Away Jordan and Grey Ranks. Note that these games are amazing whether or not they bring new blood into the hobby: they stand as works of art on their own. The fact that they deal with stuff every educated person—even non-geeks—knows about (American slavery and WWII, respectively)—is just icing on the cake.

Matt

You think serious exploration of historically accurate settings makes a game LESS geeky?

I'd humbly submit that playing Grey Ranks or SAJ for the historical content is just as geeky as playing D&D for the orcs. In MY opinion, I'd rank it to be geekier, perhaps because I'm more into games for gaming's sake than I am into history (although I love history), and there can be a tendency to see yourself as being more mainstream.

Well, I'm trying to say that one of the "barriers to entry" for well-educated but not particularly "geeky" in the traditional sense folks, isn't the purely mechanical rules of D&D, GURPS, or whatever. It's the unfamiliarity of the gameworlds and situations that presents an equally high burden. There are how many races? How many continents/planets/whatever? How many schools of magic?

GR and SAJ aren't about history, really—it's just that the setting backgrounds are things people have heard of, and that are at least reasonably easy to envision, unlike, say, DragonLance.

Although on reflection, given the popularity of LotR and Harry Potter and so on and so forth in recent years, I'll concede that the notion of being in "a fantasy world" is probably not as big a deal as it would have been in the late 90's. I still maintain that the equation "roleplaying = genre fiction" is problematic, as the two don't need to have anything to do with each other.

Matt

I would play this games.

But would you write the Vin Diesel Street Luge game? Because that would be pretty great.

A role-playing game of personal exploration.

Uh, yeah, sure. Give me a second.

I am waiting with bated breath.

Your character is an extreme street luger. He vaguely resembles vin diesel. Pick three characteristics (build, coloring, haircut, attitude, eyes, hands, voice) in which your character resembles Vin Diesel. In all other ways, he does not resemble Vin Diesel at all. Pick which ones apply.

Your character has the following attributes, measured 1-8
Toughness
History
Style
Coolness
Perception
Strength
Speaking

These correspond to the Vin Diesel comparisons. For anything that you have in common with Vin Diesel, go ahead and give yourself an 8. For anything else, roll 1d6.

Note: If you are Vin Diesel, go ahead and take an 8 in everything.

Also, seriously, Pitch Black was *so* much better than Riddick.

Seconded.

Oh, you have one other stat:

I am famous to this many people:

It starts at 1. It can get as high as 12

The first one is your mother.

The game has two parts. Luges and Ordinary Life

Luges:
You don't actually play a race. You just play the aftermath of a race, where you all review what happened over cheap beer at a guy's house. The guy, like, puts up with you for some reason, but isn't terribly happy that you're there.

Who won? Everyone draw a card. Highest card won. That person gets one prestige! About which more later. If more than one person has highest, it was a photo finish and you're arguing about it. No one gets the prestige.

So, each person gets to ask each other person a question. Which is basically about how they dealt with some tricky obstacle of the course, or about how they wiped out some time, or whatever. Basically about something that they did on the course. This requires then to use one of their attributes to answer. So you're like "oh, it totally reminded me of the time when ..." that's history. Etc. Each questioner determines what attribute you use to answer, but you can choose to force an answer with another attribute, in which case you take a penalty.

Then you see how your answer is received. If you used the questioner's suggested attribute, draw a card. If you used your own, draw two cards and take the highest.

Compare the card to your attribute. If it is equal or lower, you gain one prestige. If it is a joker, you screw up your thing and lose a prestige if you had one to lose.

Shoot the shit until everyone has asked someone else one question.

Then you try to convert your prestige into fame. Draw cards, one at a time, for each point of prestige. Is it higher than your present fame? If so, add one to fame. If not, discard it. When you've finished this your prestige goes to zero.

Then you have to deal with daily life. You have three things you want. These can be things like:
1) Get into community college.
2) Ask the hot girl at the club on a date.
3) Move out of my mom's basement.

etc.

Have a scene where you try to do one of your things. Draw three cards and compare to an appropriate attribute. If all of them are lower, you succeed!

If you are the most famous street luger, you may use your fame instead of an attribute. If there's a tie, no one can.

If you accomplish all three of your things, you win! You're happy.

You can also decide to drop out of street luging. In this case, you don't get to hang out with the guys anymore. Each time you miss a race, your fame drops by one. However, when you do other things, you only draw one card to compare to your attribute, rather than three.

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De-geeking role-playing games

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I agree with you, of course

Re: I agree with you, of course

XXXXtreme STREET LUGE!

I do not have an icon to express my excitement here

That'll do

XXXXtreme STREET LUGE!

Re: I agree with you, of course

Re: Pitch Black

Re: I agree with you, of course