Roll It Up!

So, the Raptor Squad game has effectively been dead for, oh, going on about three years now. In that time I’ve run several games for the gradually shrinking group of roleplayers. The first actual game was a play-by-post I ran during the Raptor Squad years called “Freelancer”. I was a fun game with some cool characters, but was sidelined by a selfish, self-centered gamer who was more interested in showing he could “outsmart” or “outwit” the Gamemaster than he was in playing a game with friends. A trait that would eventually lead to him being told he wasn’t welcome in the gaming group any longer. The Freelancer game lasted a few months but really didn’t go very far (thanks in part to the aforementioned player and the fact the Raptor Squad game was winding down and I was asked to GM a new game) The new game was “Boiling Point” a cross between the Star Wars RPG and Shadowrun. Boiling Point went well…I was able to do a lot of exciting things with the characters and able to create some original storylines and settings. The game took place on a planet called “Blue Xenith”, and quite a bit or work went into fleshing it out.
Boiling Point lasted from January 2006 until mid 2007. A few of my gamers left or simply disappeared (the reasons are varied, though that little tale is an entire blog entry unto itself). When it became obvious folks were having a hard time showing up, I started a play-by-post game called “OCW”.
Outlaw Championship Wrestling lasted for all of a few months. The work that went into it actually surpassed the amount of time we played the game- a piss-poor statement if there ever was one. There were a few reasons why this game failed to take off and endure. Again, I won’t go into the details…suffice to say, that I learned one VERY important rule about my gamers that day:

Do not, EVER, pit them against one another. EVER.

See, when facing insurmountable evil across the galaxy, or taking on a crimelord or cutthroat band of pirates as a TEAM, the gamers worked well together, and each loss was shared as a loss by the team. But, when pitted against one another, as the OCW did…placing player-created wrestlers against other player created wrestlers…well, lets just say that some players can’t handle “losing” in the imaginary world of roleplaying. Which was a damn shame and sad as piss really…over half of the group had a blast with it, while just a few either couldn’t summon the ambition to participate (which allowed storylines and angles to stagnate) or would get outright pissed off when their grapplers would lose (keep in mind we were only three weeks into the matches when the complaining started). It was sad that it had to end the way it did…but it did end. And looking back at all of the work, time and money spent on creating it, I can honestly say that I’m proud of what I was able to create and accomplish with it, even if it didn’t last very long, while disappointed in the players and “friends” who felt that losing in an imaginary game somehow demeaned them as human beings or something. I guess they didn’t see having a group of people who care about you and consider you a good friend counted as “winning”, but maybe that kind of insight only comes with maturity-something these folks tended to lack.

Anyway, a few months passed, and with a smaller group of roleplayers now totaling four, I figured I would go back to the Star Wars well and start up a new game. The premise? Bounty Hunters (an old, but popular, standby), out in the galaxy trying to make a buck. The players agreed and in January we rolled up characters and February we ran through our first game with the new characters.

There was only one problem- I was totally burned out on Star Wars.

See, this March marked my 9th year of doing NOTHING but Star Wars roleplaying (around the table at least). It wasn’t until time to run the new game that I realized I was just burned out. The hobby I had grown to love had become a burden. I was tired of cookie cutter Jedi, evil Hutt crimelords, starships that all looked the same save for a new ion thruster or some other such nonsense. The D6 SWRPG community is all but dead, so that helped matters little. Bottom line, if you don’t know SWRPG D20/SAGA don’t even bother going on a message board or forum looking for inspiration- it’s pretty much a waste of time. In the past, when creating a new game for my players I was driven by unrestrained enthusiasm that drove me to create some truly unique and interesting adventures and settings.

Not this time.

This time, out of respect for my players (who can only meet once a month to game) I phoned it in. I did something I’ve never done before- run an adventure out of a module.

And it sucked. Harder than a F5 blowing through a Hoover factory.

The players knew it, though God Bless Em’ they tried to be positive about the suckage, but the damage was done. I was finished. I couldn’t bring myself to shove my group under the bus again for the sake of simply running such a sucky game. At first I blamed myself, but hey, I’m all about placing blame where it is due…and the adventure module didn’t help a bit. The adventure was convoluted, confusing and in the end, made little real sense. I should have tried something else, but the fact is that I didn’t have the time to come up with something on my own, so I put my trust in this ass-tastic adventure module and got burned for it. Now, I understand the problem with adventure modules- those that work are ones that generally pigeonhole players into pre-made characters or sets limits or requirements on what kind of characters the players can run…then there are the ones that tank- and tank hard. The problem? The writers of the modules have no clue what kind of characters, or, more importantly, what kind of Players you will be running through the adventure. So, they tend to make very generic generalizations and plots that try to accommodate most games…and the end result is either a game that works and is enjoyed by everyone or a game that doesn’t work.

Well, this one didn’t work-no, this one signed up for welfare, grabbed a sign and found a cozy spot beneath a highway underpass to panhandle for loose change.

Deflated, I was ready to pack up the Gm’ing tools and call it a day. But, it’s not that easy- not for me at least. See, I don’t have tons of kids screaming for my attention every day to pull me away from gaming. I don’t have a job that keeps me occupied till 10pm slaving away for that almighty dollar. I don’t have a wife who nags and bitches at me any time she sees a gaming book lying out in the open (quite the opposite in fact- I’ve got the most wonderful wife in the world who would respond “Hey! Cool! A new sourcebook for our game!”- yes, lick your lips with envy fanboys).
So, I’ve got the time to put on a good game…heck, a GREAT game- but I’ve got to be enthusiastic. I’ve got to feel the drive to create. I didn’t have it with Star Wars anymore…but what about other genres? Now there’s an idea…an idea that had been hovering in the back of my mind for some time really.
So, I went back to my crew and presented it as such:

“There is a D6 Fantasy game, using the D6 system but instead of Star Wars/Space it's fantasy/Sword & Sorcery...it's like D&D but with the D6 rules (which I like better).Would you guys be interested in trying it out? Maybe rolling up some new fantasy characters and giving it a whirl?"

They agreed, having been weaned on old school D&D (Back in the days where you found bare breasted succubus gracing the pages of the sourcebooks). Knowing that the interest existed, I began rolling through my mind the various ideas/plots/personalities I could create and use to populate this new world. Inspiration poured from the likes of John Howe, Tolkien and even the Elder Scrolls video game (which is the world our game will eventually be set in). And gradually, but with increasing speed, the enthusiasm began to build. With every page I read in the new rulebook, with every spell I converted over from D&D, with every piece of parchment paper that rolled out of my printer sporting a new list of potions or some other bit of arcane goodness, I could hear the roleplaying muse calling to me, her sweet song drawing my fingers across the keyboard as I worked on 3d models of the new player characters or customized character sheets for the players.
We sat down this past Saturday night and rolled up new characters, and the trio of adventurers are now poised to sally forth into the fantasy world of Tamriel, where goblins, wizards and dragons await. I don’t know how long my enthusiasm will last (or that of my players for that matter) but I can’t worry about that. You don’t go through life worrying about what might happen or what will happen, you can only worry about the here and now, and make decisions and actions that will hopefully bear fruit for future endeavors. Advice as relevant to real life as it is to a pastime spent rolling dice and eating junk food with friends.
So here I am ready to run a different game set in a different world. No Jedi, no Sith, no starships. Just swords, sorcery and a group of great roleplayers willing to give it all a go and go back to their roots (and mine) as gamers.
I’ll let you know how it goes.