My Ultimate Game

Barking Alien posed a good one this month: What is your ultimate game?

I'll answer that, and then I'll expand upon it a bit: how does that drive your other games? The one's you're running now that are not your ultimate?

First though, time for some self-examination:

Genre/Setting
"The universe is your playground" - Supers!

Approach
I outline the setting, I sketch out some factions and villains, the players make their characters and we see where things go. No metaplots. No adventure paths (as an entire campaign anyway). I would figure out certain events that would be happening in each "season" and the players could react (or not) to those in any way they choose.

*Open Table* would be the holiest of grails here. . Supers is the easiest genre to justify characters dropping in and out from session to session. Maybe I run the first and the second Saturdays each month and whoever can make it makes it.

Pace
We might only meet once a month, but I'd like to get through more than one or two combat encounters in that session. More comic book "let's go!" and less planning and optimization ahead of time.


Players/PC
I'd like to have multiple groups running separately in the same setting. Some players might overlap, no problem. Might be an East Coast team, might be a West Coast team, might be in the same city, might be a space team for special occasions too. I'd let the players drive this after a while. Over time I'd like to see the players make multiple characters for different parts of the campaign. I'd like them to design some of the villains too.

System
I agree with BA here - in many ways this is the least important element. I have a multitude of systems and editions of those systems for running supers and I could have a good time with most of them. M&M, Champions, ICONS, Marvel, DC - all of them are worthy.

Now for my contribution: How does thinking of this as my "ultimate" impact my other games?

• Potential Games: Well, I like Rifts. It covers a lot of the same ground as far as freedom while having a more specific flavor. A Savage Worlds Rifts campaign where the rules add to the fun instead of blocking it is very attractive. 
• Actual Games: I like a lot of the "weirder" Pathfinder games. Wrath of the Righteous is PF dialed up to 11 via Mythic Power. It throws balance out the window pretty quickly and the latter half is looking more like a cosmic superhero campaign than a traditional D&D game. Our most-likely second choice after this is Iron Gods where lasers and robots and wrecked spaceships are all part of the package. 
• Other games: For western games I like Deadlands - because there's super tech and supernatural abilities. For Space Opera I like Star Wars - freedom and force powers. For post-apocalyptic I like Gamma World and Rifts - more powers there too. 

As far as "have I run this" - no. I've brushed up against it in some ways but I've never had the full package I discussed above. Have I run my best game already? I doubt it. I like to think I get better over time at this. New games, the occasional new player, a new tool - all of these things help adjust attitudes and approaches to even old games. Knowing what's important and what is not improves with experience. Knowing a particular group tends to improve over time. Hopefully those best games are still ahead!

Un-Horror Games (A Late Halloween Post)

I've never been big on horror RPGs. I don't hate them - I just don't get them. I've read plenty of Lovecraft, like horror movies and shows in general, but they just don't translate to the tabletop for me. Some illustration:

•  I've never seen people jump in fright at a table the way they do in a scary movie. I think this is where "An RPG is not a book or a movie" kicks in really hard for me. I think part of the impact of a horror book or a movie is the lack of control - "please don't open that door" - and yet control is one of the signature features of an RPG. It's what makes them different than a book or a movie. Characters in more traditional media routinely make bad decisions and "go into the creepy barn" when an RPG character might run away, round up some help, or go oil up the chainsaw before entering. It's a completely different situation.

• Most roleplaying games focus on some level of heroic play. You're a bigger than life character fighting the good fight against bad things. Modern D&D, Pathfinder, Star Wars, most Savage Worlds campaigns, the various superhero games - all of these tend in that direction. You don't run from evil - you run towards it! Maybe it's because you're a hero, maybe it's because they have the gold and the XP but that's a strong assumption within the game. Horror is usually assuming the opposite - there are things you should run away from and in many cases you cannot defeat at all. At best you can temporarily contain them, and that's fairly unsatisfying to a lot of heroic style players. I'll include myself in that bunch.

• The best I've been able to do and experience is a sense of impending doom. A game like the Warhammer RPG includes situations where the PC's know they have to face a foe they likely cannot defeat but have to do it anyway to save someone or cause some temporary difficulty to the foe. This is different from "fear". It's more of a doomed hero vibe than a horror vibe. I think a fair amount of Call of Cthulu adventures end up falling into this category as well. 

I'm not saying there aren't some people out there who can run it - the right GM, the right system, and the right players might do everything I cannot. I've never seen it in person but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It's just never worked that way for me, either as a player or as a GM. My attempts at horror games look more like "Ash vs. Evil Dead" than "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" and honestly I am fine with that. My players have a good time, I have a good time, everybody wins on some level. 

Yes, in Season 2 The Delta gets possessed! The horror!

I've said it before but the only thing I've seen legitimately scare players in tabletop gaming is level-drains and instant-death poison/traps/magic in old school D&D. Sure, it's random and unfair and terribly inconsiderate of your character's perceived place in the narrative, but isn't that what horror is about? The unexpected? The permanent loss? That's a canvas I can work with, but most players nowadays are not interested in those kinds of mechanics. I suspect that just reinforces my feelings about horror games stated above. It still makes for a nice change of pace every once in a while.

Meme-tastic Monday

I generally keep politics off of the blog but tomorrow is election day in the U.S. This is as close as I'm going to get to the whole thing here.

Halloween Memes

Meme-tatstic Monday

The Opportunity Game for October

So on our open slot over the weekend we ended up playing through the beginner game for Force and Destiny. I won't go into too many details as it's a very linear "learn the game while having fun doing stuff" type of product, which means it's good for one run-through and then you're pretty much done. That's fine - it does what it says it will do. We played through it in about 4 hours. By the end everyone understood the system and was interested in doing more with it, albeit with their own characters and not pre-gens. The rust came off pretty quickly for me and I felt reasonably competent in running the system after my second time.

Side note: How does the game handle Jedi in the party? By making everyone a force user! Every "class" in F&D is a force-user, and for each of them one of the three specializations (sub-type) is tied to one of the lightsaber forms. I think it will give enough differentiation between mechanical capabilities to keep a full party of force-users happy. The main question there though is setting. Do I really want to run a party of say 3-6 characters that are all force users in the Rebellion era? Even the early, "rise of the empire" years right after Order 66? I'm not sure. I can see some possibilities but I think I'd be more likely to run that party during the Old Republic era. It just feels like a better fit to me.

An additional insight, for what it's worth: This system is the inverse of Marvel Heroic, which was the other candidate for the night.

• With Marvel, the improv roleplaying is largely before the roll. "I can use this because of this and this because of this" etc. to assemble your pool and declare what you're trying to accomplish. Then once you roll it's mostly resolution of the resulting mechanics.  
• With FFG Star Wars the die elements for the roll are pretty much determined by the rules: skills, stats, gear, difficulty/opposition, and effects of earlier rolls. The roleplaying/improvising comes afterwards, as you try to explain what the roll means. "Ok ... so I missed the trooper but I shot the gun out of his hand and my powerpack is out so I need to reload to fire again." - something like that. 

Both have their ups and downs. The Marvel version is a little more grounded in the character's capabilities and history and wild swings of the dice tend to be a better or worse version of what you planned to do. Star Wars is simpler to build a pool and roll but then the results could be all over the place regardless of what the character is about. Roll a bunch of advantages and suddenly your medic might become a trick shot artist. Roll a bunch of threat and your assassin may suddenly become a clumsy oaf. This is aside from success or failure! The results depend quite a bit on interpretation, there's not really a fixed list of what things have to be, but it can be tough to 1) figure out the roll, 2) come up with a result that fits the character, and 3) do this in a timely fashion.  Marvel feels more natural at this point and Star Wars more challenging but Marvel was pretty out there when it was new to me too.

So it was time well-spent with friends and kids. When we get another open session on the calendar, and we probably will get a few as we get into the holidays, we may do more of this and try out some characters of our own making. Or we may start Chapter two of "Modern Marvels" - we will just have to see.

Meme-tastic Monday

Yeah ... figure I'll give it a week,

40K Friday - Modular Eldar

I started this Eldar ramp-up late last year after puttering around with it two years ago. This time I stuck to it, focusing heavily on the Eldar in acquisition, painting, and playing this year. I'm not quite finished with them yet but I have a pretty solid set of pieces to use.

Acquired (and mostly painted!):

• The "Ghost Host" - the wraith host formation of spiritseer, wraithknight, wraithlord, and wraithguard x3. That's 1000+ points and the core of my army in any sizable game.
• The Reaper Host - an aspect host of 3 squads of dark reapers. The rear-area line-holders of the army. It's pricey to take all 3 squads at full strength so I adjust to either smaller squads or fewer squads depending on the situation.
• The Big Guns - Area denial at its finest, this is a Vaul's wrath battery of 3 d-cannons. This is surprisingly inexpensive for what it can do, and at toughness 7 it's a tough unit, especially in cover. Thinking about putting the spiritseer or the fasrseer in it next time because of this.  
• "Swords and Swoops" - A mix of scorpions, swooping hawks, and fire dragons in an aspect host. Depending on what I need for the next fight this gives me a lot of flexibility.
• "Shuriken Storm" - 3 squads of dire avengers in wave serpents. This is still in development as I only have 2 serpents but it looks interesting so far. I also want to buff up to the full 30 avengers (I have 25 now) to get maximum firepower. That's 700-800 points alone so it may not get fielded all the time but it should be a fun option. It's either a shrine or an aspect host depending on how many I take. 

Reserves: a falcon, multiple wraithlords, a wraithguard squad, rangers, a war walker squadron, couple of farseers, and a vyper squadron. Some are painted, some are not. Most of these would end up as part of a CAD using some of the dire avengers as a core instead of the larger DA shrine.

Expansion: Not much! I could use a few more wave serpents. I might pick up a flyer to provide some air cover. I might pick up a couple more falcons as I am fascinated by the idea of deep-striking tanks full of troops. A second wraithknight is likely at some point - more as an option than as part of a plan to field two of the things.

Ruled Out: This will never be a jet bike army. The closest I will get to that is the vyper squadron and anyone playing them in the last few years knows that vypers are not exactly feared on the tabletop.

I've painted a lot of yellow already ...

Undecided: I have around 40 guardians, support weapons, and some warlocks. I am not sure if I want to make them part of the force and go full guardian host + add-ons. It is a potent force to have but I am not sure I am ever going to want to take a bunch of guardians over the units I have already completed. I used to think of them as essential to any "real" eldar army but I've loosened up on that in recent years.

They are also entirely unpainted so it's going to be a fair amount of work to get them ready. I do still have some inclination to make the old alien eldar into a fieldable force so I might go that direction. None of this is really a priority though. TBD in 2017 is what I would call it for now.

Next week: Think it's time for some pictures!

Attack of Opportunity

We have a session coming up where one of the usual Pathfinder players won' t be able to make it but Apprentice Who will be available. Since we won;t be able to run Pathfinder, I asked them what they'd like to do instead. My players actually said "what do you want to run?"

So, a limited run (with the holidays approaching) or a one-off session? Alright!

Leading candidates right now are beginning another chapter in our Marvel Heroic campaign or giving FFG Star Wars another try with a slightly different group than last time.

More to come!

Meme-tastic Monday

Luke Cage! Not a ton of memes but still some funny stuff:

The guys at "Texts from Superheros" are pretty good at this kind of thing: