Gaming Thoughts for the Day (and a Question)
One of the things I have not discussed the last little while is the state of my current roleplaying games and life of an rpger. Seeing as how tomorrow, March 30th, is Tabletop Day (which I will not be participating in, due to the health issues I've had the last little while, and didn't really know about it until earlier this week), I figured I'd update what's been going on gaming-wise for me.
Where to start? Well, originally, back at the beginning of 2013, I had stated in this post that I wanted to run only a few rpgs this year, the likely candidates being Desolation, Primeval, Heirs to the Lost World, and the occasional skip through Hellcats and Hockeysticks territory. Strangely enough, here we are three months into the 2013 calendar, and I've only run one of these games (Primeval), had some character generation for another of the games (Heirs to the Lost World) that saw both gaming groups establish that they found the system to all-worldy and not focused enough on one particular element or culture of the game world, and haven't run the other two. I still haven't run Desolation this year yet, but neither gaming group is inclined to play said game system again as yet.
The problem with Heirs to the Lost World was two-fold for me and the players. The players hated the character generation mechanics for the game, found the game too limiting in some regards (!), but didn't really like the pseudo-historical approach that was being taken. For me, it has been about the fact that I wanted to run an Aztec RPG and play in an Aztec world, but that's not really what the game really presents. It's a game about playing during the Age of Exploration in the Mythic New World, where the Aztecs are there primarily because they used magic and stuff to foil the Spanish, and thus weren't put on the road to extinction (per sé). That's not really what I want in this type of game, but we'll see what happens when a certain new RPG comes out. (And no, I'm not going to say more about that.)
In the meantime, I've decided to go back to some of the gaming roots that I have and my love for Dickensian style stuff and run the a|state RPG once more. While the Sunday campaigns of this have never gotten off the ground for various reasons, the Friday players have enjoyed their time spent in The City, and are quite eager to go back to it. Yes, I know that the a|state is no longer being produced or supported, but it's one of those games that has such a richly detailed backstory to it (even if the *truth* about The City will never be revealed now) that adventure ideas and plots leap off the pages of the material that was produced, so we'll see how this goes. I actually should be running a|state right now, given that I'll be running an adventure for the game at this year's CanGames here in Ottawa in May, but the illness that I've had the last month plus or so has prevented me from getting my head into the game at the moment. That's why, now that I've felt well enough to get back to running after what might be close to a month's hiatus, I've been running the Primeval RPG again.
On that subject, I have to say that I really am enjoying running the Primeval RPG, have been for close to two years now, having gotten involved with the game back in the early part of 2011 or so. The mechanics for the game are the Vortex System, the same set of mechanics used for the Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space game, and are really simple, intuitive, and easy for players to grasp in less than ten minutes or so. I much prefer the time travel aspects and set-up in Primeval than in DW: AiTaS, and the fact that the game is more about normal human beings dealing with the Anomalies and the creatures that they spew out. I'm running the game at the moment, figuring that it would be easier to transition back into gaming after a month plus away running it than the a|state RPG, but have to get back to that as soon as I finish the adventure that I've just started. Cubicle 7 seems to have somewhat abandoned the Primeval RPG for the moment, but there are various circumstances behind that, including the Doctor Who tv series 50th anniversary and their commitment to various products for the game line for 2013. Still, I'm hoping to see new game product for the system sooner rather than later (I hope, but I'm not crossing my fingers on this).
When I'll run Desolation again is up in the air, and I still need to find a science fiction game system and universe to satisfy a couple of my players, but I'm actually happy running the games that I am at the moment.
And that raises another issue. Folks who read my blog may have noticed there hasn't been a game session journal entry in some time. Part of the problem is that I've fallen so far behind in posting entries to the blog, as the notes on the game sessions involved have to be transcribed up to my laptop and then just pasted into the blog. And trust me, I'm quite a few game sessions behind on this stuff! (In terms of posting it to the blog, that is.) There's also the matter of feedback. I don't get a lot of feedback on the posting of the game session blogs, and I'm not sure that people want to read them here. For some, they're a waste of space (hence why I put them on the blog under a cut); for others, I guess they're useful in terms of reading about how the games that I run are going and how game systems actually run. I transcribe the notes for each game session from paper to the laptop, partially just so I have a record somewhere that I can get to when computer disasters happen. I also post them so that certain players who shall remain nameless can have complete notes, since they don't take all that many game notes, if any, when we play. So please, let me know if you'd like to see me post up the game sessions here on the blog in future, or whether I should just abandon that practice.
Well, that was an exhausting post to write. Sorry if it's been a tedious read.
Now for a cup of tea, methinks.
Where to start? Well, originally, back at the beginning of 2013, I had stated in this post that I wanted to run only a few rpgs this year, the likely candidates being Desolation, Primeval, Heirs to the Lost World, and the occasional skip through Hellcats and Hockeysticks territory. Strangely enough, here we are three months into the 2013 calendar, and I've only run one of these games (Primeval), had some character generation for another of the games (Heirs to the Lost World) that saw both gaming groups establish that they found the system to all-worldy and not focused enough on one particular element or culture of the game world, and haven't run the other two. I still haven't run Desolation this year yet, but neither gaming group is inclined to play said game system again as yet.
The problem with Heirs to the Lost World was two-fold for me and the players. The players hated the character generation mechanics for the game, found the game too limiting in some regards (!), but didn't really like the pseudo-historical approach that was being taken. For me, it has been about the fact that I wanted to run an Aztec RPG and play in an Aztec world, but that's not really what the game really presents. It's a game about playing during the Age of Exploration in the Mythic New World, where the Aztecs are there primarily because they used magic and stuff to foil the Spanish, and thus weren't put on the road to extinction (per sé). That's not really what I want in this type of game, but we'll see what happens when a certain new RPG comes out. (And no, I'm not going to say more about that.)
In the meantime, I've decided to go back to some of the gaming roots that I have and my love for Dickensian style stuff and run the a|state RPG once more. While the Sunday campaigns of this have never gotten off the ground for various reasons, the Friday players have enjoyed their time spent in The City, and are quite eager to go back to it. Yes, I know that the a|state is no longer being produced or supported, but it's one of those games that has such a richly detailed backstory to it (even if the *truth* about The City will never be revealed now) that adventure ideas and plots leap off the pages of the material that was produced, so we'll see how this goes. I actually should be running a|state right now, given that I'll be running an adventure for the game at this year's CanGames here in Ottawa in May, but the illness that I've had the last month plus or so has prevented me from getting my head into the game at the moment. That's why, now that I've felt well enough to get back to running after what might be close to a month's hiatus, I've been running the Primeval RPG again.
On that subject, I have to say that I really am enjoying running the Primeval RPG, have been for close to two years now, having gotten involved with the game back in the early part of 2011 or so. The mechanics for the game are the Vortex System, the same set of mechanics used for the Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space game, and are really simple, intuitive, and easy for players to grasp in less than ten minutes or so. I much prefer the time travel aspects and set-up in Primeval than in DW: AiTaS, and the fact that the game is more about normal human beings dealing with the Anomalies and the creatures that they spew out. I'm running the game at the moment, figuring that it would be easier to transition back into gaming after a month plus away running it than the a|state RPG, but have to get back to that as soon as I finish the adventure that I've just started. Cubicle 7 seems to have somewhat abandoned the Primeval RPG for the moment, but there are various circumstances behind that, including the Doctor Who tv series 50th anniversary and their commitment to various products for the game line for 2013. Still, I'm hoping to see new game product for the system sooner rather than later (I hope, but I'm not crossing my fingers on this).
When I'll run Desolation again is up in the air, and I still need to find a science fiction game system and universe to satisfy a couple of my players, but I'm actually happy running the games that I am at the moment.
And that raises another issue. Folks who read my blog may have noticed there hasn't been a game session journal entry in some time. Part of the problem is that I've fallen so far behind in posting entries to the blog, as the notes on the game sessions involved have to be transcribed up to my laptop and then just pasted into the blog. And trust me, I'm quite a few game sessions behind on this stuff! (In terms of posting it to the blog, that is.) There's also the matter of feedback. I don't get a lot of feedback on the posting of the game session blogs, and I'm not sure that people want to read them here. For some, they're a waste of space (hence why I put them on the blog under a cut); for others, I guess they're useful in terms of reading about how the games that I run are going and how game systems actually run. I transcribe the notes for each game session from paper to the laptop, partially just so I have a record somewhere that I can get to when computer disasters happen. I also post them so that certain players who shall remain nameless can have complete notes, since they don't take all that many game notes, if any, when we play. So please, let me know if you'd like to see me post up the game sessions here on the blog in future, or whether I should just abandon that practice.
Well, that was an exhausting post to write. Sorry if it's been a tedious read.
Now for a cup of tea, methinks.