Random Witterings!

Roleplaying Games? What are they?

Everyone will tell you, roleplaying is easy to do, and hard to explain. In this respect, I’m no different. It is really easy to do, and very hard to describe.

Essentially, a number of people take on different personas, and use their imaginations to play roles in certain situations. However, in order to keep this roleplay under control, there needs to be some sort of control, or a list of guidelines.

These guidelines usually come in the form of a rulebook or source book. Rules perhaps aren’t the best word for what they contain, since they usually describe much more.

So, you have a group of people, a set of guidelines, the only thing missing from this which is present in other games is a goal or aim. This is one of the areas where roleplaying differs from other games, since the aim or goal can be very different.

The Aim of the Game – when Roleplaying

The aim in chess is to capture the king of the other player; the aim in snakes and ladders is to be first to the end; the aim in monopoly is to be the last person with any money left.

The aims in roleplaying are to

1. Work together as a team to overcome problems
2. Work together as a team to have fun and enjoy yourselves
3. Work together as a team to create an exciting story, in which the players take on the roles of the main characters.

The first point that should be obvious from this, is that it’s not a competitive game, there isn’t a way to win; in other words, there’s no one to beat, and no way to beat them even if there were.

So? What’s the point? Well, the aims are to have fun creating an adventure, solving problems together, working as a team, using unique skills to overcome difficulties, applying some brain power, acting out roles. You know, the things games were before you became an adult?

Who’s in charge of the Chaos?

The last element to roleplaying, and another place where it tends to differ from other types of game (although not from sport), is that there is usually a single person who ‘runs’ the game, for want of a better word.

Somebody has to organise the game, decide which roles the players are going to get a chance to play, work out who they are going to interact with, decide what problems they are going to have to overcome, work out the world in which they are going to pretend to exist.

This person, in roleplaying games, is called the Games Master (GM), since they are in charge. (Sometimes also known as Dungeon Master, since many of the early roleplaying games centred around adventures underground in dungeons).

Watch and see

So, if you turned up to a roleplaying session, what would you see? Well, you’d see a number of players, probably sitting around a table, with the GM at one end.

Each of the players would have in front of them a few bits of paper, which they use to record information about the characters they are playing. The GM will probably have a lot more information around them. They need to have the rules of the world and the situation the player’s characters will be in. They also need information about everything the players could meet, about the story, the adventure, the plot, etc.

There may be some dice on the table (not just the ‘normal’ six sided ones, but perhaps a few with 20, 12, 10, 8 and even 4 sides). These dice are used during the games to work out the results of some actions that need a random element (for example, one of the characters wants to search a room for a small object, the GM decides the character has a 25% chance of spotting it, so they roll the 4-sided dice. A roll of 1 might mean they found the object, anything else would mean they failed).

There will be plenty of scrap paper for writing down ideas, mapping areas of the location they are in, send each other secret notes, doodling, etc.

Ok – so do you worship the devil? or What happens during the game then?

Well, the GM describes to the players the current situation in which they find their characters. The players and the GM then form a continuous dialogue for the rest of the game, with the players describing the actions of their characters, and the GM working out the results and effects, and describing these to the players. It is essentially a dynamic, two-way story.

The GM uses the guidelines to decide if what the players wish their characters to do is possible, and to work out the results of the actions. However, since the rulebooks are by their nature generic, the GM will need to use common sense in order to work out many actions.

The game carries on for as long as the plot takes, or in some cases, indefinitely, since the players usually keep their characters over several adventures or games, slowly improving their abilities and filling in information about their background, idiosyncrasies, etc. There is no set end to a game, other than when the plot has been met, and/or the players decide not to carry on.

Roleplaying Worlds

The worlds in which players ‘play’ their characters are very varied. It is not accurate to think all roleplaying is connected to dungeons and dragons. There are literally 100’s of roleplaying games available, each of which describes a unique world in which players can play roles.

Here’s just a few samplers,

Gang Busters : 1920’s Gang Crime game.
Golden Super Heroes : Game based on American super hero cartoons.
Dungeons & Dragons : Based on Fantasy elements, and myths/legends.
Call of Cthulhu : 1900’s horror.
Paranoia : Humorous look at Sci-Fi.
Toon : Based totally on cartoon characters.

Summary or Run that by me again?

In summary, and in a single paragraph, roleplaying is, “A group of players get round a table and assume the roles of imaginary characters. A single person describes what they can see and hear, and everything about the imaginary world in which their characters exist. The players work as a team towards some goal, and describe what they wish to do to the GM. The GM evaluates these actions, and describes the result to the players. This continues throughout the game. It is usually very casual, not, “Right, it’s your turn now”, but instead, more like a conversation.”

Games I’ve Played

• Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (AD&D)
• Ars Magica
• Bunnies & Burrows
• Call of Cthulhu
• Champions
• Cyberpunk
• Dungeons and Dragons (D&D)
• Earthdawn
• Fading Suns
• Gurps
• Hercules & Xena
• Middle Earth Roleplaying (MERP)
• Paranoia
• Pendragon
• Rifts
• Rolemaster
• Runequest
• Shadowrun
• Star Wars
• Tales of the floating Vagabond
• Toon
• Traveller
• Vampire the Masquerade
• Warhammer FRP
• Werewolf

After a long break from roleplaying we are back playing again, giving D&D 4th Edition a go.  After a few sessions it’s going really well and enjoying it immensely.  We missed playing a lot!