My games have all pretty much suffered from the PC vs NPC problem.  NPC's exist to be exploited or shot or provide an obstacle which requires ignoring until such time as it can be exploited or shot.

Part of this is my own fault, but I would like to see my PC's treat the game world with a little more respect whilst they're there.

As to the real world issues, I don't bring them in because I either don't care or don't know enough about it to make it poignant.  And to be honest I doubt my players care or know enough them to care that they're there.

We're here to play games, not explore our feeling towards the patriarchally oppressed wymmyn of Delta Centauri

Quote from: SettembriniI know of the Civil-War wargaming abundance, so I was wondering why this isn´t a popular RPG genre.

Lack of elfs and magic wands? Perhaps it isn't really a time noted for heroic individualistic efforts? It isn't romantic in the right kind of ways for the current RP group? The whole one big battle on one side vs. the other isn't easy in the popular RPG models? The emotional dramatic aspects that had brother pitted against brother haven't yet been mined? *shrug*  EDIT: Come to think of it war RPGs in general (haha I made a pun) aren't very common.  Sure you've got a few, but not many.

Why aren't detective murder mysterys common? Agatha Christie, while not actually having sold more books that God, is one of the world's best selling author of all time.

No, that isn´t all.
Wars are, along with murder mysteries very popular.
Not D&D popular, mind you.

But at least it´s a possibility that if real world politics invade too much, people avoid using that.

Quote from: SettembriniNo, that isn´t all.
Wars are, along with murder mysteries very popular.

Games centered on this, such as? CoC has detective stuff, but it's not really murder mystery.

For real wars you've got IHW (troupe style) and Burning Empire (sort of but part wargame and you'll have to adapt it to a real modern war of your choosing) a few Vietnam games (I couldn't even give you the names) and likely some D20M products I suppose you could count. But we aren't even talking top 20 games, which gets you down into the tiny, tiny range.

In war you are military, you are the government bossing the military around, you could be a spook (but basically military intel), or you are little people that just show up in the bombsites. Playing little people that just show up in the bombsites generally doesn't sell well. When you center on military things get a bit wierd for RPGs because you are above the action or you are getting told what to do within narrow confines. IHW addressed that with troupe, BE addressed that by covering action at a scale that it typically isn't in RPGs. But all in all it seems the set piece games (wargames) handle war better for most people.

QuoteBut at least it´s a possibility that if real world politics invade too much, people avoid using that.

That does make some sense. But there still aren't a lot of war RPGs out there.


EDIT: OK, looking back with the CoC example you are talking about the war as a backdrop.  Sort of like Gone With The Wind did. It isn't about the war at all. Well maybe nobody has found an angle that intregs people?  You know, that 19th century thread? Maybe I'll look at doing just that, expanding the scope a bit to include NA since the The War Between The States falls right in middle of the range I was thinking of. At least you don't have the "in the bombsites problem of modern war". And given europe's indirect involvement non-military spooks and such could come into play. I'm going to have to think about that.

QuoteThat does make some sense. But there still aren't a lot of war RPGs out there.

Huh!?

(Mega)Traveller, Twilight: 2000, 2300 AD, Mechwarrior, Star Wars etc. ad nauseam are about war.

QuoteBE addressed that by covering action at a scale that it typically isn't in RPGs

Double huh?

Mechwarrior, Traveller and D&D had war mechanisms since the early eighties. BE pales in comparison, and actually isn´t very good in it. BE is about characters, as you put so nicely.

Quote from: SettembriniDouble huh?

You mean the separate Traveller wargames? Well yeah, exactly. As for D&D what exactly are you talking about?

QuoteBE is about characters, as you put so nicely.

Welcome to RPGville.

QuoteYou mean the separate Traveller wargames? Well yeah, exactly. As for D&D what exactly are you talking about?

No, rules for warfare in the RPG supplements. D&D had WarEngine, Siege Engine etc.

Although I might not be doing justice to you, my experience with you shows me, that this will not end well, so I bow out of this thread.

You just don´t know what this is about, as you don´t know why BE is so bad at what´s discussed here. War is about factions, not about characters.

Have fun, and get yourself some old RPG material [Expert set, Companion Set, High Guard, Mercenaries or the Mechwarrior RPG & Mercenary handbook might be a start]. You might be amazed at what you find.

EDIT: Have a nice blakkiefied thread.

Wars are about factions. But RPGs are about characters. There is the rub.

Like I said. Not common. Black Company too had a battle formation thingy (left me totally limp) [EDIT: and it is sort of a war set game but not firmly. More of mercenary set game, I think?] It's been a lot of years now (not even sure how many) but I do recall looking through some old D&D stuff for larger scale. It looked kind of tacked on but I never played it, and don't recall the details now, so... *shrug*

P.S. Mechs generally do nothing for me or I'd consider that. Yeah, I guess BattleTech should be classified a war RPG. That's another one.

Shades of Earth is set in the 1930s and has a number of war elements in it. House of Vega is all about the Spanish Civil War and the factions involved. That said, I think the key to making an RPG set in a war time is to make it about the characters and how the war affects them. HoV sells well in Europe an especially in Spain. I have had people praise my treatment of Franco and others curse the air I breath. It is a tricky subject to cover in a game.

IME, if you make the game about war, battles and the battle field, you leave so much untouched and settle too far into a narrow definition. Now, I am not saying some players would not enjoy that. I have had, and have a source book about it, groups that love playing military. It is mission oriented, clear objectives and often helps focus character creation. However, as the GM I always make sure they are going way out beyond instantaneous communication and make sure that if a PC is not in charge then everyone above him dies. Thus, you get the flexibility to play a more traditional group.

I guess if I were to play a battle or war, I would go for a miniatures game. It does it better and allows me to focus on the exciting (read: what interests me) parts of the setting.

Bill

I'm going to surprise everyone, myself included, and agree strongly with Blakkie here. RPGs are about characters, and wars are about factions. Reconciling these in favor of the RPG is difficult, and requires some bending of the standard setup - as Blakkie noted, troupe play is an excellent tool for this, because it allows you to distribute the giving and receiving of orders, and gives great flexibility to the composition of any given mission.

I've done a lot of military RPGing - from Napoelonic to Vietnam - and have learned from my failures and my successes. The big reason to roleplay a war is to explore the characters' reaction to it - how they deal with the exrciting action and brutal realities of wa,r and how they deal with the peaceful interludes between actions. Who wins the battle or the war is best settled with wargames, IMO. The smaller the scale you are playing, the easier it is to roleplay war. It works best on a  personal scale - a single ship, a platoon of grunts, or a squadron of fighters.

Keep it on the character level and I think it'll work much better.

-clash

I played in a Delta Green Vietnam game once, I was a civilian adviser, most of the horror came from our starting to question whether the locals we encountered really were part of resistance villages or VC cells.  After a while we started to notice that there wasn't much actual evidence that the people we were killing had actually done anything at all.

Indeed, that was the horror, the only Lovecraftian element was an odd statue we found, the real horror was that men had learnt to laugh and kill (the quote from the CoC story) in new ways, a quote the GM read at the end of the game after the squad escorting us took out most of the party when we rebelled against their tactics.

My PC ended up in a VC PoW camp, only one made it back sane and intact.  Good game.

To the OP:

Yes, David, I enjoy pushing potentially painful situations on PCs to see how -or if - they can resolve it. Sometimes you hit a nerve as it were, particularly when you are dealing with events that time hasn't healed. In my IHW:NN Captain's game, the PCs are trying to deal with the Barbary Pirates who raid and enslave whole ships and towns, yet they are American Naval officers, from the classes that would own slaves themselves. In a political meeting with a bashaw, the bashaw gifted some officers with slaves - the PCs were scandalized, yet some of them owned slave servants and even whole plantations back home! The fact that the gift slaves were white was perhaps the thing that stuck in their craw, but I think not. It was the fact that it was foreground, not background, that mattered IMO. A lot of interesting gaming came out of that gesture.

-clash

Quote from: JimBobOzI said, "mate, it's supposed to be a secret. And ship's boy? Mate, he's a homosexual, not a paedophile."
"But gay guys like boys."
"No mate, just because you like one gender doesn't mean you like children or adolescents of that gender. You're straight, but are you interested in 12 year old girls?"
"Well, if it was legal -"
"Say no more. No - no more."

Funny as hell.  Brilliant.

Quote from: BalbinusI played in a Delta Green Vietnam game once, I was a civilian adviser, most of the horror came from our starting to question whether the locals we encountered really were part of resistance villages or VC cells.  After a while we started to notice that there wasn't much actual evidence that the people we were killing had actually done anything at all.

Indeed, that was the horror, the only Lovecraftian element was an odd statue we found, the real horror was that men had learnt to laugh and kill (the quote from the CoC story) in new ways, a quote the GM read at the end of the game after the squad escorting us took out most of the party when we rebelled against their tactics.

My PC ended up in a VC PoW camp, only one made it back sane and intact.  Good game.

I've run very similarly focused Blood Games Vietnam games - without any supernatural - the horror coming from realizing what you just did - after a series of small, logical steps that seemed perfectly reasonable at a time, you find yourself doing monstrous things.

-clash