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Characters or Situations?

Started by KrakaJak, November 02, 2006, 06:16:36 PM

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Settembrini

#30
November 04, 2006, 02:11:01 PM
Quote Actually, the published texts that are about characters is... The Players guide; meanwhile the DMG and the MM are about providing situation.

So what? The "situation" materiel in current D&D is all about the situation in regards to the characters: Monsters to fight, Magit Items to loot.

OTOH in Traveller the CharGen is an extrapolation of the situation.

In current D&D it´s the other way round. Both have merits, both have flaws. I love both, for different reasons.
If there can\'t be a TPK against the will of the players it\'s not an RPG.- Pierce Inverarity

KrakaJak

#31
November 06, 2006, 09:41:08 AM
Quote from: JMcL63I'm with the essential unity myself. The nuances certainly come from things like the kind of game, players' preferences, whether you're PC/GM, to name but 3 examples. It's also a peculiar duality in that everyone is simultaneously character and situation.

As a PC you're both a character for yourself and a situation to everyone else. The dynamics of this will vary according to the kind of game; eg. PC's are much simpler situations to each other in a straight dungeon bash than they would be, say, in a game with lots of high soap opera. I said everyone, but of course GM's can be pure situation- eg. the weather. And GM's are usually more situation than character because that's what GM's do: contrive situations for the other players' characters.

And so on and so on spiralling into a miasma of ever more finely divided jargon that makes me wonder what's been happening in KrakaJak's game to set off musings prompting this question in the first place. What's up KrakaJak? ;)
Not in my paricular game right now, but what got me to thinking about it is everyone has one of those players who is only a Stat-Line; with a name like "Chee-to Book" (Or whatever else is nearby at the time), which they finally come up with after the game is started.
 
Does a character without any "character" really matter if the GM or Player can make Cheeto an entertaining situation to be in. The situation can create the character of Chee-to. After an intriguing situation, what was once just a stat-line and a begrudged name is now someone with a history and a reason to do things.
 
*Side Note* I know Situation and Character are both indespensable. I would never dream of trying to run a RPG without either one.
-Jak
 
 "Be the person you want to be, at the expense of everything."
Spreading Un-Common Sense since 1983
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