Quote from: Silverlion;383699I also rather dislike the habit of some "universal" games that assume every trait or ability is equally valuable across any genre/campaign.

BESM 2e had it's flaws but it did have the idea that the cost for various skills varied with genre.

Quote from: David Johansen;383683Well, sometimes as a GM the players have background stuff that fits and other times I just have to work around it and even avoid it outright.  Also, passive players will rarely find their character background stuff being tapped because if they don't care to draw upon it I'm sure not going to bother.  On the other hand, if I'm GMing you probably want to write up your character's family so I won't just do it myself...

Now, if I have a passive player, I try to figure out why they're passive.  Are they just shy?  Then I work with them to make them less so.  Are they just occupying table space?  Then I'll work around them as long as they aren't actively disruptive.

One of my best friends was very, very passive in AD&D2e group settings due to shyness, so I started making him play solo until he felt confident about contributing in character...now he's fairly routinely a leader type when we play.

Quote from: chaosvoyager;383694I swear I don't know why every GM doesn't do this. I find it so much easier than creating a scenario beforehand and then playing a back and forth with incoming character concepts until they fit.

Yeah, and even with pre-written scenarios I read them, compare with character sheets and see if there's not something that makes me go "Oh, crap, these guys are screwed if I don't do something"...that something being anything from making a tweak to things or adding an NPC who has a pretty unique purpose.

When we started playing Necessary Evil for Savage Worlds, there's a scenario real early on that requires getting a large machine moved quickly...the problem?  No one on the team was superstrong or had a power that could do it.  So I inserted a overly strong, yet simple-minded brick to their team so that the whole thing didn't grind to a halt at that point.

Quote from: Nicephorus;383735BESM 2e had it's flaws but it did have the idea that the cost for various skills varied with genre.

Yeah I liked BESM2E. Although attributes didn't get a pass in a similar manner. Which is somewhat odd..

Quote from: chaosvoyager;383694I was excommunicated from my local gaming club.

Please tell us there was a ceremony!  With candles!

ChaosVoyager,

 It just sounds like you need someone like ME as your GM.

Your best bet is to move to southwestern Ohio.


- Ed C.

Why would Gary Oldman move to Ohio?

Got to love an answer to this companion thread over on tBP.

Quote from: Noclue on RPG.netCV, why not play games where the rules demand that the GM (assuming there is one) must address this stuff in play?

Goddamn dude, just see a psychotherapist and have done.

As far as OP goes, I feel your pain.  A detailed chargen that ends up not being used for anything can get real frustrating.  I think this is more a GM/Player problem though and has nothing to do with detailed chargen systems.

Quote from: CRKrueger;384005Goddamn dude, just see a psychotherapist and have done.

Ah yes, RPGs as therapy. I hate those people.

QuoteCV, why not play games where the rules demand that the GM (assuming there is one) must address this stuff in play?

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

So now they're going to search for a GAME BOOK to solve a problem of PEOPLE.
"The rules are the game. The game is the rules."

For fuck's sakes. It's like these people don't have any social common sense.
Talk about it with your GM, God dammit! :rolleyes:

Quote from: Benoist;384063WHAT. THE. FUCK.

So now they're going to search for a GAME BOOK to solve a problem of PEOPLE.
"The rules are the game. The game is the rules."

For fuck's sakes. It's like these people don't have any social common sense.
Talk about it with your GM, God dammit! :rolleyes:

Right.
Any GM worth his salt will want to work with you.  he might learn something useful, and might give his game another angle.  
Our Chargen has changed over the 26 years of use dramatically, mainly due to Player input.
And one of the most important thing is to have rolling when it is fun, but to make PLAYER DECISIONS MEANINGFUL!  If the decisions made in Chargen don't help the roleplaying, what's the use?

Quote from: Benoist;384063For fuck's sakes. It's like these people don't have any social common sense.
Talk about it with your GM, God dammit! :rolleyes:

Gamers with below average social skills!?! :eek:

That never happen, sir. NEVER!**


** (By which I mean, that's the norm.)

Even in games where the GM designs according to the character's designs.  I'd still rather just pick a simple template and make a handful of choices to make my characters slightly different from someone else of the same template or the stock example.  Just a few simple things to make that character feel like mine and not yours.

I don't want the responsibility to come up with everything from scratch, to come up with lofty goals and back stories with the assumption that this character I have made is the culmination of all of that.  When in reality it's a starting character fresh off the boat in a foreign land.  

As long as the character isn't completely gimped (ie I made a thinker in an entirely combat game) then every character is just a starting point to adapt to the campaign at hand.  Keep it simple.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;383697When asked, every GM will claim that they're completely impartial and apply the rules completely consistently with no focus on particular areas and handwaving of others....

I don't. I let people know up front pretty much how I run games and what I'm interested in/not interested in, starting with "I don't do Rules as Written and I simplify or handwave anything that seems to take too much time or effort in actual play. I make rulings based on the current situation rather than waste time hunting up seldom-used rules in the rulebooks. Combat is fast and abstract, if you are mainly interested in hacking everything you run into or want combat to be a tactical challenge, you will probably hate my games." Etc.