Are there game settings you won't let a player into unless they are pretty familiar with it? I had a case where I let a guy who knew exactly jack shit about warhammer 40,000 into a game of dark heresy.
Let's just say the game became one of "let's explain to the FNG why we do everything grimdark here". I mean he just didn't get the settung at all.
I had him read a couple of my 40k novels and he finally got it then. Then he didn't want to do all that dark depressing stuff. :mad:
From now on anyone getting into a 40k RPG I'm running better know what it's about.
Any games you want players to be grounded in before playing?
Dresden Files. Especially if someone wants to play a wizard; the rest of it, not such a big deal. There's enough baggage to playing a wizard with the Council and Laws of Magic that I don't want to have to explain it before hand.
Quote from: Schwartzwald;1002621I had him read a couple of my 40k novels and he finally got it then. Then he didn't want to do all that dark depressing stuff. :mad:
Can't say I blame him. It was one thing when back in the day when it was more satirical. It became less appealing once the company decided the setting needed to be serious instead of tongue in cheek. Burned out on grimdark myself.
There are two things here:
1. Knowledge of setting
2. Expectations of tone and play
They're connected, but not the same
I always make it a point to lay out expectations for both of these as clearly as possible before even considering play -- so either people can bail, or a new game is picked. I want everyone on board before we go any further.
Players just need to know how to role-play. Especially if a game session will only take place on a city block during a festival, and the players don't need to know anything about a galaxy's setting.
I'd like the players to be familliar with the setting of Albedo before I GM it. Though Ive gotten fairly good at giving a basic rundown of the setting by now.
Past that Im not too demanding other than that the players at least try to work within the general setting and premise.
Ancient Mesopotamia.
I wouldn't bar a player but it certainly helps if they are playing a (traditional) super hero game and they understand the good guys aren't trying to kill the bad guys and other conventions of the genre.
Quote from: Schwartzwald;1002621Are there game settings you won't let a player into unless they are pretty familiar with it? I had a case where I let a guy who knew exactly jack shit about warhammer 40,000 into a game of dark heresy.
Let's just say the game became one of "let's explain to the FNG why we do everything grimdark here". I mean he just didn't get the settung at all.
I had him read a couple of my 40k novels and he finally got it then. Then he didn't want to do all that dark depressing stuff. :mad:
From now on anyone getting into a 40k RPG I'm running better know what it's about.
Any games you want players to be grounded in before playing?
It certainly helps, but it's not required. I'd love it if all players in my Middle Earth game had read the books. If not that, then I hope they've seen the movies. If not even that, I'll prepare a one-page synopsis. One page, that's it. So here's your 40K challenge: Sell your players on it with one page. If you can't do that, you probably don't have a good grasp on your premise and the game will fall apart.
Warhammer 40k, Exalted. Marvel or DC superheroes setting (they need to know and understand characters and tropes)... Most licensed settings in general, now that I think about it.
Empire of the Petal Throne. I honestly have no idea wtf that setting is about, and it looks like it's
all about the setting and themes.
Quote from: ChristopherKubasik;1002627There are two things here:
1. Knowledge of setting
2. Expectations of tone and play
They're connected, but not the same
I always make it a point to lay out expectations for both of these as clearly as possible before even considering play -- so either people can bail, or a new game is picked. I want everyone on board before we go any further.
Yup. Good to have everyone on the same page there.
Doctor Who.
All of them, but I don't think it needs more than a single page of bullet points to get somebody up to speed on everyman knowledge.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1003656Doctor Who.
Yeah, the silly putty science is something people have to expect. It's not too good for hardcore sf people.
Quote from: Angry_Douchebag;1002625Dresden Files. Especially if someone wants to play a wizard; the rest of it, not such a big deal. There's enough baggage to playing a wizard with the Council and Laws of Magic that I don't want to have to explain it before hand.
Can't say I blame him. It was one thing when back in the day when it was more satirical. It became less appealing once the company decided the setting needed to be serious instead of tongue in cheek. Burned out on grimdark myself.
Well, in the 40k universe sometimes you must sacrifice or even kill thousands of innocents to save millions or even billions. Yeah, grimdark, but in the real world Churchill let the Nazis bomb the British city of Coventry to keep the Nazis from learning about the British radar network.
Monster Hunter International. I have had some luck explaining the setting to people, but it's usually easier if I just have them read the first Larry Correia novel or two.
Quote from: Achaerone;1004353Monster Hunter International. I have had some luck explaining the setting to people, but it's usually easier if I just have them read the first Larry Correia novel or two.
Can't say I'd commit to reading novels just to be allowed in someone's game, but then again it seems like the only players who would be interested in something so specific would have already read said novels...
Quote from: RPGPundit;1003656Doctor Who.
Do you though? I mean it has it's own mythos and lore and stuff, but when it boils down to core it's really just TV melodrama in a variety of settings with costumes.
Quote from: Achaerone;1004353Monster Hunter International. I have had some luck explaining the setting to people, but it's usually easier if I just have them read the first Larry Correia novel or two.
I think the name alone encapsulates most of the setting. It's the tone of the novels that might take some getting across. They are fun reads anyway.
Quote from: Schwartzwald;1004126Well, in the 40k universe sometimes you must sacrifice or even kill thousands of innocents to save millions or even billions. Yeah, grimdark, but in the real world Churchill let the Nazis bomb the British city of Coventry to keep the Nazis from learning about the British radar network.
It was, if it happened, done to protect the Ultra secret, that the allies could read the German's coded messages, not to protect the secret of the radar network. And there is still some doubt that the allied high command knew the specific target of the raid.
Quote from: DavetheLost;1004368I think the name alone encapsulates most of the setting. It's the tone of the novels that might take some getting across. They are fun reads anyway.
Yeah, I agree with this. When I try to explain the setting to people, the gist of it takes two, maybe three sentences; it's the extended mythology and the
feel of the world that's hard to convey in an elevator pitch.
L5R is a notable one, as is Kindred of the East. There is a setting element of the baroque and immediately punitive to those outside their station.
Maybe Amber if I run it again. Players really need their own motivations in a player driven game.
There are no such settings.
maybe not mandatory, but certainly helpful is Earthdawn. a post apocalyptic fantasy land after demons have forced everyone into underground cities and ravaged the world.
Earthdawn is a little like Fallout (there are design links according to the Fallout 1 devs), in that the GM really only has to describe the culture of the underground-bunker-town you and your family have been living in for the last 500 years, and you get to explore the rest of the Setting "in game". (At least, for one of the starting options - "Adepts from the Un-opened Kaer.")
The person running this website is a racist who publicly advocates genocidal practices.
I am deleting my content.
I recommend you do the same.
Quote from: Dumarest;1003076I wouldn't bar a player but it certainly helps if they are playing a (traditional) super hero game and they understand the good guys aren't trying to kill the bad guys and other conventions of the genre.
+1. Some people just don't get four-color. My wife, for instance, tends to play ruthless pragmatists who (unless they're outright pacifists) have no patience with codes against killing and the like.
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1004367Do you though? I mean it has it's own mythos and lore and stuff, but when it boils down to core it's really just TV melodrama in a variety of settings with costumes.
To a great degree,
Doctor Who is four-color supers. I enjoy the series, but it comes with an enormous frigging suspension of disbelief, because the Doctor relies really heavily on the enemy (a) lacking killer instinct, (b) being thoroughly inept, (c) swallowing his colossal and frequent bluffs, or (d) all of the above.
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1004367Do you though? I mean it has it's own mythos and lore and stuff, but when it boils down to core it's really just TV melodrama in a variety of settings with costumes.
If you want the game to play anything like Dr.Who then you absolutely need to have familiarity. Otherwise you'll end up with something that's set in the Dr.Who universe but plays more like WH40K or something.
Talislanta or Skyrealms of Jorune.
They are both such departures from normal fantasy/sci-fi settings that I think, in order to fully appreciate the game, the players would have to become at least partially familiar with these two.
Quote from: Mike the Mage;1005125Talislanta or Skyrealms of Jorune.
I don't think Jorune is so weird that I can't get the basic starter idea off with a short preamble during play... the PCs start as young adults working to gain citizenship by performing various tasks for established members of the community. Start off in some rural place with a less diverse populace... introduce races and creatures as you go along.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1005086If you want the game to play anything like Dr.Who then you absolutely need to have familiarity. Otherwise you'll end up with something that's set in the Dr.Who universe but plays more like WH40K or something.
I don't see why... most Dr. Who episodes I've seen are more investigation/exploration without much combat at all. If the PCs are 'companions' of the Dr. or some other timelord then it's normal for them to start out as perplexed fish out of water.
Quote from: Simlasa;1005151I don't see why... most Dr. Who episodes I've seen are more investigation/exploration without much combat at all. If the PCs are 'companions' of the Dr. or some other timelord then it's normal for them to start out as perplexed fish out of water.
... and when the players decide they're unwilling to be clueless sidekicks, they're going to take the bit in their teeth and play according to their own lights, and that's unlikely to be Doctor-standard pacifism any more than you'd dump a bunch of newbies on
Star Trek and expect them to follow the Prime Directive.
Quote from: Ravenswing;1005161... and when the players decide they're unwilling to be clueless sidekicks, they're going to take the bit in their teeth and play according to their own lights, and that's unlikely to be Doctor-standard pacifism any more than you'd dump a bunch of newbies on Star Trek and expect them to follow the Prime Directive.
So what? Are you trying to emulate the TV show or play free-willed PCs in the setting? Characters in TV shows and movies do all sorts of things that the average person would not... but I usually, except maybe for Call of Cthulhu, avoid games that force Players to recreate those dramatic performances.
It might be interesting to see what happens if the Dr. ends up with some companions who are much more proactive and confrontational.
In Star Trek I'd expect some consequences for characters who ignore the Prime Directive... are there such setting-based reinforcements of Dr. Who's pacifism?
The Doctor taking offense at people from TARDIS that don't follow it might well be considered a reinforcement.
Pendragon. Because it's not Conan or Westeros.
Quote from: AsenRG;1005185The Doctor taking offense at people from TARDIS that don't follow it might well be considered a reinforcement.
That makes sense. I'd go with that sort of thing, the setting reinforcing itself, rather than relying on Players to behave themselves for the sake of emulating the show.
Quote from: Simlasa;1005151I don't think Jorune is so weird that I can't get the basic starter idea off with a short preamble during play... the PCs start as young adults working to gain citizenship by performing various tasks for established members of the community. Start off in some rural place with a less diverse populace... introduce races and creatures as you go along.
Well that's encouraging. I have a 2nd edition boxed set but I never played it. I wish I could these days.:rolleyes:
Quote from: Mike the Mage;1005214Well that's encouraging. I have a 2nd edition boxed set but I never played it. I wish I could these days.:rolleyes:
There's a lot of nomenclature for all of it... social positions and races and magic... but the concepts aren't that difficult to parse into plain language. The setting is reminiscent of Tekumel's but not nearly as dense (IMO). The magic is probably the most unique and complicated element... color-coded magical energy (Isho) and spells (dysha)... magicians worry a lot about magical weather and their personal magic levels.
It astounds me that people wouldn't get why Dr.Who would be difficult to emulate. It's been a huge problem with all Dr.Who games ever. In essence unless you want to act the way the characters in the show do, you aren't going to be playing Doctor Who, just some sci-fi game.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1005592It astounds me that people wouldn't get why Dr.Who would be difficult to emulate. It's been a huge problem with all Dr.Who games ever. In essence unless you want to act the way the characters in the show do, you aren't going to be playing Doctor Who, just some sci-fi game.
I think if you were brought up in the UK, with Doctor Who being very much part of the normal household entertainment, you just end up observing that it is, for the most part, just a generic vehicle for playing a variety science fiction tales - like Star Trek does too in effect. There are re-occurring characters, monsters and lore and so on, but that is the same for any show. You can run all sorts of tales without heavy canon.
It is different to usual sci-fi rpgs insofar that there is little violence in BBC family viewing shows, which is mechanically addressed of course, but that is a different issue for me to the question of familiarity. If you grew up with it, it's already familiar.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1005592It astounds me that people wouldn't get why Dr.Who would be difficult to emulate. It's been a huge problem with all Dr.Who games ever. In essence unless you want to act the way the characters in the show do, you aren't going to be playing Doctor Who, just some sci-fi game.
The problem isn't with Dr. Who, IMO, but with players who don't like playing pacifists;).
Quote from: AsenRG;1005603The problem isn't with Dr. Who, IMO, but with players who don't like playing pacifists;).
I think that's less of a problem than that Big Bads are less likely to be bamboozled by the pacifists than when they have sympathetic scriptwriters and showrunners compelling them to be so.
Quote from: Ravenswing;1005639I think that's less of a problem than that Big Bads are less likely to be bamboozled by the pacifists than when they have sympathetic scriptwriters and showrunners compelling them to be so.
That and having a bunch of confused pleb PCs joined to one demi-godlike NPC who owns the primary means of travelling around the setting.
Like most movies/books/shows with a single primary super-human character and their followers, it's got inherent difficulties for translation into an RPG.
If you could run it like Dark Heresy, with The Dr. engaged elswhere, it might work... but then that's not the same show... and who gets the Tardis?
Quote from: Ravenswing;1005639I think that's less of a problem than that Big Bads are less likely to be bamboozled by the pacifists than when they have sympathetic scriptwriters and showrunners compelling them to be so.
Maybe - never tried running it, myself;).
Quote from: RPGPundit;1005592It astounds me that people wouldn't get why Dr.Who would be difficult to emulate.
But is it really any more difficult to "get" than many other properties (like say, Star Trek or 4-color comics) that people may, or may not, be familiar with and which they may, or may not, choose to engage on its own terms?
Running a game in the Dr Who universe for people who aren't familiar with Dr Who would be not much different to running other wierd sci-fi fi stuff. I wouldn't expect it to feel much like the show though. I am not sure that gamers who are familiar with the show woud produce a game that has the same feel either to be honest.
I have the C7 RPG and I think it does an excellent job, but Dr Who depends a lot on things that might not translate so well to RPG play.
Quote from: AsenRG;1005603The problem isn't with Dr. Who, IMO, but with players who don't like playing pacifists;).
Didn't the Doctor contemplate smashing a cave man's head with a rock in the very first episode?In Day of the Daleks he kills an Ogron, with a gun. Doctor's 5 and 6 both killed Cybermen with their own weapons, and I recall 6 pushing someone into a vat of chemical something. Doctor 7 once made a magic baseball bat so Ace could whack Daleks with it. He was also known to have said something along the lines of, "Give me some of that Nitro Nine you're not carrying." I met Sylvester McCoy at a convention and even asked him about Nitro Nine and Ace and one of the things he mentioned was that he was adamant that the Ace character be a stand in for when the Doctor needed to do something violent. He said something along the lines of, "In this scene it says The Doctor fires a bazooka and I said to them, 'No, ACE fires the bazooka.' " More recently, The Doctor Conspired against himself and let several incarnations believe that he had committed genocide to his entire species.
Without even naming Leela and River Song, a hunter and a psychopath, as well as the aformentioned Ace, there's many examples of companions resorting to physical force. And he allies himself with UNIT despite their trigger happiness.
The idea which is embedded in the initiative system of the Cubicle7 game is that quick thinking lowers the body count. Doctor Who has never been about stopping the body count, it's about minimizing it. Saving as many people as possible. The Doctor spends a lot of time saving people because he doesn't like to see them die. But remember, if you push his buttons, he will do shit to you that will make you wish he just used a gun.
So certainly you can run a game in the Doctor Who universe without the players knowing anything about that universe. That's the whole reason companions exist, so they can be the viewer's eye to this greater universe, only in an RPG you are cutting out the middle man. Of course players might not be companions. The Universe is big and not everyone solves problems the nice way. For instance, every single episode of Torchwood. You don't even need Timelords or The Doctor. You could have any assortment of characters get together for whatever reason.
In a game like that, yes there is the potential for violence to be the common solution. Lt Rasczak from Starship Troopers is probably right about that. Just ask the Carthaginians. If you have players that would rather find alternative solutions then you should be using a system which reflects that, like DWAITAS. Mostly though, it's The Doctor himself who doesn't like to solve things with violence, and he has supernatural ability to simultaneously impress, flatter, awe, intimidate, frighten and confuse his foes. This is a guy whose stared down Gods. Also, he doesn't want to kill his enemies. He wants them to be better. To act with conscience. Even if he knows he'll fail, because people who can stare down Godlike beings are like that, capable of great acts of compassion.
But the good thing about Doctor Who is, if you don't like compassion you can run a game in that universe just fine without it. You don't have to go around saving people, running around in gravel quarries. You can shoot people. Or swindle them. Or just travel around. Pick an Antagonist. I was able to freak out an entire group of adventurers with one Dalek. Of course it was something like the 1970s, and The Dalek was discovered in a sunken U-boat off the coast of a town in Wales, which mysteriously was not full of water. The PCs were wallking around inside said U-boat. Good times. :D
I'm sure you could also run a game playing all Canon characters or even multiple Doctors. I've never had problems running games set in the Whoniverse. If you have problems figuring out tone, you can emulate a Scooby-Doo episode and get a similar effect, only Mr Jenkins was actually an alien all along instead of the other way around (http://www.dorkly.com/post/70582/the-difference-between-scooby-doo-and-doctor-who).
Well, Krimson, you have obviously considered the show much more than me. I know better than to argue with experts;)!
Quote from: AsenRG;1005784Well, Krimson, you have obviously considered the show much more than me. I know better than to argue with experts;)!
It was my main purpose in life during childhood until I discovered D&D. FASA Who was the first non D&D RPG product I ever bought which I never played but did use as source material, usually in AD&D because we put everything in that kitchen sink. I will never have trouble running Doctor Who games. DWAITAS pretty much runs out of the box. If your group doesn't like the initiative system, use something else. I think I own the PDF to Primeval, I should see how they do it since the game uses the same engine.
All of them.
The thing is, our cultural background noise includes enough familiarity with a whole bunch of shit to play a game based on them.
But if somebody had never even heard of the Middle Ages, or fantasy at all, even a simple D&D dungeon crawl would be a baffling mystery.
My first D&D session included my two cousins who were experienced players, myself who was new but an avid fantasy fan, and my mother who was quite bewildered by the whole thing.
There was a time when "orc" was a foreign word for most people. These days I begin conversations about RPGs with "it's like D&D..." even most people who have never played D&D have some idea of what it is.
Good points Dave and Gronan, I think LotR was the big turning point and GoT sealed the deal.
The One Ring--the setting is Tolkien Middle Earth, not reskinned hack and slash battle bros pillage. It is not intended to be a tactical set piece combat emulation and players looking to play the game in a (shudde) Hobbit movie style will be sorely disappointed.
Torchbearer--you are scabs on the poxie underside of humanity, no one likes you, no one wants you and you have managed to fail your way into grubbing around in graveyards and cave diving into nasty subterranean lairs. You will not "win," you will not get the girl, you will not found a kingdom or retire in leisure and comfort to smoke your pipe Rakasa (sp?) style. Life is shit and it is going to get shittier, then you die.
Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1005947All of them.
The thing is, our cultural background noise includes enough familiarity with a whole bunch of shit to play a game based on them.
But if somebody had never even heard of the Middle Ages, or fantasy at all, even a simple D&D dungeon crawl would be a baffling mystery.
What do dungeon crawls have to do with the Middle Ages?
Quote from: Dumarest;1005968What do dungeon crawls have to do with the Middle Ages?
"Rules for Medieval Fantastic Wargames Campaigns." You wear armor and have swords.
I'm talking about somebody who somehow has no idea of even what a "sword" or "dagger" or "shield" is.
The person running this website is a racist who publicly advocates genocidal practices.
I am deleting my content.
I recommend you do the same.
Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1005969"Rules for Medieval Fantastic Wargames Campaigns." You wear armor and have swords.
I'm talking about somebody who somehow has no idea of even what a "sword" or "dagger" or "shield" is.
So: nothing.
Quote from: Ted;1005962Torchbearer--you are scabs on the poxie underside of humanity, no one likes you, no one wants you and you have managed to fail your way into grubbing around in graveyards and cave diving into nasty subterranean lairs. You will not "win," you will not get the girl, you will not found a kingdom or retire in leisure and comfort to smoke your pipe Rakasa (sp?) style. Life is shit and it is going to get shittier, then you die.
Setting familiarity? There is no setting. You just have to be a pathetic hipster who wants to ironically mock the unwashed masses who play "gamist" games while pretending because the game has resource rules so ridiculous it's almost Pythonesque that your game is "about something".
About setting familiarity and non-violent solutions.
I'm all for that. But my lateral thinking is going to be different from the module writers lateral thinking and the DMs. I get really tired of guessing games. Lately I just reach for a bigger gun and shoot 'em again.
Oh you won't talk eh? Ok well I guess your no good to me then. Too late shit head. I'm not playing that game. Blam.
Again, I'll repeat myself, I say MOST licensed settings require the players to have some buy-in before they can play. It's why I pick genres or settings my players know.
Quote from: Headless;1006029About setting familiarity and non-violent solutions.
I'm all for that. But my lateral thinking is going to be different from the module writers lateral thinking and the DMs. I get really tired of guessing games. Lately I just reach for a bigger gun and shoot 'em again.
Oh you won't talk eh? Ok well I guess your no good to me then. Too late shit head. I'm not playing that game. Blam.
In most of my games, that would make you "the guy who screwed the whole party";).
Quote from: AsenRG;1006037In most of my games, that would make you "the guy who screwed the whole party";).
Or the guy who got sick of the DM treating every NPC as an expendable pawn on the game board. And shooting down or ignoring half a session of PC planning. I'll engage with what you bring and I expect the DM to do the same for me.
Its not my job to save the world, I'll try but if you don't like what I'm doing, its your world, you save it. I'll watch it burn.
Sorry. Its been a while since I've had a DM that really responed real time to what the players are bringing. A little frustration seems to be coming through.
Quote from: CRKrueger;1005998Setting familiarity? There is no setting. You just have to be a pathetic hipster who wants to ironically mock the unwashed masses who play "gamist" games while pretending because the game has resource rules so ridiculous it's almost Pythonesque that your game is "about something".
.
Actually there is a setting called Middlemark, quasi-Norse setting. I cannot address your comments about hipsters and mocking, but three of the five players in our group like it, one is on fence and one does not like it. My children liked it too, but they are pretty open minded as children are wont to be--we are playing 5e now and have a good SWN game on hold. interesting to me, I like the encumbrance mechanic a lot; I've never really enjoyed the encumber an even accounting in other systems, but the placement on someone's paper doll cutout is ... fun for me.
But I think your comment is really an agreement, if Torchbearer is going to hit the table better have full buy in.
Quote from: Dumarest;1005968What do dungeon crawls have to do with the Middle Ages?
If there is a
setting from which the dungeon crawlers come, it might be medieval. If they operate outside the dungeon some of the time or most of the time, as in all but one of the campaigns I have played in or run, maybe they should know that it is unsafe to be snotty with the nobleman/knight/samurai, maybe they should have some idea of other factors of the setting. On the other tentacle, they have to be aware that the setting is not really "back then."
Quote from: Headless;1006044Or the guy who got sick of the DM treating every NPC as an expendable pawn on the game board.
If the NPCs were expendables, you wouldn't be known as I said:).
QuoteAnd shooting down or ignoring half a session of PC planning.
Sure. If your plan after half a session amounts to "let's bring a bigger gun", you'd wish that I simply shot it down...but most likely, I won't be that kind;).
QuoteI'll engage with what you bring and I expect the DM to do the same for me.
However, if all you bring is a list of equipment, "the same" might be less than you'd want.
QuoteIts not my job to save the world, I'll try but if you don't like what I'm doing, its your world, you save it.
I never said a thing about saving the world. I was commenting on the "shoot the NPCs, then bring a bigger gun" school of "planning", which was what you suggested;).
Are you still replying to my post?
QuoteI'll watch it burn.
That's, putting it mildly, unlikely:D!
Far more likely, the world would see you to your shallow grave that you dug yourself.
QuoteSorry. Its been a while since I've had a DM that really responed real time to what the players are bringing. A little frustration seems to be coming through.
Yeah, I can sense the frustration. But I can only comment about my games, not other people's games.
Glorantha.
Quote from: AsenRG;1006198If the NPCs were expendables, you wouldn't be known as I said:).
Sure. If your plan after half a session amounts to "let's bring a bigger gun", you'd wish that I simply shot it down...but most likely, I won't be that kind;).
However, if all you bring is a list of equipment, "the same" might be less than you'd want.
I never said a thing about saving the world. I was commenting on the "shoot the NPCs, then bring a bigger gun" school of "planning", which was what you suggested;).
Are you still replying to my post?
That's, putting it mildly, unlikely:D!
Far more likely, the world would see you to your shallow grave that you dug yourself.
Yeah, I can sense the frustration. But I can only comment about my games, not other people's games.
We might be talking past each other.
My plan didn't star as bring a bigger gun. But thats the plan that works.
Second point. In my role playing experience the more the DM says he doesn't want to run a hack and slash campaign, donsn't like social skills, doesn't like all that gamey stuff. The more twinked out min/maxed system mastery I will need in order to do stuff.
I'll play a poet if that doesn't cripple my charcter. But if I play that for a while and the basic experience is one of things not working and always needing bigger numbers, I'll come back with bigger numbers.
Quote from: Ravenswing;1005161... and when the players decide they're unwilling to be clueless sidekicks, they're going to take the bit in their teeth and play according to their own lights, and that's unlikely to be Doctor-standard pacifism any more than you'd dump a bunch of newbies on Star Trek and expect them to follow the Prime Directive.
A good GM is going to take note of Player Character abilities and craft encounters accordingly. If they have characters that want to fight something, then give them something to fight. It's not like villains haven't just popped out of the blue in the series. But it's also Doctor Who, so they should have the option not to fight as well. So there needs to be goals which can be accomplished without hitting things, but since it's Doctor Who violence is going to happen. The Doctor has totally had companions who have solved things with violence as I have already mentioned, and for a pacifist he sure has a lot of friends who use guns.
Sarah Jane Smith. In her first encounter with The Doctor, she found herself in medieval England and thought he was the villain. What did she do? She organized a militia complete with Hal "Boba Fett" the Archer and set out and captured him. I have no idea what people are talking about when they say companions are pacifists. Leela? Ace? Jack Harkness? River Song? Ace aside, the other three are murder machines. And he married one. How many murder machine K-9's did he build? For fun, emulating quaint 50th century Earth technology. The Doctor has built a death machine in the form of a cute dog, for fun. More than once.
Doctor Who adventures often boil down to "What's the best way to keep the body count as low as possible?" Often there is a nonviolent solution. That one is on the GM to provide and drop clues for. Players can and will have their own idea on how to solve things. But Doctor Who is fueled by bullshit science, so in a game if a Player Character comes up with a bullshit science idea then hear it out and see if you can work with it. They might come up with an outlandish idea, but the GM still gets to decide how they have to accomplish that. As I said above, if there are characters who like hitting things, give them something to hit. Have some outlandish plan on a radiation laden world where the radiation suits coincidentally look like Cyberman shells, and since the radiation jams radio signals, if the PCs can get a few Cyberman heads and hollow them out, they might be able to bluff their way past a group too large to fight to get to the place with the thing that foils their plan. So now it's violence with purpose.
Remember, since Torchwood is canon, Doctor Who can range from light hearted science fiction romantic comedy to ultraviolent grimdark.
Now, if I was running a group of people who had no idea what the show was, then I'd be inclined to let them play whatever shade of grey they like. If for some reason they are playing companions of the Doctor, then they definitely need some room for Agency. You can't have The Doctor calling all the shots like he does in the show. Or, if he does call the shots, the PCs should at least have some leeway to interpret his instructions. If your character is one of those gun toting ones, just ask yourself "What would K-9 do?" :D
The best way to deal with Players unfamiliar with the Whoniverse is to let them stumble around on their own, and let them deal with stuff before running into the Doctor. Give them something they know they have to fight. Like Sontarans. They don't know what Sontarans are but tell them there's a bunch of armored guys with Juggernaut helmets carrying rifles coming out of a big armored sphere that just scorched the earth in a thirty foot radius, and your player characters will get the idea.
I think one line from a previous post is key to running games in a particulr style or setting.
Are the players prepared to engage with the setting? Engage with what the DM brings?
If yes than setting familiarity is just a tool to help them do that. If not then knowing the system won't matter. And the flip side is also important. Is the DM prepared to engage with what the players bring? Their interpretation of the setting which will be different than yours. Their discovery of the setting if they are new players.
You invited players, not actors and not an audience.
Quote from: Headless;1006216We might be talking past each other.
We definitely were, but I think I understood why:).
QuoteMy plan didn't star as bring a bigger gun. But thats the plan that works.
If that's what works, you do that, of course.
My point was that bigger numbers don't work, by themselves.
QuoteSecond point. In my role playing experience the more the DM says he doesn't want to run a hack and slash campaign, donsn't like social skills, doesn't like all that gamey stuff. The more twinked out min/maxed system mastery I will need in order to do stuff.
Yeah, I've seen those kind of Storytellers, too. It's a popular mistake - some GMs just crunch the system to the max, and then use that, or a level slightly below, as a baseline;).
QuoteI'll play a poet if that doesn't cripple my charcter. But if I play that for a while and the basic experience is one of things not working and always needing bigger numbers, I'll come back with bigger numbers.
Yeah, and I'm a Referee who would let you use your poetry to your advantage. Provided, of course, that the plan is good, but that also goes for using those bigger numbers.
Conversely, moronic plans with bigger numbers end up with dead characters, almost invariably. Which was how the talking past each other started:D!
Quote from: Vile;1006210Glorantha.
I've had a lot of success with players who either had no familiarity with Glorantha, even no familiarity with Glorantha or roleplaying. It worked fine. (Granted this was Runequest 2 era Glorantha, not the dense, subjective narrative that exists today.)
Quote from: Bren;1006421I've had a lot of success with players who either had no familiarity with Glorantha, even no familiarity with Glorantha or roleplaying. It worked fine. (Granted this was Runequest 2 era Glorantha, not the dense, subjective narrative that exists today.)
I'd have to second this. I've only ever had I think 3 players that had substantive knowledge of Glorantha before playing RQ, but then I play RQ2 with Cults of Prax as the primary source. I did run a campaign recently that drew from more of the material and realized I was swamped, and eventually put most of the later material up for sale...
Frank
When RQ2 hit our group none of us had heard of it before and we did fine. There was the Lunar Empire but all we knew was about that. Glorantha doesn't require a PhD in the world to run.
RQ2 Glorantha was a whole different beast, I agree - I had no trouble running it when I had never heard of it. But that soon changed.
I am not sure that one needs to know any more about Glorantha to run a game there today than back in 1980. That is like suggesting that one cannot run D&D unless evry corner and aspect of the game world is known in full Gloranthan detail. I would wager that most GMs and players regardless of game world do not know them in anything near that exhaustive level of detail.
To run Glorantha you need know about nothing further than your characters can be expected to travel. That can be a very small area. Start with a village, add a couple of adventure sites, let things grow from there.
Quote from: DavetheLost;1006548I am not sure that one needs to know any more about Glorantha to run a game there today than back in 1980.
I'm sure that unless one chooses to run Glorantha for some humorless, anal-retentive and pedantic scholars of all things Gloranthan there is no reason to need all the details that have ever been published. And who would ever choose to do that?
It's hard to run Dr.Who effectively even with people who ARE familiar with the show.
Quote from: Krimson;1006218Remember, since Torchwood is canon, Doctor Who can range from light hearted science fiction romantic comedy to ultraviolent grimdark.
The Doctor is what makes Dr. Who as an RPG difficult, because he either becomes a GM PC or it doesn't really follow the style of the show. Do you have to have the Doctor for it to be an RPG in the Doctor Who setting? If the players never go to a (or the) dungeon, isn't it still a D&D setting?
You could do a campaign where the Doctor is always recovering from regeneration (like Castrovalva) and the PC companions have only a vague idea how to run the Tardis. Or the player characters are all murderhobos recruited by the Master to crew a second stolen Tardis and to create trouble across all of time and space, to distract the Doctor from the Master's real plan. Are these still the Doctor Who setting, since they don't seem to require a lot of familiarity from the players?
A campaign in which every player plays one of the Doctors, all on the same Tardis together, might work for an RPG (at least short term), but the players would need a Krimson level of familiarity.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1006937It's hard to run Dr.Who effectively even with people who ARE familiar with the show.
I've run Doctor Who with lots of groups. It's one of the
easiest games for me to run.
The current Dr Who game includes notes on playing without the Doctor, having players take turns playing the Doctor, and/or playing with other time travelers, or even no time travel at all.
I would say that Dr Who is similar to pendragon, The One Ring, or Castle Falkenstein in that player buy in to the basic style premise of the thing can make a huge difference in play and in how much the rules fight the players.
I'd assume you both are talking about your personal experiences, which means you might both be right:).
Quote from: DavetheLost;1007233The current Dr Who game includes notes on playing without the Doctor, having players take turns playing the Doctor, and/or playing with other time travelers, or even no time travel at all.
I would say that Dr Who is similar to pendragon, The One Ring, or Castle Falkenstein in that player buy in to the basic style premise of the thing can make a huge difference in play and in how much the rules fight the players.
Precisely.
Quote from: DavetheLost;1007233The current Dr Who game includes notes on playing without the Doctor, having players take turns playing the Doctor, and/or playing with other time travelers, or even no time travel at all.
I would say that Dr Who is similar to pendragon, The One Ring, or Castle Falkenstein in that player buy in to the basic style premise of the thing can make a huge difference in play and in how much the rules fight the players.
Which may be true, but it isn't all that complex to manage in practice.
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007465Which may be true, but it isn't all that complex to manage in practice.
It's not if the players are familiar, or familiarized by the GM, with Doctor Who. Without at least some of that going on, they'll be likely to take on the tropes of more standard Sci Fi, which are not the same as the ones used by Doctor Who.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1007668It's not if the players are familiar, or familiarized by the GM, with Doctor Who. Without at least some of that going on, they'll be likely to take on the tropes of more standard Sci Fi, which are not the same as the ones used by Doctor Who.
Doctor Who is what most people brought up on it regard as a staple of science fiction. It may be a British vs American thing, but to say it's not standard sci-fi is like arguing Star Trek isn't standard sci-fi. For many people, as a popular family show, its their first experience of scifi. You could argue that there is an issue about who plays the Doctor (or not), but that is no different to the issue of who plays Gandalf in Middle Earth games. Moreover, almost every Doctor Who plot is basically just a Monster of the Week or some other form of melodramatic plot.
Doctor Who is a game and genre I could run on the fly with almost zero preparation, it already has strong brand and genre recognition from pretty much every player I've ever ran it with and it's easy to run with the mechanics it has. I really don't see what would be difficult. For me, it's primary use is as an intro game for newbies.
Any campaign where canon knowledge is important to the success of the campaign is going to require players having that canon knowledge.
Quote from: Spinachcat;1007675Any campaign where canon knowledge is important to the success of the campaign is going to require players having that canon knowledge.
But this is the point I made before - it really doesn't. The storylines in Doctor Who are pretty generic sci-fi melodrama. Simply come up with a new monster of the week and you've pretty much got a plot at hand.
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007680But this is the point I made before - it really doesn't. The storylines in Doctor Who are pretty generic sci-fi melodrama. Simply come up with a new monster of the week and you've pretty much got a plot at hand.
If you are just running generic sci-fi melodrama, then your campaign doesn't hinge on canon knowledge and any players with basic interest in sci-fi will do.
If you are running a campaign where players are expected to know various trivia to operate effectively and immerse in the game world, then you need those players who love the trivia of that setting.
AKA, I am a perfect player for generic sci-fi, but I'm not a good player for a campaign where the GM expects players to know the in & outs of the various Doctors, Companions, Locales, and major villains and references them constantly in a way my PC is supposed to respond intelligently.
AKA, the difference between running LotR for people who've only watched the movies vs. a table of JRRT trivia junkies.
Quote from: Spinachcat;1007681If you are just running generic sci-fi melodrama, then your campaign doesn't hinge on canon knowledge and any players with basic interest in sci-fi will do.
If you are running a campaign where players are expected to know various trivia to operate effectively and immerse in the game world, then you need those players who love the trivia of that setting.
AKA, I am a perfect player for generic sci-fi, but I'm not a good player for a campaign where the GM expects players to know the in & outs of the various Doctors, Companions, Locales, and major villains and references them constantly in a way my PC is supposed to respond intelligently.
AKA, the difference between running LotR for people who've only watched the movies vs. a table of JRRT trivia junkies.
If you sat down for a game with Moffat and co, who actually write the shows, I would guarantee you'd be able to get by without knowledge of the canon. Just like the millions of casual viewers who watch the TV show, in fact.
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007684If you sat down for a game with Moffat and co, who actually write the shows, I would guarantee you'd be able to get by without knowledge of the canon. Just like the millions of casual viewers who watch the TV show, in fact.
Agree but Dr. Who is pretty cult viewing in the US and Canada in my experience. Unless someone caught it when it played on PBS when they were kids even a number of sf fans don't know more than the Daleks and 'Exterminate!' It is a series that I completely missed for example, although I grew up on The Prisoner or The Avengers.
Dr Who has time travel. Its not standard Sci Fi. Its standard bullshit.
Quote from: Bren;1006556[...] there is no reason to need all the details that have ever been published.
That would be a whole other definition of "familiar with".
Quote from: Headless;1007710Dr Who has time travel. Its not standard Sci Fi. Its standard bullshit.
Let me introduce you to H.G.Wells.....
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007803Let me introduce you to H.G.Wells.....
That was forward.
Quote from: Headless;1007710Dr Who has time travel. Its not standard Sci Fi. Its standard bullshit.
Much of Sci Fi is replete with artificial gravity, FTL travel and communication, time travel, aliens, and other "standard bullshit"
Time travel is meaningless. Or a-meaningful. Beyond outside of human understanding.
One of the foundations of human understanding is cause and effect (the other might be 1 thing can't be in two places at the same time I can't remember) cause and effect breaks down if effects take place before the cause.
Aliens, true aliens are not human, meaning different from human understanding. Possibly impossible to understand. And in good sci fi dealing with aliens that is front and center. Its a story about gow can I deal with this being that I can't understand, even if I can understand the words they speak. But aliens aren't beyond reason, they just have a different reason.
Time travel is anathema to reason. A story with it can't make sense. Some of the best are A-sensical, but most of them are just non-sense.
Dr. Who's Time Traveling is not the focus of the show. This is what a lot of people miss about it, they're focusing on the wrong thing. The show is about solving a situation using the Doctor or his associates as a vehicle to do so. Personality, skills, knowledge, this is what the focus is on.
Quote from: Headless;1007846Time travel is anathema to reason. A story with it can't make sense. Some of the best are A-sensical, but most of them are just non-sense.
Seems too broadly stated. Most tropes of sf, from psionics to FTL, have little to no basis in sciencem One of the first masterpieces of sf is based around time travel afterall, Wells'
The Time Machine and there is a reasonable supposition that the popularity of time travel as a trope in the scientific romance was connected to the growing populairty of evolutionary theory, again Wells' book makes that connection overt. Bishop's
No Enemy But Time is also an excellent sf novel on the theme.
Quote from: Headless;1007846Time travel is meaningless. Or a-meaningful. Beyond outside of human understanding.
One of the foundations of human understanding is cause and effect (the other might be 1 thing can't be in two places at the same time I can't remember) cause and effect breaks down if effects take place before the cause.
No, anticipating things that will happen and acting in reaction to them before they happened is actually standard human activity. Yet it includes reaction before the cause has happened;).
Anticipation is based on patterns of past experiences.
Quote from: Headless;1007934Anticipation is based on patterns of past experiences.
And yet it acts as time travel for that specific case.
And time travel is also very much related to your past experiences;).
Star Trek.
I'm not 100% fully into the setting but I do love to run it, but when I get a player who knows more about it and tries to fudge their way out of a situation by saying 'I'll use an inverted tri-phase resonator on the transponders they use for the transporter room!' like they're in a Voyager episode, and then try to convince me that it would work because they know more about Star Trek than me, that's annoying.
Quote from: AsenRG;1007945And yet it acts as time travel for that specific case.
And time travel is also very much related to your past experiences;).
First sentence- we all travel through time. Only one direction though. If you want to go faster. No problem. Slower, still no big deal. Go backwards non-sense.
Second sentence. Words don't make sense any more dealing with time travel. If I go back to 1965, my being there can't be related to past experiences. I wasn't born then. I have no experience.
Most time travel stories are like trying to devide by zero. Its not clever its non-sense.
Quote from: Headless;1007846Time travel is meaningless. Or a-meaningful. Beyond outside of human understanding.
One of the foundations of human understanding is cause and effect (the other might be 1 thing can't be in two places at the same time I can't remember) cause and effect breaks down if effects take place before the cause.
Aliens, true aliens are not human, meaning different from human understanding. Possibly impossible to understand. And in good sci fi dealing with aliens that is front and center. Its a story about gow can I deal with this being that I can't understand, even if I can understand the words they speak. But aliens aren't beyond reason, they just have a different reason.
Time travel is anathema to reason. A story with it can't make sense. Some of the best are A-sensical, but most of them are just non-sense.
The end of eternity was pretty good in my opinion. That is one of the best science fiction stories I ever read and all about time travel.
You are going to run into logical issues when introducing time travel in a story or game....but the game of figuring it out, finding potential contradictions, etc is part of the fun.
Quote from: Headless;1007985First sentence- we all travel through time. Only one direction though.
We are all time peasants.
QuoteMost time travel stories are like trying to devide by zero. Its not clever its non-sense.
Doctor Who has little to do with paradoxical time travel, though; travel to the past was just an excuse to visit various events in history. Usually they travel to one particular point in time and space and have an adventure there.
Quote from: rawma;1008181Doctor Who has little to do with paradoxical time travel, though; travel to the past was just an excuse to visit various events in history. Usually they travel to one particular point in time and space and have an adventure there.
Time travel in Doctor Who is nothing more than a vehicle for adventure, anyone who makes it into a bigger thing than that, doesn't get the show. And this is coming from someone who actually doesn't care about the show.
Quote from: Headless;1007985First sentence- we all travel through time. Only one direction though. If you want to go faster. No problem. Slower, still no big deal. Go backwards non-sense.
That wasn't my point, though.
Anticipation amounts to skipping a certain period and then
going back and acting on that with pre-knowledge. Granted, usually that amounts to a very limited timeskip, but it still amounts to acting on the knowledge of something that has not happened.
If you can do that with purely mental skills, you can do better with a machine that allows you to travel. It's not a fundamentally different experience.
QuoteSecond sentence. Words don't make sense any more dealing with time travel.
Except they do.
QuoteIf I go back to 1965, my being there can't be related to past experiences. I wasn't born then. I have no experience.
Then go back to 1990, instead. Makes sense, doesn't it?
QuoteMost time travel stories are like trying to devide by zero. Its not clever its non-sense.
No, it just seems to be your particular hang-up;).
Except that the thing you are anticipating hasn't happened and might not.
Words aren't equations them seem to make sense even when they don't. They are very powerful they can carry meaning both with and through non-sense.
Go back to 1990? Where are you going with this.
You can have time travel stories. You can have time travel shows which amount to going to a new place every week. The new place is supposedly a different time but since every place is imaginary it doesn't matter.
If you try to have a plot based story where the plot turns on time travel it all falls apart on close examination. Plot is a narritive about cause and effect, cause and effect are irrelevant to time travel. It makes a mockery of them.
Quote from: Headless;1008386If you try to have a plot based story where the plot turns on time travel it all falls apart on close examination. Plot is a narritive about cause and effect, cause and effect are irrelevant to time travel. It makes a mockery of them.
You couldn't possibly be more wrong. The entire concept of time travel is inextricably linked with Cause and Effect. They stand astride Time Travel like a Colossus, influencing everything. All you do while time traveling has an immediate effect as well as a temporal effect upon the Timeline (or Timelines). Aside from academic research, in most stories the entire point of Time Travel is to cause an effect in the Timeline.
You all need to watch the new BBC 'Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency' show. They are not attempting to film the books, but are using the characters for something new. The first season was good, the second is keeping the momentum going. Time-travel is a coherent and essential piece of season 1.
https://media1.tenor.com/images/66e7bdeb2ff88c7c31203de864ac3667/tenor.gif
Quote from: CRKrueger;1008387You couldn't possibly be more wrong. The entire concept of time travel is inextricably linked with Cause and Effect. They stand astride Time Travel like a Colossus, influencing everything. All you do while time traveling has an immediate effect as well as a temporal effect upon the Timeline (or Timelines). Aside from academic research, in most stories the entire point of Time Travel is to cause an effect in the Timeline.
Yeah two of the best Heinlein short stories are 'By His Bootstraps' and 'All you Zombies' where the cause and effect is central. 'All you Zombies' was recently adapted into the excellent film Predestination.
Quote from: Voros;1008399Yeah two of the best Heinlein short stories are 'By His Bootstraps' and 'All you Zombies' where the cause and effect is central. 'All you Zombies' was recently adapted into the excellent film Predestination.
"I know where I came from, but where did all you zombies come from?"
I always found it interesting that Heinlein last short story was 'All you Zombies' and after that he wrote Starship Troopers. It's like he looked into the abyss (also sensed in Them, By His Bootstraps and The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag) and then turned around and ran the other way for the rest of his writing career.
Quote from: CRKrueger;1008387You couldn't possibly be more wrong. The entire concept of time travel is inextricably linked with Cause and Effect. They stand astride Time Travel like a Colossus, influencing everything. All you do while time traveling has an immediate effect as well as a temporal effect upon the Timeline (or Timelines). Aside from academic research, in most stories the entire point of Time Travel is to cause an effect in the Timeline.
Yes. I recognize that. And I catagoricly reject the entire genera. Its all either non-sense or un-sense Asensecal.
The best is deliberatly outside of understanding. But most of it is just deviding by zero and thinking its clever.
Quote from: Headless;1008403Yes. I recognize that. And I catagoricly reject the entire genera. Its all either non-sense or un-sense Asensecal.
The best is deliberatly outside of understanding. But most of it is just deviding by zero and thinking its clever.
Or maybe it's just a little beyond you.
Quote from: Schwartzwald;1002621Are there game settings you won't let a player into unless they are pretty familiar with it? I had a case where I let a guy who knew exactly jack shit about warhammer 40,000 into a game of dark heresy.
Let's just say the game became one of "let's explain to the FNG why we do everything grimdark here". I mean he just didn't get the settung at all.
I had him read a couple of my 40k novels and he finally got it then. Then he didn't want to do all that dark depressing stuff. :mad:
From now on anyone getting into a 40k RPG I'm running better know what it's about.
Any games you want players to be grounded in before playing?
Its difficult for total Newbies in an Exalted game unless you start off as mortals. There's allot of 'lore' established characters would know.
The person running this website is a racist who publicly advocates genocidal practices.
I am deleting my content.
I recommend you do the same.
There was plenty of wierd time traveling red head sex in the later novels.
Quote from: Justin Alexander;1008418Except Heinlein wrote a bunch of time travel novels after that.
I meant the themes of existential dread in those stories not the use of time travel. I've never been able to struggle through the later novels which seem terribly written to me but I am aware they're full of Heinlein's solpilsism, but from what I dimly recall before I gave up on them they lacked the pathos of the stories I mentioned.
Well, time travel stories are not everyone's cup of tea I suppose. Personally I really enjoy them, but if they don't work for you, they don't work for you.
I am curious Headless, how do you feel about things like Back to the Future?
Quote from: Voros;1008402I always found it interesting that Heinlein last short story was 'All you Zombies' and after that he wrote Starship Troopers. It's like he looked into the abyss (also sensed in Them, By His Bootstraps and The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag) and then turned around and ran the other way for the rest of his writing career.
Short stories had stopped being "the backbone of SF" (meaning the way to make the most money) somewhat before then. His wife Ginny said that he continued writing them "out of habit." I think it might be easier for the writer _and_ the reader to look into the abyss in the shorter forms.
Troopers was the last of thirteen novel written on his juvenile contract with Scribner's, so he had been running in that direction for over a decade. The deal was that the contract would end if and when his editor rejected one of them. When she rejected Troopers, he went out and sold it for more than he would have gotten from Scribner's. Even Ginny wasn't sure whether he'd written it expressly to end the contract.
I don't think he ever believed in any abyss but that wouldn't have kept him from writing about it if the money were rolling in.
It's possible that the less-than-commercial theme was better to tackle in short stories instead of novels but he didn't really abandon it so much as dilute the intensity. Solipisism continued to be a recurrent theme throughout Heinlein's writing, it pretty much takes over and ruins many of his last novels which hardly seemed aimed at being commercial with their nearly plotless 'stories' and didactic monologues. I know Heinlein liked to play the folksy and/or cynical pulp writer (that exact persona/character is the protagonist in 'All you Zombies') but these earlier stories have an intensity and personal tone that goes beyond mere pulp.
But we're way OT perhaps I'll create a Heinlein thread in Media.
Quote from: BedrockBrendan;1008436Well, time travel stories are not everyone's cup of tea I suppose. Personally I really enjoy them, but if they don't work for you, they don't work for you.
I am curious Headless, how do you feel about things like Back to the Future?
Back to the future is a great movie.
Paycheck was a cool movie. Predestination was very well done.
I'm not sure why I picked this "time travel is stupid" hill to die on. I'm not angry about it.
I've never looked into the media forums and I won't start now. I've dealt with two much ignorant, from my point of view, early Heinlein good, late Heinlein bad nonsense to get into it again at this late date.
It's not ignorant for others to hold a different opinion. I've read a lot of Heinlein and I struggled with his later books, I think there's a good, reasoned arguments that the late period work is a lot weaker than his mid-period peak. Lots of writers decline in their later years.
From the outside, their work seems to go down hill when the author becomes more successful than the editor.
Guys, this is getting off topic. If you want to discuss the literary merits of given writer, take it to the Media subforum.
Quote from: Headless;1008386Except that the thing you are anticipating hasn't happened and might not.
Same as with time travel. Your presence as an observer might be changing what happens in a time travel story, too:).
QuoteGo back to 1990? Where are you going with this.
I assume you were born back then, and could benefit from having pre-knowledge.
QuoteYou can have time travel stories. You can have time travel shows which amount to going to a new place every week. The new place is supposedly a different time but since every place is imaginary it doesn't matter.
Yes, so?
Quotef you try to have a plot based story where the plot turns on time travel it all falls apart on close examination. Plot is a narritive about cause and effect, cause and effect are irrelevant to time travel. It makes a mockery of them.
Apart from proving that plots aren't the best way to deliver an RPG experience, where are you going with that;)?
You've lost me Asen.
Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007673Doctor Who is what most people brought up on it regard as a staple of science fiction. It may be a British vs American thing, but to say it's not standard sci-fi is like arguing Star Trek isn't standard sci-fi. For many people, as a popular family show, its their first experience of scifi. You could argue that there is an issue about who plays the Doctor (or not), but that is no different to the issue of who plays Gandalf in Middle Earth games. Moreover, almost every Doctor Who plot is basically just a Monster of the Week or some other form of melodramatic plot.
Doctor Who is a game and genre I could run on the fly with almost zero preparation, it already has strong brand and genre recognition from pretty much every player I've ever ran it with and it's easy to run with the mechanics it has. I really don't see what would be difficult. For me, it's primary use is as an intro game for newbies.
Yeah, I think you're thinking in terms of the UK experience. Certainly, Doctor Who has become steadily more popular in the rest of the world on a yearly basis, but it wasn't a show every kid watched like it is in Great Britain.
Anyways, the point of the exercise is to assume that players are NOT familiar with it.
Quote from: Headless;1008883You've lost me Asen.
...OK, can we just agree to disagree on the matter of time travel destroying causality? I don't think the point I was making was important enough to dwell for much longer on it.
Not using time travel for cheap tricks is one of the elements of Doctor Who players must be familiar with.