I remember a time that people complained about and looked down on games that started with rules instead of setting info (this would be rpgnet circa '00-'02). I think it really depends on the game.

But when I pick up a new game in a store and flip through it, the first thing I look at is the character sheet, and then the base mechanic, and then the combat system, and then flip through the random fluff.

Quote from: RPGPundit;515624Chargen didn't start "always" being at the beginning until the format of 3e became the standard format of organizing rules for almost all d20 games, and from there for all the industry.

It's not even really true today. For example, the Dresden Files RPG doesn't start that way. (Which happens to be the RPG closest to hand.)

But it's always been true in D&D. And it appears to have been almost universally true through at least 1980.

Quote from: RPGPundit;515624Chargen didn't start "always" being at the beginning until the format of 3e became the standard format of organizing rules for almost all d20 games, and from there for all the industry.

People tend to think that intro-attributes-race-class-skills-feats-additional info-equipment-combat-magic-world stuff is how its always been, but its really only that way since D&D 3e.

Earlier posts in this very thread pointed out how in the 90s and earlier, it was all over the place.  

So I chalk the universality of this formula up to the success of D&D 3.0

RPGPundit

I was sitting at my bookshelf and did an informal check of some of my pre-D&D3e games.

Torg (1990) = Chapter One: Creating a Character
James Bond 007 (1983) = Chapter Two: Creating a Character (Chapter One is the Introduction)
Mekton II (1987) = Character Creation is the first section
Cyberpunk 2020 (1990) = The first section is on character roles and character creation.
Star Wars 1e D6 (1987) = Chapter One is character creation
Star Trek: The Next Generation (1998) = Character Creation is the first section after a completely extraneous section about what Star Trek and the Federation are.
Tunnels & Trolls 5.5 = the first section after the generic RPG Introduction is 1.3 Creating Characters
All Palladium games up until Nightbane in the mid 90s started with a character creation section
Dragonlance Fifth Age Saga (1996) = Generic introduction and then Character Creation, which is pretty notable since Dragonlance is often assumed to be all pre-gens all the time.
Star Hero (1989) = Character Creation at the front
Universe by SPI (1982) = Intro and then character creation

The only pre-3e games I found with any substantial stuff before the character creation section were Jovian Chronicles, 7th Sea, and post Nightbane Palladium games.  Everything else in my library had character creation first.  And it was really only in the late 90s that burying character creation deeper in the book was even a regularly recurring trend.  Even after 3e, the games with character creation buried in a later section are the definite minority.

Quote from: Gabriel2;515719I was sitting at my bookshelf and did an informal check of some of my pre-D&D3e games.

In Classic Traveller Book 1, character creation starts on Page 4.

Quote from: Gabriel2;515719The only pre-3e games I found with any substantial stuff before the character creation section were Jovian Chronicles, 7th Sea, and post Nightbane Palladium games.  Everything else in my library had character creation first.  And it was really only in the late 90s that burying character creation deeper in the book was even a regularly recurring trend.  Even after 3e, the games with character creation buried in a later section are the definite minority.

Yes, in the mid-to-late-1990s and onward, you'll see online arguments in favor of character creation starting later in the book after the setting has been established and plenty of games started being published that worked that way.  The question is whether it actually helped the hobby, since the sales of role-playing games also declined during that period.

On introducing a setting that lacks obvious cliches, like napoleonic ducks, you are still better off doing something like having an illustrative picture on the cover than then leaping into the book with 'first, what type of duck are you'.

If you need more than a line or two of 'its the napoleonic era. You are a duck' to get people to grok your setting you are trying too hard.

Thought I do find it funny that people are using 'it actually started on page 4... or 8' arguements to show how so few games actually started with character creation.


There is an obvious divide in game design mentality here too. Notice that the metaplot heavy "This is our setting you want to play in" vs "Here is how to make characters for this Genre... we might have a setting" comes into play.

Cyberpunk had a setting. In fact I think the page count describing that setting, at least in the main book, was roughly comparable to the page count in Shadowrun. Unlike Shadowrun, however, the timeline and exposition was in the back.  As a result you had less emphasis on the setting from the fans, and consequently more perceived freedom to do what you wanted with your games.

Obviously Pondsmith felt a little more protective of his setting, given how he did CP3, but thats neither here nor there.



On a personal note, there does seem to be some arrogance in assuming, as a game designer, that people really want you 150 pages of background first and foremost.  I, for example, picked up Seventh Sea back in teh day because it looked like a good swashbuckling, three musketeers kinda game. Instead I got Theah and a deeply invovled backstory of geopolitics driven by chtuloid-alien faerie and bug-demons...  I wasn't out to buy Theah (Yes, yes, I know some people actually were, from some card game that I never actually ever saw anyone play...)

The value of the game system for swashbuckling is a debatable topic for another day.

Quote from: Spike;515735Thought I do find it funny that people are using 'it actually started on page 4... or 8' arguements to show how so few games actually started with character creation.

Just to be clear, I pointed out that Traveller started on Page 4 to show that it did start with character creation.  I don't expect "starts with character creation" to mean "Page 1", but I do expect it to start in a the first dozen pages after a short "What is Role-Playing", a full page piece of art or two, and brief intro to the genre and/or setting (in the range of Justin Alexander's 5 page limit).

Quote from: Spike;515735On introducing a setting that lacks obvious cliches, like napoleonic ducks, you are still better off doing something like having an illustrative picture on the cover than then leaping into the book with 'first, what type of duck are you'.

If you need more than a line or two of 'its the napoleonic era. You are a duck' to get people to grok your setting you are trying too hard.

I've never liked books that start with setting info and push characters and rules into obscurity at the back because of something akin to this.  

From my point of view, the setting info and short stories are of very limited utility.  I'm typically only ever going to read them once to get an idea of what is being described.  After that, those sections of the book are dead space, and when they're right up at the front of the book, I feel that kinda sucks.

On the other hand, I'm going to use character creation over and over again.  It's more convenient to have it at the front of the book than buried halfway in.

You mentioned Shadowrun.  In your post you alluded to it having a setting heavy opening.  I had to pull my 1e corebook down from the shelf and check, because I honestly did not recall any setting information at the start of the book.  Lo and behold, there was a setting section talking about the Awakening and all that BS.  I hadn't read or even registered any of that stuff being there for over 20 years.  I'm absolutely sure I read it once and never had any further need for it.  However, the character creation section is dog-eared and has soda and pizza stains.

Oh, I wasn't trying to call you out, John. You're post was understandable, but for some reason it seems to have spawned a host of defensive page counts.

17 pages into a 150-200 page book is still pretty close to being in the beginning.


Of course, now I know that if I ever decide to dazzle the world with my brilliant game design, to make sure and start my page numbering in the negatives, just so I can avoid charges of putting creation too late....

I don't have a preference on where they locate chargen stuff-but I've played the game for a long time.  I don't know if it'd be different if I was new to the game or not.