I'm only interested here in genres you don't hate with the fire of a thousand suns by the way, I don't get mecha so I can't run it, but that isn't really a surprise. Similarly Pundy probably can't do romantic fantasy too good, but given his view of it who would expect him to?
For me, Supers. I can't run it at all, I struggle to play it well.
Why? I guess I think too much in terms of realistic/credible behaviour, I can't think in genre, for me fundamentally the rules are the physics of the game world and I really struggle to ignore as a player stuff my character would surely notice. I get the same with epic fantasy a la high level DnD, if my PC can soak up 30 arrows I struggle to rationalise why he wouldn't notice that.
Other folk manage it fine, me, when I run supers it rapidly turns into some ghastly version of Watchmen but with more violence, as everyone slowly begins to act rationally and the logic of the game rapidly begins to disintegrate.
You? Anything you aren't averse to that you really struggle to run or play?
Fantasy. I don't understand it at the root level.
-clash
I love hard scifi RPGs but I don't know shit about the physics of it all, not even enough to produce a remotely credible, ad hoc mumbo jumbo version. I.e., jump drives in Traveller: I just struggle for words, nonsensical or not. WTF is a "relay conveyor"? How long can a human survive 7G, or a punctured vacc suit? Fucked if I know.
No, Doc: for once, giant %&$%ing spiders aren't the answer. Alas.
Quote from: flyingmiceFantasy. I don't understand it at the root level.
-clash
How so? Can you expand at all?
Also, Blood Games has magic and all doesn't it, and you seem pretty proud of it, I understand it's not fantasy (it's horror) but there are relationships between the two genres.
Just querying as I'm curious.
To address the main topic, I've gotten as far as character creation in Call of Cthulhu a couple times. In both cases outside events conspired to keep me from actually playing the game, but had I done so I think I'd have been pretty much at sea. I've got no real sense of the genre; I've read "Dagon" and one or two "mythos" stories by third-party writers; I've also played
Arkham Horror and got nothing out of it.
Quote from: BalbinusI get the same with epic fantasy a la high level DnD, if my PC can soak up 30 arrows I struggle to rationalise why he wouldn't notice that.
This used to give me trouble, now I realize that stuff like this, along with high-level fighters being able to "fall" from great heights with plenty of HP to spare, is best not rationalized, it should be embraced. E.g.
DM: You find yourself surrounded by a group of soldiers with crossbows.
Player: Oh noes, woe is me, I had best allow them to capture me, I should be scared of such an ambush, otherwise my sense of verisimilitude will be shattered.
= teh suck.
OTOH,
DM: You find yourself surrounded by a group of soldiers with crossbows.
Player: Excellent! Make my day, suckahs!
= r0xx0rs.
High level D&D fighters at least should be seen as Roland or Hurin, able to absorb prodigious amounts of physical damage and take on whole armies of normal foes.
To paraphrase something Pierce Inverarity PMed once, D&D should not be played as if it were Harnmaster.
Horror. I'm not able to generate an element of fear into a RPG.
Quote from: BalbinusI guess I think too much in terms of realistic/credible behaviour, I can't think in genre, for me fundamentally the rules are the physics of the game world and I really struggle to ignore as a player stuff my character would surely notice.
I pretty much have the same problem with any genre that requires the characters not to notice things that they should obviously notice and not do things that clearly make a lot of sense for them to do.
Horror is a really, really tough one for me. I can do fantasy, supers, and sci-fi just fine, but horror is always a chore.
I can play Fantasy....but I cannot run it to save my life:)
Fantasy / Sword & Sorcery.
..and its not that I suck st it. I actually did a pretty job running that genre fall of last year - I juist have no enthusiasm for it. It doesn't really interest me .
Three of my players said they had a lot of fun with the way I ran it, the fourth doesn't really enjoy medieval Europe type setting...but she was enjoying our company socially....and knew we were getting back to the TRAVELLER universe in a few sessions.
= Ed C.
I'm really pretty limited with the kind of stuff I can come up with really, which is why I don't really GM much.
I can come up with some basic archetypal D&D fantasy stuff, and I'm good at SWAT/spec ops scenarios because it's an interest of mine in other areas of gaming.
By and large though, I just suck. And ask my to actualyl come up with "story" or "plot", and I'll laugh at you. I can't even write an outline for crap fro real fiction, so anything that requires even a pale shadow of that skill tends to fall flat on it's arse.
I tihnk it's why I've been gravitating to Wilderlands so much, because that's sometihng I think I could run. Cavorting through a preset setting full of simple excuses to go bash orc skulls and invade caverns is sometihng I think even I could do.
Supers. I hate having my hands tied by the genre expectations.
Quote from: John MorrowI pretty much have the same problem with any genre that requires the characters not to notice things that they should obviously notice and not do things that clearly make a lot of sense for them to do.
Nicely put, that's the nub of my issue.
To respond to another poster, re horror, I love horror gaming, I just don't expect (or want actually) to be frightened or to frighten my players. The characters experience the horror, the players are sitting at a table having fun with snacks and something to drink, and that's the way I like it.
supers, as in "4 color & spandex" types. there's just too much of a disconnect.
anything historical, for the most part. i'd want to research the background enough for the history major in me to be comfortable i'm representing the period accurately. my players would probably never notice the difference, but i'd know.
maybe detective stories? my CoC adventures (always modern-day) end up as research then scares then OMFG! stuff.
Quote from: BalbinusI'm only interested here in genres you don't hate with the fire of a thousand suns by the way, I don't get mecha so I can't run it, but that isn't really a surprise. Similarly Pundy probably can't do romantic fantasy too good, but given his view of it who would expect him to?
Actually, I'd probably kick ass at Romantic Fantasy. My games are very character driven, and various campaigns of mine end up getting a very soap-opera feel (The Legion of Superheros, for example). I would also have no problem running a game that was about an underdog facing hardship in a society that doesn't understand them because of gender, race, strange powers, whatever, and who are struggling to find their place, prove themselves, and maybe find love.
I just wouldn't be particularly good at running a collectivist-utopian feminist-"progressive liberal" PC fantasy with a straight face.
As for what else I would suck at, I've come to the conclusion that I'm pretty piss-poor at running Cyberpunk. Also, for that matter, any kind of modern game that isn't supernatural-horror or "dark conspiracy" kind of stuff.
Everything else I pretty well rock at.
RPGPundit
Quote from: RPGPunditI just wouldn't be particularly good at running a collectivist-utopian feminist-"progressive liberal" PC fantasy with a straight face.
Isn't that a fairly good summary of the romantic fantasy genre? As opposed to a fantasy with romantic elements, I have no doubt you'd be fine with that given your actual play posts.
I can't do obvious comedy stuff, like Paranoia. My sense of humor just doesn't lend itself to stuff like that.
Supers doesn't work for me, despite being an old-school comic fan. I'm just not very good at doing the "filler" stuff between battles. It makes for great comics, but is dull as dirt to me in play.
I think I run most genres well enough except I have to be able to twist the genre conventions enough to make what I consider to be an internally consistant (game-able) universe.
So high fantasy? Great, if we are willing to accept a slightly more lethal version (i.e. No 30 arrows sticking out of your guy). I love cyberpunk, but sorry, no cyberhacking (since I think the one guy going off into "cyber-ville" is not game-able IMO). Supers? Awesome, I love supers... but expect combats to be hard-fought tactical affairs... with the occassional monologue.
So, I can do them all... if I can cheat them a little bit. Except for "kitchen-sink" genres like Shadowrun and dimension hopping. The whole "everything goes" attitude bugs me.
supers.
I can't stand supers rpgs, though I like comics and such. Why do I suck at them? Can't get over that fact that most superhero rpgs are buillt with the intent to never have supers die or seem threatened.
Post-Apocalyptic.
I really don't like games where PCs are just reactive and trying to survive.
It gets piss-boring for me.
For me this genre only gets interesting once the PCs have accumulated enough resources to start rebuilding civilization.
And by then the game already is halfway out of the PostAp-sandbox.
Quote from: BalbinusIsn't that a fairly good summary of the romantic fantasy genre? As opposed to a fantasy with romantic elements, I have no doubt you'd be fine with that given your actual play posts.
No, its a good description of Blue Rose. There's a lot of romantic fantasy that doesn't read anything like Blue Rose.
RPGPundit
Quote from: alexandroPost-Apocalyptic.
I really don't like games where PCs are just reactive and trying to survive.
It gets piss-boring for me.
For me this genre only gets interesting once the PCs have accumulated enough resources to start rebuilding civilization.
And by then the game already is halfway out of the PostAp-sandbox.
Post-Apocalyptic doesn't mean survival necessarily. I mean look at Gamma World, the grand-daddy of the genre.
I can do SF, but I get bored with it pretty quick.
I suck donkey balls when it comes to investigation-based pulp noir games with no fantasy or horror elements. I can't... I just can't.
-=Grim=-
My philosophy is to take the genre by the scruff of its neck and force it, kicking and screaming, to do my will.
Intrigue-heavy games. I can run swashbuckling and 007-style games where the intrigue is just something in the background that gives a reason to kick some villain ass and provide plot twists, but anything where intrigues are actually the main weapon and meat and bones of the game would suck
.
I don't know a single system that takes the intrigue resolution away from my plausibility reasoning, without pulling out the broad conflict resolution club to make every conflict the same (what would just give intrigues a thin painting to divide them from other kinds of conflicts - not much fun).
To come up all of the time with good intrigues, counter-intrigues, spionage methods, counter-spionage methods, intelligence and so on where the system can only support in parts would make my head explode, especially as I'm an adversial GM who can't just throw away neutral and fair rule usage.
Therefore, I'd stay clear from Amber, Camarilla Vampire LARP, courtly 7th Sea and everything else that would demand to rely heavily on intrigues.
Horror. I've all but given up on it; every time I've tried running something in a horror vein it ended up with massive gunfights. I think I'd do okay with action-oriented horror (and along those lines, I do really want to run Masks of Nyarlathotep some time), but in general it's just not something I can do well.
Superheroes, too. I've only tried doing so a couple of times, but it's not something I can get myself into. It doesn't help that I am not into superheroes that much -- I watch the movies and may read the occasional TPB, but that's it.
Supers. I'd really love to play a good supers game, but it hasn't happened in 20 or so years. I played in a promising game a year or so ago, but it ended after a couple of sessions.
As for the why I suck at it? Maybe it's just too confining for me play it seriously.
Quote from: BalbinusHow so? Can you expand at all?
Also, Blood Games has magic and all doesn't it, and you seem pretty proud of it, I understand it's not fantasy (it's horror) but there are relationships between the two genres.
Just querying as I'm curious.
It's not about the magic, Balbinus. It's about the core reasoning. My Fantasy games are all SF or historical in disguise. I'm very proud of Blood Games II, but it's not at all fantasy-like. The feel is totally off.
-clash
No All Flesh . . . No zombie survival horor. Zombies creep me out, man. I invented a board game for Hot Wheels and plastic dinosaurs called "Demolition Derby on Zombisaurus Island," and I can barely play it. I built the truck from Land of the Dead (Dead Reckoning) in Hero and GURPS and CORPS, and designed some boss scenarios--but I can't play it. Just can't get my head in that space.
Voodoo zombies are ok.
Anime. I just end up running a fantasy game. I cannot grok how anime is any different than fantasy. I don't hate it, just cannot seem to embrace whatever is supposed to make it anime. It just turns into fantasy with big eyes.
Bill
I can run/play just about anything, with varying degrees of success. I'm not completely sure why, but I find if very difficult to run Werewolf. Ideas just seem to evaporate from my mind when I try to think up stuff for this one. My players weren't too into it, either. Something about the inevitable combat and the weird powers/critters you run into just doesn't seem to mesh for me. Though, I respect the idea of it, I think. :(
I'm terrible at GMing horror, because players usually insist their characters are horrified by nothing, and even when they're decent roleplayers, still as players they crack jokes which turn your horror into comedy. I'm unable to give them the focus needed...
Quote from: HinterWeltAnime. I just end up running a fantasy game. I cannot grok how anime is any different than fantasy. I don't hate it, just cannot seem to embrace whatever is supposed to make it anime. It just turns into fantasy with big eyes.
Bill
That's probably because Anime isn't really a matter of genre, it's a matter of style.
-clash
Wraith
I can't for the life of me figure out how to make a game out of this thing. Which is too bad since it's wierd enough to have definitely piqued my curiosity.
LARP Vampire Mind's eye Theater (or whatever it's called now)
I'm always bored out of my skull at these events. It seems to me that there's no actual Roleplaying or Game going on, just gossip about who's fighting or having sex. But, my friends in the Cam always have stories about what happens in the game so who knows? It's a mystery!
Modern Horror that doesn't look like the X-Files.
The World of Darkness and the Buffyverse and their clones (d20 Modern Shadow Chasers, I'm looking at you) to me all feel more like a superhero genre than horror. There is not enough mystery or feeling of actual emotional horror to them for me to either GM well or play well in.
Any Genre Setting where the PCs are Powerless to affect the outcome.
Toon
Paranoia
Cthulhu
Etc...
Just no fun for me...
QM
Quote from: BalbinusYou? Anything you aren't averse to that you really struggle to run or play?
Supers. Specially the 4 color variety. For very much the same reasons Balbinus mentioned. I don't know what to do between battles, and though I like SH comics, I can't wrap my head around the genre. Also, nobodyaround here runs SH games, as it seems to not be very popular around Spain.
Other than that, I strongly rock running any game.
I can't do pulp. I just don't get it. I cannot play it or run it with any originality. I can't come up with an interesting character and couldn't come up with any sort of plot to run for players.
Call of Cthulhu horror. Another genre I just don't get. I've read a bunch of Lovecraft stories and didn't particularly like them (not saying they are poorly written, just not to my taste).
Supers. I can have a blast designing superheroes all day long, but I can't come up with interesting stories to run a supers game. My creativity with this genre is limited to having a supervillian commit a crime and then having the heroes show up and fight him.
Oh, and comedic games like Paranoia and Teenagers from Outer Space. I just can't run these. I feel that I am funny, but it's just not as consistent as these games require. :(
Quote from: flyingmiceThat's probably because Anime isn't really a matter of genre, it's a matter of style.
While there may be some merit to that distinction in media, many role-playing games pretty much reduce genre to a matter of style.
Quote from: John MorrowWhile there may be some merit to that distinction in media, many role-playing games pretty much reduce genre to a matter of style.
I know Bill. :D
-clash
Maybe this is a bit conceited on my part, but with the right players I can run anything.
Quote from: Balbinus
For me, Supers. I can't run it at all, I struggle to play it well.
Other folk manage it fine, me, when I run supers it rapidly turns into some ghastly version of Watchmen but with more violence, as everyone slowly begins to act rationally and the logic of the game rapidly begins to disintegrate.
Now see, that actually sounds interesting to me.
I'm actually okay at Sci-Fi... but it's a struggle for me, mainly because I have a hard time coming up with vast universes that feel appropriately rich and complex.
I can do it... it's just difficult... and all too often I feel like I've invented (sigh) another giant mega-opolis with 2000-story sky-scrapers, or another generic starport or whatever.
Cheers,
-E.
Quote from: RomanNow see, that actually sounds interesting to me.
And run by someone else, I'm sure it would be to me too.
Seriously, I can run a fair whack of stuff, but supers is not among my gifts.
Horror/Comedy: Both require affecting the players, not their characters, in very similar ways. You have to take something normal, and then you turn that thing in a specific manner that either violates them or compells them to find it absurd without insulting them. This requires a degree of trust that isn't present most of the time, which is why both games often fail.
Superheroes: The genre conventions, when used uncritically or without any thought put into them, quickly become absurd and insulting so players often ditch them in favor of a more reasonable or practical use of their character's powers or skills. Left unchecked, you're going quickly to something more like the Authority, Kingdom Come or Civil War and less like The Superfriends. To be more than a glorified skirmish game, you have to warm up to it and be smart about the specifics- you can't play cold and stupid.
Proceedurals: There's a reason you don't see much in terms of investigation, and that's because playing investigation scenarios are often boring exercises in pixel-bitching matched with folks who lack either desire or knowledge about the process. Doing it right has too many variables in the mix to make it worth the effort to attempt it, and the one counter-example (Call of Cthulhu) is notable in the effort to make the boring aspects--the stuff that's in a lab or library--either quick to resolve or interesting in its own right. (You can do it with Shadowrun or Cyberpunk, but that requires a slightly different approach to Decking, certain uses of magic in play, and drones, and is quite atypical.)
Military: The subcultural issue with authority along with Party Niche Habits makes this difficult, especially when vehicle drivers are the obstensible unit at hand (e.g. Robotech, Mechwarrior) and the nominal unit size is not a snug fit for the numbers at the table. God forbid that you get someone at the table that's current or former military gain-saying you; within their specific experience, they can be an asset, but the further you deviate from that the more it becomes just another hassle.
I often struggle running "realistic" historical genres. If I take great liberties with historical settings, it can GM it with no problems. But if I stay close, it's tough.
Part of it is due to scheduling. My main campaigns are usually fantasy or sci-fi. So I have little time to prep accurately an historical epic, remember names, customes, history, geography and so on.
Part of it is also due to my players. Most of them aren't too motivated in doing research. Also, I have several female players and many of them can't come up with character concepts that interest them in such settings.
Quote from: BalbinusYou? Anything you aren't averse to that you really struggle to run or play?
Victorian/1890s-era horror. I love the source material, I just can't do anything with it and I don't know why. CoC and Masque of the Red Death are the two settings that I wish I could run to my satisfaction. My players seem to have fun, but I always feel like I'm not doing justice to the setting/genre and it's frustrating as hell.
Pete
Quote from: Bradford C. Walkersnip
With the exception of procedurals (and maybe even that too), though, all of those genres run just fine when the players are willing to accept the conventions and expectations of the genre (as well as generally agreeing not to be dicks). They're only problematic genres if you play with problematic players.
I'm a huge fan of sci-fi in literature and film, but have almost no interest in running or playing it. Consequentially the few games from the genre I have GM'ed have been fairly dull, insipid affairs. At least to me.
On the other hand if I introduce sci-fi elements to a different genre (fantasy, horror, whatever) then I'm immediately bursting with ideas. It's an odd one, but that's just how my imagination works.
Quote from: DrewI'm a huge fan of sci-fi in literature and film, but have almost no interest in running or playing it. Consequentially the few games from the genre I have GM'ed have been fairly dull, insipid affairs. At least to me.
On the other hand if I introduce sci-fi elements to a different genre (fantasy, horror, whatever) then I'm immediately bursting with ideas. It's an odd one, but that's just how my imagination works.
A ditto here, word for word, pretty much.
I am unable to run horror games. My games are lot of fun and laughter not that much serious. And I have problems to switch to really dark, creepy atmosphere of horror.
Hi!
I cannot run Time travel games. I tried and its just no good. I can't wrap my brain around it. My plots are either too simple or too complex...
And I cannot play games where my char HAS to be stupider than me (Gama world, Paranoia, etc). Any game where identifying the difference between a cell phone and a calculator is a skill that has to be learned in play is not something I can get "into." I am sure they are good games and that other people genuinely have fun, but its still not for me...
Quote from: RezendevousWith the exception of procedurals (and maybe even that too), though, all of those genres run just fine when the players are willing to accept the conventions and expectations of the genre (as well as generally agreeing not to be dicks). They're only problematic genres if you play with problematic players.
That's why they fail; they rely on something known to be unreliable--people--to achieve the intended results. Never design a tool that incorporates elements that you do not control in order to achieve desired results. A properly-designed game will possess systemic mechanisms at the core of its design that compel the intended results reliably even when used by the very worst players.