Quote from: Bren;981556It does. Self publication or amateur publication was somewhat common in the 1970s and early 1980s. Often it took the form of APA fazines like Alarums and Excursions, but it also included game rules. Here's one example of a game a friend of mine self published in 1980.
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And apparently it's now available again on Amazon.

I think I have that one. Is it digest-sized?

Quote from: Dumarest;981559I think I have that one. Is it digest-sized?

Its bigger than a traditional paperback and smaller than a typical magazine or RPG rule book. I guess that's digest sized.

Dumarest, out of curiosity did you get the Amazon version or the original 1980 edition?

Quote from: Arminius;981494Inclusion of D&D as a story game strikes me as either a distinction without a difference (what RPG isn't a story game, then?), or parochial interpretation (D&D can be played as a story-game if you apply certain conventions, like grafting the GMing section from DitV or Sorcerer/Sorcerer & Sword, structuring the game in scenes, improv GMing with no presumption of pre-existing facts in the world, and players given unquestioned input to scenes and scenarios as sort-of co-GMs). Or it's a motte-and-baily argument that only gets trotted out as a defense against characterizing story-games, then shelved for all other purposes.

Out of curiousity, have you taken a look at the 1st Ed DMG, pg 169-195? It's a series of tools to help the DM make things up as he goes. Alternatively, (and Appendix A *is* designed for this) it can be used for playing without a GM. Co-DMing also wasn't all that rare (if you had multiple DMs in the group), though it seemed to become extremely rare in the 90's, when everyone's campaign was too special for another DM to ever touch it.

Speaking for myself, the goal of play is to have a fun time creating a collaborative story. If you asked a lot of other people why they play, if "story" isn't on the list of reasons for the majority, it's definitely a large minority. And I'm still talking about plain old AD&D here. Point being, I don't know anyone can legitimately claim the "play goal" or "creative agenda" constitutes a different type of game from the traditional RPG. I'm not saying there's no difference between D&D and the so-called "story-games." I'm saying if there is a substantial difference, this ain't it. Neither is collaborative world-building, co-GMing, GM-less (or GM-full) play, or improv.

Quote from: Bren;981565Dumarest, out of curiosity did you get the Amazon version or the original 1980 edition?

I assume it's a reprint as I only got it in the last few years. I can't tell you the provenance as it was a gift and I didn't ask.  When I get home I can try to find it and see what it says.

Edwards used to go on and on about how "drift" made games like not only V:TM but also D&D "incoherent." I.e., the ability to do multiple styles of gaming with a single system (personal horror vs. katana vampires, court intrigue vs. dungeon crawling) was a sign of bad design. Games were meant to be focused like lasers.

It was a crock then, and it's a crock now. Focused games are fine, but so are diffuse ones.

Quote from: Bren;981565Dumarest, out of curiosity did you get the Amazon version or the original 1980 edition?

Copyright page says 3rd printing from 2011. I haven't had the opportunity to play it yet. I do like that it retains the charm of having been written on a typewriter; it reminds me of the early Champions books that way.  Have you played it?

Quote from: Bren;981551And knowing is half the battle...

I must have had lower expectations for those books. They remind me a bit of the solitaire board games (SPI, Avalon Hill, etc.) and solo scenarios for a multi-player games from back to the 1970s. They were no where near as much fun as actually playing against another person, but they were more fun than watching Happy Days or Laverne and Shirley on the TV and they did help learn the wargame rules. Similarly I've seen a few of those numbered paragraph branching solo adventures that were better than a sharp stick in the eye as a way to help new players learn a new system. WEG D6 had one or two of those. I think I remember seeing some for Runequest and Call of Cthulhu back in the 1980s. Alone Against the Wendigo was mildly fun and it was amusing to see how L.C. Nadelmann (your character) was going to get borked this time.

Spoiler

CYOA or Gamebooks were almost all designed for kids. Nothing the matter with that obviously they were the gateway drug for probably thousands if not tens of thousands of kids into RPGs.

Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone pretty much left GW because they could make way more writing the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks in the 80s.

There are an excellent series of adaptations of Steve Jackson's Sorcery books into a text/video game hybrid by the UK designers Inkle that is well worth checking out.

The only truly adult CYOA book I'm aware of is Kim Newman's Life Lottery, which was reissued a few years ago in TPB.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;981475The funny thing about all this, and I say this as someone who did not even know "Story Games" were a thing until a couple months ago, and who only had a vague notion that the "OSR" was anything more than "old versions of D&D tarted up with better-organized manuals," is that these pretentious blowhards are making it sound like "the industry" has left D&D behind when in fact D&D and Pathfinder together comprise the lion's share of this teeny, tiny, $35m industry in terms of sales. Add in the various 3rd-party supplements, toss in the similar-but-not-quite D&D games like 13th Age, and you've got all these story games fighting over something like $5m in revenue, maybe less.

I'm sure there are randos on the internet saying that but I haven't any 'storygamer' designers claiming that they're somehow more important than D&D, particularly commercially. In fact it was the publisher behind 13th Age who pointed out that D&D is the tide that lifts all boats: when it is doing well all RPGs and storygames do better.

Quote from: Dumarest;981584Copyright page says 3rd printing from 2011. I haven't had the opportunity to play it yet. I do like that it retains the charm of having been written on a typewriter; it reminds me of the early Champions books that way.  Have you played it?

Yes. I was at college with Bill Underwood, the designer. I'm pretty sure the original rules were written on a typewriter. I played in Bill's campaign and that of one of the playtester/contributors.

It's an off-shoot of D&D. The big modifications that I recall were (i) inclusion of height and weight (similar to the contemporaneous Chivalry & Sorcery), (ii) a separation of hit points into body and stamina (as a way of getting around some of the oddities of the wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey, mish-mash of meat, fatigue, and combat capability that D&D hit points represent), (iii) related to that having critical hits and missile attacks do body damage, (iv) some tweaking or change in the armor and encumbrance rules, (v) a separation of melee and missile combat ability (at each level characters chose how much they improved their missile or melee attack, (vi) inclusion of separate religions for clerics with spells/miracles that were differentiated by religion, (vii) magic schools to differentiate magic users by area of focus (4 elements, illusion, necromancy, control, etc.), and (viii) use of a spell point system (mana) to allow casters to choose their spells at the time of casting rather than ahead of time.

Lunamancer, improv alone isn't what makes a story game--I was suggesting that someone could use the whole list to make D&D a story game. Yes, I did read the DMG, including those sections, when I bought it in 1979. At the time they seemed to be in the spirit of solitaire wargame rules--a set of procedures to generate details of an objective world, not guidelines for creating a dramatic narrative. Many story games do have the latter either embedded in formal rules or described in GMing advice about bringing character issues to the fore (etc.).

Have you read or played any story games such as Sorcerer, DitV, The Mountain Witch, My Life with Master, Poison'd, Primetime Adventures...?

Wasn't most of the RPGs that started small, but made it big, self published to begin with?

Like, right from the first box of D&D onwards?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSR_(company)#Tactical_Studies_Rules

I mean, unless it's a specifically licensed IP product, aren't almost all RPGs originally 'indie' in effect?

Quote from: Vargold;981577Edwards used to go on and on about how "drift" made games like not only V:TM but also D&D "incoherent." I.e., the ability to do multiple styles of gaming with a single system (personal horror vs. katana vampires, court intrigue vs. dungeon crawling) was a sign of bad design. Games were meant to be focused like lasers.

It was a crock then, and it's a crock now. Focused games are fine, but so are diffuse ones.

Diffuse ones are better because the variety of scenarios possible allow to keep going back to them, rather than just use once and discard after.

Quote from: Lunamancer;981569Out of curiousity, have you taken a look at the 1st Ed DMG, pg 169-195? It's a series of tools to help the DM make things up as he goes. Alternatively, (and Appendix A *is* designed for this) it can be used for playing without a GM. Co-DMing also wasn't all that rare (if you had multiple DMs in the group), though it seemed to become extremely rare in the 90's, when everyone's campaign was too special for another DM to ever touch it.

Speaking for myself, the goal of play is to have a fun time creating a collaborative story. If you asked a lot of other people why they play, if "story" isn't on the list of reasons for the majority, it's definitely a large minority. And I'm still talking about plain old AD&D here. Point being, I don't know anyone can legitimately claim the "play goal" or "creative agenda" constitutes a different type of game from the traditional RPG. I'm not saying there's no difference between D&D and the so-called "story-games." I'm saying if there is a substantial difference, this ain't it. Neither is collaborative world-building, co-GMing, GM-less (or GM-full) play, or improv.

And speaking for myself, creation of "story" is literally nowhere in my mind as any sort of goal when I'm playing D&D.  It doesn't even cross my mind, any more than it does when I climb out of bed in the morning and start my day.  A session of D&D is a series of choices, events, and resolutions and if there is a story created, it's pretty much the same as the story anyone creates when they tell somebody what they did yesterday (with more Bugbears.)  At no point during play do I pause to consider what might be "good for the story."  There is zero concern for any sort of traditional narrative arc.  No beginning, middle, and ending.  No epiphany.  No concern for whether or not my character is fulfilling any sort of dramatic potential.  Just a bunch of (hopefully fun) stuff that happens.

I'm not sure I actively hate story telling elements in something like Fate. But I wouldn't be mad on collaborating or GM-less games at all. That would be a stretch too far. More because I like the traditional structure of a GM and players.

A good GM will be picking up on story elements from the players at any rate whether they know it or not. So, players will always have some input into how the story goes even though the GM will control it overall (or at least the flow of it).

I'm fine with Fate Points (in WFRP) or Bennies, etc. These technically can really change the outcome of a story and give the player quite a bit of control over their own fate. I like the way these add drama and can cut the players a break. Especially in low fantasy settings where players can drop like flies.

For mechanics like 'aspects' in Fate, I'm alright with those too, but only in regards to that specific system. It works pretty well when you have a good group who are not taking the piss. I think it allows for a lot of player creativity, but it can be abused. That said, the GM can always overrule you, so you have that as a back up.

In general, I prefer a more traditional system but don't always 'hate' on narrrative stuff.