Game Prep- is it All That Big of a Deal?

One of the responses I received on my last blog entry was the claim that one of the things that doom 'heavy' systems for older and/or more busy gamers is the game prep they require.

Now, I'm a older more busy gamer with limited time. And somehow this isn't a issue for me. Why would that be?

Perhaps I'm smarter, faster, better looking and frankly more than a step above the common gamer at everything. But while that is likely true, I don't consider it the primary reason. Rather I think the primary reason is the same as always- anyone who doesn't really know their game system will suffer horrid inefficiencies both in running them and preparing to run them. Those who do know their chosen game systems well, won't.

I suppose first we need to define game prep.

Back at the dawn of the hobby it was extensive mapped dungeon complexes or other adventuring areas with backgrounds on dozens or more of NPCs- friend and foe. Call it World/Setting Creation and doing that sort of thing is certainly a major time sink...

...except that it would be time sink no matter what the game system if what you want is a completely mapped world with backgrounds on all the NPCs. Very few of the popular heavy systems (HERO, GURPS, D&D 4E) do this sort of thing for you- at least with the core books that make up said heavy system. World creation is world creation and if you want to skip it, you can skip it no matter what game rules you're using. If you do it, you do it again no matter the system.

There's the creation of adventures of course. This may take time although a pure sandbox skips this step completely. However once again, few of the common heavy rule systems offer more than advice in this area. A campaign against the dark elves of New York remains a campaign against the dark elves of New York if it's done in HERO or in FATE.

So three major components of game preparation- Setting and Background, detail maps, and adventure creation aren't really impacted by game systems. And that's nearly everything except actually playing.

The one detail left is the mechanical NPC write-up. Determining game stats and abilities for those NPCs (or things in some cases) that require them. Certainly this must take up a huge amount of time for heavy systems?

Not for those who understand their system.

Let's take an example from my own campaign, from a session ran a couple of weeks ago. I want many consider a highly complex game system- HERO for this campaign. I knew that the players would (after choosing a certain path) come across a high tech security android assigned the task of guarding the area the players were seeking access into. I didn't want this to be a stand up fight, so...

1. The android would attack after or during an encounter with mutant ruin rats.
2. It would be neat of the android looked like a corpse, it would appear that a dead man just stood up and started to kill them.
3. Hmm, dead looking android. I could steal much of the design from Terminator there.

HERO is very detailed when you're interested in adding up all the points and balancing the creation to a budget. But points aren't game balance no matter what anyone says. What matters in this encounter is it's weapon, it's OCV and DCV, BODY and defenses. I've ran this system for years and decided upon those values in less than a minute. I tossed in some enhance senses and skills that might be important (PER, combat levels, etc) for another maybe another minute of thought. Nothing needed to hit paper, nothing needed to be pointed out.

Same process with the ruin rats (already done some time back, so I already had these).And I was ready to go.

Prep Time: About 20 minutes in total split up through the week thinking about what adventure I was going to run Sunday. The result was tightly fought and close battle that had the desire effect (i.e. scaring the players) and then some.

I can rather easily run such things off the top of my head with no prep- because I understand the system and its game balance. Later I spent about three hours actually writing up the T-800 just to have a copy of it because I enjoy that sort of thing. And it makes it easier for players who don't have a firm grasp of the rules if they should want to run something. But that's above and beyond just running the game.

Add in published write ups for NPCs/creatures (HERO has lots, although I don't care for their construction methods they can still be a base for something)- and really, I don't have any prep time.

I can do these before I've been running HERO since it was first published in the 80s. The editions are close enough that any work I've done before can be applied to something done today. I have a huge resource at my call.

And that wouldn't be possible if I was changing game systems every few months like most bloggers seem to do.

So if prep time is a problem for you- it's your own fault. Caused either by  your own non-mechanical related demands, or a failure to stick with something long enough to know it well enough. You're just wanting to pass the blame to the game system.

What about people new to the hobby who don't have decades of experience to make this possible? It's called work, you get out what you put in. If you don't have time to learn a heavy system, then you don't have the time. You have to do what you have to do.

But don't claim it isn't possible for others. Your limits do not define mine- or the hobby itself for that matter.

Is the future Lite?

Zachary is one of my daily reads, mostly because he's rather level headed for this hobby (it's certainly not because we like the same games). With this post however I was rather puzzled.

With D&D 4E at the top of the sales charts, and games like Shadowrun, HERO System, Dark Heresy and GURPS still highly represented on the game shelves- what sort of cool-aid has Zachary gotten into? The assertion that the gaming world is going Lite seems rather baseless from everything I see.

But Zachary isn't dumb, so what's going? Has Gencon really shifted towards Lite rules, are most of the events running things like FUDGE or FATE (i.e.... FUDGE + a house rule or two)? Or has he fallen into the trap of self-selecting data? He's going lite and thus hangs out with others going lite and therefore thinks everyone is going lite?

He likes reading this blog and perhaps will answer for himself. It should be interesting.

As I've said before, predicting the future of the hobby is difficult at best because it is a such a small hobby and thus subject to shifts from rather small sources. But I will go out on a rope and say one thing- if the future is Lite, the hobby will shrink to an even further degree of insignificance. When even the most basic MMORPG can provide a more detailed environment for gaming, when even the most inexperience gamer can match the published designs on first try, when gaming books ofter nothing but the endless repeating of the same lame advice and fluff- people who actually are interesting in playing an rpg will go elsewhere.

From an industry point of view- if the future is Lite, the future is DEAD.

Oh and one other comment about 'resolution lag'.

It doesn't exist for people who know their game system inside and out. I run the most complex systems in the hobby- and have the same limits on my time as Zachary. The difference is that I am still running the games I've been running for decades, I know them very well indeed. If however you're always chasing the latest thing- well you won't know it well and that brings 'resolution lag'.

So time is a problem- the solution isn't going with something so easy that time doesn't matter (because the game isn't taking any time, i.e. it's not doing anything). Rather the solution is focus and knowledge of what it is that you're doing in the first place.

Review: HERO System Advanced Player's Guide 6th Edition

I was for some reason actually expecting new optional and advance rules with this product, I should have known better. As I've mentioned before, Long is basically a cut and paste writer who will reprint material whenever given the chance. This book is no exception.


Most of the book (again with the ugly cover from hell- could these possibly be worse?) consists of sections yanked from 5th edition books- be it genre books, ultimate books, or whatever.

There are basically three types of 'rules' contained within.

First is those that should have been in the core books. For example, piercing from Dark Champions? It's in here. Applying Limits on Advantages? It's in here. And so on. A significant amount is just going into more details on what are IMO mainstream rules. One could say that they are in this book because they are 'advanced'- but that doesn't explain why for some powers he goes into detail in the core book but others are withheld until this. Unless while he cuts and pastes- he's really not that good at it (like after removing COM from the game, he still left in modifiers to COM under the Disabling Wound section...). So maybe he just forgot.

Second are those rules that are more genre or specific item focused. Things like salvaging gear and items from the 5th edition Post-Apocalyptic HERO book (lots from that book actually). Stuff from Ultimate Brick 5th edition. And so on.

The third and smallest type of item is actual 'new' rules or methods. I think I've seen all them at one time or another but generally they aren't very interesting so I don't recall just where I ran across them. Nothing that I'd use (movement by segment instead of phases for example, other ways of using SPD, etc).

One is on their own with the rules contained within. They often cover the same ground (for example options to make AP offset a fixed amount of defense are but pages away from the cleaner Piercing rules- which offset a fixed amount of defense) or even conflict.

Some do part of the job and then fall flat when you go to apply it throughout the game. For example there's a welcomed 'Heroic' STR chart that has an improved progression (i.e. slower)- but it wasn't carried over into any of the other related subjects- like Growth, Density Increase or the defenses of the environment (doors, walls, etc.). I guess that would take more than cut and paste editing.

In any event, it doesn't live up to its billing. Nothing here strikes me as 'advanced', very little if anything is new, and it doesn't really take the game in new directions unless gutting the SPD and segmented systems core to HERO is your idea of a new direction.

However I still like the book, because it means that there's almost no reason (unless you want what I consider rather basic and obvious genre advice + lame versions of those settings) to buy any future genre/setting books. All the rules have been pulled into this one- just select what you need and go forth.

So if you're into HERO 6th- buy this book and avoid any future ones. Or if you for some strange reason like those genre/setting books- don't buy this one and wait until your favorite(s) comes out. I'm sure Long will cut and paste whatever he thinks it needs from the Advanced book.

I'd rather be a good bad gamer than an elite one

Anyone who's followed me online know the degree of disgust I hold for Forge style designers, i.e. those out to make the next big thing or change the hobby. Those who think of gaming as ART, the endless (and I hold destructive) search for GREAT things in rpgs.

Gaming isn't the only thing where this type of split occurs, indeed one may say that it afflicts any human activity. There are always those seeking great meaning, intelligence and art in ways that most people just don't concern themselves with- and thus in the end they will by any real measure fail.

Consider this article by George Orwell on Good Bad Books as an example of this. Here's what I consider the key statement:

"The existence of good bad literature — the fact that one can be amused or excited or even moved by a book that one's intellect simply refuses to take seriously — is a reminder that art is not the same thing as cerebration. I imagine that by any test that could be devised, Carlyle would be found to be a more intelligent man than Trollope. Yet Trollope has remained readable and Carlyle has not: with all his cleverness he had not even the wit to write in plain straightforward English."

Yes, I'd rather be a good bad DM, player and designer than in the end an overblown and in the end forgotten and useless artist- no matter how much the critical elite may look down upon the former and exalt the latter.

When I Use Random Character Generation

Zachary is singing the praises of random character generation over on his blog. I thought he was giving that up (the blogging, not the singing. I think Zachary must spend all his time signing about one thing or the other) or at least significantly cutting back. Hasn't happened, at least not to any degree I've noticed. But then again it's a classic to try and pull away from the waste of time that online interactions are only to fail. Sort of like trying to quit smoking, but without most of the health problems at least.

Where was I? Oh yes, random character generation. Personally I don't really like the method.

Or rather, I don't like it for one type of campaign and do for another.

I use random generation for long term campaigns where one would see family lines and multiple generations of characters. Mine are half-sand box and half epic fantasy arc (I've only done this in one setting), and given that players will over the life of the campaign run multiple characters (some of which are children of previous PCs)- a certain amount of random generation of stats and the like makes sense. You just don't always get what you want from the kids (vast understatement that, on the other hand you sometimes get more).

More common these days are concept campaigns because that's what my players are interested in. The one team of runners for Shadowrun. The one Morrow Project team that will either save or lose the future. The re-imagining of the Marvel Universe. And so on.

Concept Campaigns (which last a handful of years in real time for us) really demand concept characters- and thus full control over their creation.

So, partially random for sand box and designed for concept. This split in campaign types explains in a large degree why I use two rpg systems instead of one. It's not the only reason, but a it's a very significant one.