My son is running a Only War campaign for us for a while, doing a good job at it too. It's sort of interesting in some ways to see how things change from one generation to the next, what we share and want we don't.
He's not as concerned as I about having perfect rules and he's willing to accept 'The Rule of Cool' to some extent, but he also doesn't buy into the rather sloppy approach to them that characterizes modern gaming either.
The result is a small set of House Rules for Only War that I've put up on my website here. They are still a work in progress, and some vehicles will likely be uploaded tonight.
May as well make them public for others to consider or ignore as they wish.
Monday, October 14, 2013
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
Design Zombies - Part II
We're continuing the series about game mechanics that failed when they were first
developed, failed in every game they were used in thereafter, and fail
in games designed today. But they are still used for mysterious reasons beyond the understanding of mortal man.
Today we take a quick look at the Game Breaking Stat. I'm going to focus on one type related to damage, but the concept applies beyond that single area.
Let's use FFG's Only War as our standard bearer. Want to create a character for this dark vision of future war where life is cheap and death is close? What's that you say? You want to be an nearly invincible titan on the battlefield?
Grab a character sheet, use point allocation and throw as many points as you can into Toughness. You'll hit 40 points easy and maybe even more depending upon home world and other factors. Now select the Stormtrooper as your archetype and get five points of armor free. Build the right type of regiment with the right aptitudes and using your starting experience add another 10 points to Toughness.
Out of the gate, nothing special and you're already immune to anything less than max damage from many common weapons. Make attaining Best Quality armor (much easier than it sounds with the system) and gain a another point of Armor. Work towards the Armor Monger Talent for yet another point of armor. Should only take a handful of adventures.
Gratz! You are now immune to nearly all the common weapons your foes should be using. Las Rifle fire will roll off you like rain water. I've watched characters wade through the mass fire of 20 NPCs in the open just to pick up a piece of dropped gear- because he could.
Of course the GM may respond with giving every opposing grunt Heavy Weapons, Sniper weapons or the like. Sucks to be you I guess, but it sucks for the setting and campaign more and it has to suffer the intense violence of mainstream weapons being worthless.
As a side note, the Toughness stat is far more effective than armor, because armor is subject to penetration by the more potent (and less common) weapons. Toughness isn't.
This one error in the overwhelming effect of a Stat dates all the way back to 1st edition Warhammer way back in 1986 where the invincible dwarf (due to toughness and armor) became a legend in gaming circles.
It also dates back to the original Star Wars RPG in 1987 where a common Wookie could make himself all but immune to the typical Imperial Blasters.Yep, you could get through armored doors with those things ('lock the door and hope they don't have blasters'), but couldn't take down a wookie with one. Oh well.
How and why this is still happening is beyond me. Give any gamer who understands mechanics five minutes with the rulebook and he'll find this hole immediately. But it seems that a game designer will never see the problem, even if it's been around for decades.
Today we take a quick look at the Game Breaking Stat. I'm going to focus on one type related to damage, but the concept applies beyond that single area.
Let's use FFG's Only War as our standard bearer. Want to create a character for this dark vision of future war where life is cheap and death is close? What's that you say? You want to be an nearly invincible titan on the battlefield?
Grab a character sheet, use point allocation and throw as many points as you can into Toughness. You'll hit 40 points easy and maybe even more depending upon home world and other factors. Now select the Stormtrooper as your archetype and get five points of armor free. Build the right type of regiment with the right aptitudes and using your starting experience add another 10 points to Toughness.
Out of the gate, nothing special and you're already immune to anything less than max damage from many common weapons. Make attaining Best Quality armor (much easier than it sounds with the system) and gain a another point of Armor. Work towards the Armor Monger Talent for yet another point of armor. Should only take a handful of adventures.
Gratz! You are now immune to nearly all the common weapons your foes should be using. Las Rifle fire will roll off you like rain water. I've watched characters wade through the mass fire of 20 NPCs in the open just to pick up a piece of dropped gear- because he could.
Of course the GM may respond with giving every opposing grunt Heavy Weapons, Sniper weapons or the like. Sucks to be you I guess, but it sucks for the setting and campaign more and it has to suffer the intense violence of mainstream weapons being worthless.
As a side note, the Toughness stat is far more effective than armor, because armor is subject to penetration by the more potent (and less common) weapons. Toughness isn't.
This one error in the overwhelming effect of a Stat dates all the way back to 1st edition Warhammer way back in 1986 where the invincible dwarf (due to toughness and armor) became a legend in gaming circles.
It also dates back to the original Star Wars RPG in 1987 where a common Wookie could make himself all but immune to the typical Imperial Blasters.Yep, you could get through armored doors with those things ('lock the door and hope they don't have blasters'), but couldn't take down a wookie with one. Oh well.
How and why this is still happening is beyond me. Give any gamer who understands mechanics five minutes with the rulebook and he'll find this hole immediately. But it seems that a game designer will never see the problem, even if it's been around for decades.
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
Design Zombies - Part I
No, not that type of zombie. Here I'm referencing game mechanics that failed when they were first developed, failed in every game they were used in thereafter, and fail in games designed today. But they are still used. It would be baffling if one didn't expect people to be stupid, but sadly they are and so I imagine we'll never outgrow bad game design.
So in this post (the first of a series) I want to take a quick look at Design Zombies.
First up, spending your XP in exchange for altering or changing in-game events. One simple example is classic Deadlands where you spend your hard earned chips for re-rolls or instant healing.
It’s a meta-game decision that pulls you out of character, and doesn’t in any way relate to anything ‘real’ to the character. Think about it, does James Bond put off raising his driving skill in order to keep Goldfinger from killing him? I never saw him consider that exchange in the movie or book. Perhaps I missed it.
I think this mechanic results from a game design that fails to represent the genre by providing too many non-genre results. To correct this the designer puts in a player controlled ‘override’ ability but doesn't want to give away 'freebies'. Thus he charges him the one currency the player always values (XP) to make sure it's not 'over-used'.
Alternatively, the designer loves to have his players make meta-game decisions (mistaking such things as a type of resource management), puts the mechanic in and then designs his game to *fail* at providing genre appropriate results so that the players must purchase them with XP.
Both reasons are terrible. The whole concept should be avoided like the plague it is and the designer should just design a good game that provides good results upfront.
But that would be hard I suppose. And why do hard when people will still buy easy?
So in this post (the first of a series) I want to take a quick look at Design Zombies.
First up, spending your XP in exchange for altering or changing in-game events. One simple example is classic Deadlands where you spend your hard earned chips for re-rolls or instant healing.
It’s a meta-game decision that pulls you out of character, and doesn’t in any way relate to anything ‘real’ to the character. Think about it, does James Bond put off raising his driving skill in order to keep Goldfinger from killing him? I never saw him consider that exchange in the movie or book. Perhaps I missed it.
I think this mechanic results from a game design that fails to represent the genre by providing too many non-genre results. To correct this the designer puts in a player controlled ‘override’ ability but doesn't want to give away 'freebies'. Thus he charges him the one currency the player always values (XP) to make sure it's not 'over-used'.
Alternatively, the designer loves to have his players make meta-game decisions (mistaking such things as a type of resource management), puts the mechanic in and then designs his game to *fail* at providing genre appropriate results so that the players must purchase them with XP.
Both reasons are terrible. The whole concept should be avoided like the plague it is and the designer should just design a good game that provides good results upfront.
But that would be hard I suppose. And why do hard when people will still buy easy?
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Downtime
For any that happen across this site, it's worth noting that real life has asserted itself. At this time I don't foresee any more posts being made here. The future however is hard to see, so no long term promises. Now and then a miracle does come along. I've shutdown the Age of Heroes offering at Lulu, the errata for that will continue to exist here.
This is all for the best as I've come to realize that the style of design I embrace and its goals have all be disappeared from the hobby. This in fact may be its last grave marker as it goes on to join other elements of a dying culture. Such is history, good things last but a short time.
For any friends I've met along the way, thanks. It was worthwhile.
This is all for the best as I've come to realize that the style of design I embrace and its goals have all be disappeared from the hobby. This in fact may be its last grave marker as it goes on to join other elements of a dying culture. Such is history, good things last but a short time.
For any friends I've met along the way, thanks. It was worthwhile.
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Genre Simulation RPGs
It's clear to me that in any practical sense I play and design RPGs rather differently than... well just about everybody. This is due to how I approach the subject and isn't that hard to define, but its still worth a post making it a bit detailing it a bit.
The concept arises out of three core beliefs.
- I think realism is a definable and achievable goal in game design. That puts me at odds with most people in the modern gaming scene who feel completely differently- often for the simple reason that they'd feel that admitting such a thing would lessen the games they play themselves (because they almost without exception have serious flaws with respect to realism).
- I think simulation of genre is desirable and also achievable by a mix of game mechanics and what could be called meta-mechanics (more commonly called play style). This puts me at odds with everyone who identifies as Simulationist be it Threefold, GNS, or the more individual definitions I've encountered online.
- I believe this combination allows one to create (or recreate) their own fantasy or sci-fi epics, basically on par with modern film and literature themes, plots, and events (perhaps more a sad comment of the state of modern film and literature than a comment about how great the gaming style is)- and thus serves many of the more common 'story' goals people have expressed in the past.
In total it is in short a middle of the road style that uses sophisticated and rather complex rules to reach a perfect mix of realism, genre and story without stressing one to the point that the others break. This style was born in the 70s and remained common in the 80s although most attempts at game design for it was a failure (mostly of scaling).
It has however nearly completely faded from the scene over the last couple of decades for reasons that are IMO mostly cultural and irreversible. But I still design and play according to it, and have settled on the label 'Genre Simulation RPG' to describe it.
The concept arises out of three core beliefs.
- I think realism is a definable and achievable goal in game design. That puts me at odds with most people in the modern gaming scene who feel completely differently- often for the simple reason that they'd feel that admitting such a thing would lessen the games they play themselves (because they almost without exception have serious flaws with respect to realism).
- I think simulation of genre is desirable and also achievable by a mix of game mechanics and what could be called meta-mechanics (more commonly called play style). This puts me at odds with everyone who identifies as Simulationist be it Threefold, GNS, or the more individual definitions I've encountered online.
- I believe this combination allows one to create (or recreate) their own fantasy or sci-fi epics, basically on par with modern film and literature themes, plots, and events (perhaps more a sad comment of the state of modern film and literature than a comment about how great the gaming style is)- and thus serves many of the more common 'story' goals people have expressed in the past.
In total it is in short a middle of the road style that uses sophisticated and rather complex rules to reach a perfect mix of realism, genre and story without stressing one to the point that the others break. This style was born in the 70s and remained common in the 80s although most attempts at game design for it was a failure (mostly of scaling).
It has however nearly completely faded from the scene over the last couple of decades for reasons that are IMO mostly cultural and irreversible. But I still design and play according to it, and have settled on the label 'Genre Simulation RPG' to describe it.
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