Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore

Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore

Lewis Pulsipher

For the first time in a few years, I refereed a fantasy role-playing game. In this case I was using my own simplified rules (“Basic (Fantasy) RPG”), in order to playtest them, and I was running a game for my usual college playtesters.

Keep in mind that I started playing D&D in 1975. The title refers to how things are a lot different than they were in 1975, at least in role-playing games. Role-playing games have been badly influenced by video games, where you cannot lose because you can always go back to a save game, then worsened with MMOs and free-to-play games. The practice there is to constantly reward people so they'll continue to play, so that ultimately spend some money on in-game purchases/transactions.

So the players were constantly wondering where the loot drop was when they bumped off a few kobolds that wandered by, or some other wimpy monster. But worse, I saw manifestations of something I read about recently, where players frequently experiment with items to try to find “creative” ways to use them, and expect the referee to accommodate them.  (For example, rub a little healing potion on a wound and expect it to heal it.) One player had been captured and probably killed (as far as other players knew) by a fairly powerful monster; he was unconscious. In his backpack, wrapped up in a bag, he had a crystalline disk, about the size of a frisbee, that they picked up from some phraints (thri-keen). He wanted the disc to slip out of the bag, somehow, then out his backpack, and cut the monster in half! I just looked at him and said no, but he had already decided that there had to be a chance for it and rolled dice as though he was rolling for it. I told him, if I were to give you a roll for that, and I don't, you'd have to take 10 six sided dice and roll six on everyone. (The chances were actually MUCH worse than that, but it was enough for me to think he’d shut up. No, he proceeded to gather up 10 six sided dice and roll them. (Keep in mind, this lad is a freshman and appears to enjoy being an annoying younger brother.) It didn’t count, of course, and of course he didn’t come close to 10 sixes.

There was another player who was constantly trying to do tricks – what *he* called creative – with the dead kobold that he carried around on his back. He evinced astonishment whenever he couldn't do what he wanted, and at one point he even said “you’re interfering with my creativity.” Well, creativity has to be associated with reality, and many things he was trying to do just didn't make any sense. That's not creativity, that's brain fever.

Now I know that many younger people playing role-playing games indulge in this kind of so-called creativity all the time, but I won't have any of it. Creativity in problem-solving is desirable, but not when flying in the face of physics or other realities.

Another of the things he felt he ought to be able to do, is run away from some enemies who were beating on him (melee), then stop, turn around and shoot them in the face with his self bow. I said, these guys are right on top of you. You turn around and run away, when you turn back to shoot them they're gonna be there and they're going to break your bow with their weapons. If nothing else. He didn't seem to understand how that would be. Of course, in some game rules when you run away like that the opponents get a free attack on you and then you could pull off what you said. I was treating it like a realistic situation in this case - it was a playtest - and there was no way he could do this.

It was also a one-shot game rather than a campaign, so they didn't take it as seriously as they might have otherwise. At least they enjoyed it.

In olden days you had to “train” players to accept limitations. I suppose that’s true today as well, but contemporaries strongly dislike constraints, and often want this kind of game to be a playground, not a game where you have to earn something.

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The “exigencies of life” (and hurricanes) have interfered with this blog.  I still (until the past couple weeks) post a screencast (video) each Thursday on my “Game Design” YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/LewGameDesign).