Trask

A few weeks after my husband and I joined the local gaming club, one of the male members came up to our game table to see what we were playing.  Upon noticing me – the token girl at the table – he started going on and on about how awesome it was to see a new girl at the club, and that the club definitely needed more estrogen, and that the next time I got together with all my girlfriends at the salon (he actually said “hair club”, but I’m going to assume that meant “salon”) I should mention the gaming club and try to get some more girls to join.

I believe the fellow had had a few beers by this point, and I have no doubt that his heart was in the right place.  But had I not already been a content and confident gamer-girl, happy to be at the club and at the game table, I might have run away after that “welcome”.

The question of how to get more girls into gaming comes up anywhere gamers congregate – at game tables, at cons, on internet forums.  I think the more important question is, once you get a girl to try gaming, how do you make sure she wants to keep at it?  Let’s assume that you truly, honestly want to introduce the women in your life to the great world of gaming – if you just want to get some girls at the table so you have something pretty to look at while you’re rolling your dice, this blog post is not for you.

Let me make the disclaimer that I do not, and cannot, speak for all women.  There are plenty of women out there who I don’t understand either, so don’t be discouraged, boys.  I can only speak for myself and my own experiences, and what I’ve observed with the other ladies I’ve gamed with over the years.  So here’s some food for thought on successfully getting girls at the table and keeping them there, happily (and honestly, most of these things can be applied to male gamers, too).

1.)     Don’t treat us like novelties.

Yes, the majority of gamers are men, but the gap is narrowing.  There were a lot of women at the last two cons I attended.  Plenty of women play computer or console games, which opens the door to tabletop play.  And as much as we probably all hate to admit it, books like Twilight have opened many women’s eyes to fantasy and horror, and a fair number of them want a more substantial story.  There are also more women in the industry – for example, our small game company (4 Winds Fantasy Gaming – http://www.4windsfantasygaming.com) boasts a female co-owner, and two-thirds of both our artists and contributing writers are female.  So it’s really not that odd anymore for women to have a spark of interest in roleplaying games.

That spark will sputter and die if a woman is made to feel like a novelty.  Don’t make a huge fuss over the fact that she’s female.  Just think of her as any other new gamer, and make her feel welcome.  Roll out the welcome mat, but don’t throw rose petals on it, you know?

2.)    The Old Boys Club concept might have to go.

Personally, I’ve always been one of the guys.  I grew up playing rough and tumble with my male cousins, and then entered a scientific field when I went to college.  I’m used to hanging out with guys more than girls, and I’m remarkably difficult to offend.  Not all girls are like me.  Any gamer –guy or gal – who feels uncomfortable at the game table will not want to come back.

If game night has long been your Guys Night Out, you may have to make some adjustments to make it more female-friendly.  This is going to vary depending on the female in question.  One universal recommendation I can make – for the love of all things holy, clean the bathroom.  Guys generally have no qualms peeing into a questionably clean toilet.  If I gag at the state of your bathroom cleanliness, I will not be coming back, no matter how awesome your game is.

3.)    The game has to be fun for everyone (or, get to know your players)!

I don’t buy into the concept that girls like different things than guys do when it comes to gaming.  I’ve known girls with no interest in combat, but I’ve also known girls who relish hack-and-slash like nobody’s business.  Some girls don’t care for the diplomacy and strategy aspects of roleplaying, some thrive on it.  For as many girls who want an in-depth plotline, just as many would rather not have to keep track of which NPCs are connected and how.  And all these things apply to male gamers as well.

If a male gamer at your table was really struggling with playing a wizard and keeping track of his spells, you wouldn’t deduce that it was because he was a guy.  You’d realize maybe he wasn’t good with details and would find a way to make it easier for him, even if that meant rolling up a new character.  If the female playing a paladin is freezing up every time she has to speak for the party, don’t assume it’s because she’s a girl.  Talk to her about it and find out what would work better for her.  Maybe she and the guy who’s having no luck with the wizard can trade characters and it’ll be better for everyone.

This will take some trial and error, but if you can find a way for everyone – male and female alike – to build a character they enjoy playing, they’ll like the game and want to keep coming back every week.

4.)    Don’t force it.

We’ve all seen the girl who games only because her husband or boyfriend does, and she looks like she’d rather be anywhere else but at the game table.  Nobody should be sitting at the table if they don’t want to be there.

Sometimes, no matter how hard you try, no matter how accommodating you are, no matter how much help you offer, a girl just won’t catch on and get interested in gaming.  That’s OK.  It’s no fault of hers, or yours, it’s just how it is.  Don’t make her feel like she has to keep playing (“If you quit, the party won’t have a spellcaster anymore, and they’ll be doomed!”).  Making her feel guilty might keep her at the table, but she won’t be happy, and what good is that for anyone involved?

So, the next time you’re trying to get a gal interested in gaming, keep these suggestions in mind and see if they help.  I’d love to hear your experiences or any other comments on this topic.

Let us begin with the rule book, a key requirement for any game. I foresee the death of paper rule books in favor of an e-paper solution. I know this is not much of a prediction since the Kindle and its ilk are making inroads in the book market, but there are still some serious technological and cultural hurdles for e-book readers to overcome. Notably issues with copyright, battery life and most importantly, fossils like me that actually prefer a real paper book. If books still exist beyond a quaint novelty, print on the demand is the only viable solution. Printing 1000 books you hope might sell….maybe is just not cost efficient for publishers. This is a key element for game publishers since they tend to be smaller companies that cannot absorb a poor selling book.

Sadly, along with the death of physical books, game stores will also disappear. Although I do see a place for “clubs” with membership fees that provide comparable services and gaming space. The number of these clubs will never approach the current number of game stores, as they are something of a niche. Online communities will thrive, as will online play.

Game publishers will still create original stories and rules and sell them as a software package.The “crunchy” rules will be transparent to the players and a computer will adjudicate rules issues such as “line of sight,” damage tracking and movement. There will no longer be rules arguments. Although whining by dead players will continue unabated.

Most games, whether board, card, miniature or RPG have a physical component, ie miniatures, boards and grid maps. Advances in touch screens will make entire game tables display output from a computer and respond to player’s touch and voice. This technology already exists, but it is prohibitively expensive and rare. Once you can buy a 4×6 foot touch display cheaply that rolls up like a map, then tabletop games will truly come alive. The game clubs I mentioned above might have more elaborate or permanent installations of this technology. Rather than using miniatures, carefully crafted avatars move across the “table” into battle. This development will kill the CCG and miniature companies in short order.

When not in combat, game masters use the table to track the story and make notes in real time as the players move their PCs through the scenario. I also pray the table is soda-proof, given my personal history with “Mountain Dew” floods across game tables.

The one prediction I will not make is who will be producing the games. Game companies are having a hard time fighting piracy already and there is no technological solution in sight to this costly problem. I cannot imagine how they will stay in business over the long-term. Assuming most game companies fail, I have no clear idea what will replace them. My only thought is that the gaming community will form small, volunteer development teams/communities, ie Linux to create games.

Pessimism aside, I have no doubt that gaming will continue for many years to come, but I doubt it will resemble the gaming culture we enjoy today.

Feel free to add your own thoughts in the comments.

Trask, The Last Tyromancer

The Role-Playing Search Engine

Update: Welcome Stumblers! If you are interested in this post, then you should also check out The Tale of Jacques, my award winning tale of the world’s dumbest gamer.

Every gamer has one game session that just “went wrong.” Whether it be a car accident on the way to the game, a house set on fire by the DM’s candles or collective food poisoning from “Circle-K” chili-cheese hot dogs, we all have at least one tale of a nightmare game session. Rather than let these great tales fade into oblivion, post your best stories in the comments and share with the world. There are no prizes, save the knowledge you amused gamers across the globe and posterity will know of your courage in the face of a bad game session.

I will start. In my youth, I regularly played at the local taxpayer’s league offices from dusk till dawn on Friday nights with John, Joey, Wes and myself. John had delusions of a political career and thought the taxpayer’s league was a stepping stone. They elected him head of the organization. This fact probably had a great deal to do with him being the only serious applicant. Anyway, at about 9:00 PM one Friday night, John, Joey and Wes go out for a beer run. Twenty minutes later Joey and Wes, winded from running, return to the office.

“John got arrested.” said Joey, flat toned. Joey was mellow to the point of coma most of the time, part of it was personality and part of it was constant use of the local cash crop.

Wes, somewhat high-strung and lacking any “mellowing” agent in his system, starts to panic.

“Ohmygod,omygod, They just arrested him! What are we going to do?” Panic, panic, panic, etc, ad infinitum

My thoughts focused on more important matters.

We were in a particularly bloody game of “Diplomacy” and I needed John’s naval support to eject the Russians from the Baltic Sea.

“We have to get John out of jail,” said I.

Several calls to John’s relatives and a friendly bail bondsman springs the wayward gamer from jail. 90 minutes later, I had my ally back, Joey was still mellow and Wes kept repeating the same thing over and over again.

“I can’t believe you guys are just going to keep playing! John was in jail and you just want to keep playing. Doesn’t any of this bother you? How can you be so calm?”

We continued the game, spending most of it making fun of John for not paying his speeding tickets. John swore up and down that he would resolve the issue on Monday. He did not follow through and got picked up again the following game night. We got him out in less than an hour that time. We knew the procedure and cut a few corners.

So ends my tale. Share your tales of woe in the comments sections and let us all learn about gaming in the face of adversity.

Trask, The Last Tyromancer

Before getting into that, let me take you through the new Manual of the Planes. What to expect and what it contains, so you too can decide if it is right for your game table. The first chapter is Exploring the Planes. This chapter talks about the different types of planes, the overall D&D 4E Cosmology, what portals are and how they work, planar hazards, and planar vehicles. I really like how the new planar layout looks. It is much more manageable and usable then previous iterations. It still doesn’t make me want to jump for planar joy, but I thing there are more aspects of planar travel that I will incorporate in my games then I ever have before.

Chapter 2 is all about The Feywild. One of two Parallel Planes. This is a must-read section for players of the Fey races in the game. It provides information about how to travel to and from the Feywild, Fey Demesnes, Information on the main races in the Feywild, and some brief information about 13 locales in The Feywild.

Chapter 3, The Shadowfell, was the section I most looked forward to. I was filled with mixed emotions when I found out that WOTC wrapped Ravenloft into the Shadowfell. I was very sad that Ravenloft wasn’t announced as a “Core World” product, though it still could be. But I was happy that it was still living and breathing under it’s less known name; The Domains of Dread. I was excited, for in Dragon 368, they showed us their first Domain of Dread: Sunderheart, the Funeral City. Unfortunately, the Manual of the Planes, did not go into any more of detail of new Domains of Dread. Nor were there any of the classic Ravenloft locales. My hopes are now placed into next months release, Open Grave. At least we know that it will contain stats for everyone’s favorite Vampire, Count Strahd. What this chapter does contain is information fairly similar to the Feywild section and a nasty new disease called Soul Rot.

Chapter 4 is all about The Elemental Chaos. From where the D&D universe was created, the E.C. is home to Demons, Archons, Genasi, Slaads, and of course Elementals. It also features the famous City of Brass, home of the Efreets. The E.C. is also the location of many other exciting adventuring spots. The Demonweb, The Abyss, and Zerthadlun, a great Githzerai city.

Chapter 5 brings The Astral Sea. This great silvery void is  home to The Nine Hells. To quote a great man, “You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.” Though, Tu’narath, the greatest of all Githyanki cities is a close second.

Chapter 6 presents new Monsters of the Planes. While mostly Demons and Devils, there are 31 new monsters to throw at players. There are no new undead, which sucks. But Baphomet, a deity of the Min0taurs, appears.

Finally, chapter 7 is for the Planar Characters. All the good crunch that players want. There are 8 new paragon paths, 12 new rituals, including the return of an old favorite, Rope Trick. and 8 new pages of magic gear for characters of all kinds. And for the low-low price of a cool 3,125,000 gold… you too could have your very own Spelljammer.

All and all I give this book three out of five dice.

The information was interesting, but it almost covered too much for such a little space. The Feywild and Shadowfell section could easily be expanded into their own books, and I was hoping for fewer locations in more detail.  And of course, my personal peeve of not covering enough of the old/new Ravenloft stuff. Also the book was a little on the thin side. It carries the same $29.95 price tag as the 3.5 Planar Handbook, but only comes in at 159 pages (instead of 192).  But that seems to be the new trend for the $30 book, as that is the same page count as Martial Power and the Forgotten Realms Players Guide.

But there was a lot of good info in the book and it was very well written. I look forward to some comments of what people think of the book.

Haaldaar

The Poster Child for a Rules Redo

Storytelling is at the heart of every role-playing game.  Think of the game master as a director and the players as actors in a very dynamic piece of theatre. Though, they are not in total control. Chance plays a part in this play as well.   Gamers use a rules system (usually dice based) to determine success or failure and add an element of risk to the game experience.  When the story is original an exciting and the rules serve to advance the story, all is well.

Sadly, that is often not the case. Games with amazing stories often endure grossly inappropriate rules that bury exciting worlds in terrible mechanics. These are my top picks for games with great plot and world design, but systems that need serious updates. Of course, few of us have the time or energy to completely redo a game’s rules, so this is just wishful thinking on my part. Hey, it is Christmas, the time of miracles. You never know…

1. Nightbane or Nightspawn

This 1995 offering by CJ Carella is one of my favorite game worlds. An urban fantasy version  of the “X-Files” combined with superhero PCs and a secret invasion from another dimension. Lots of sneakiness and intrigue wrapped in a growing horror. A great game to play with those that do not own the book. Makes the revelations about the world all the more startling.

Did I mention it uses the Palladium game system?

I actually quite enjoy some of the other Palladium game worlds (Rifts,) but their rules system is unclear, unbalanced and nearly unplayable.  Palladium rehashed this system so many times that you would think it would improve with each release. Not so! Cut and paste is the order of the day. I long ago gave up on their product lines, though I heard there was some sort of new rules release in the past couple years. Someday I might rouse myself to take a look at it, but a new version of Nightbane is what I really want.

2. Traveller (Original)

A rousing space adventure from days gone by. I have fond memories of carefully generating a character in anticipation of a new game. I gave him statistics and started him on the path of personal development, went to school, attended the space academy and then died.

Yes, died. Traveller had rules for killing you during character generation. Admittedly this was back in the days of truly random character creation, but it was unusual even then.  Combat system was not bad, but the character generation was ugly. There are many versions of Traveller since, but I have a soft spot for the original “little black book” game. Hence its appearance on my list.

3.  White Wolf

White Wolf, strictly speaking, is not a game but a company. They created the elaborate and interesting “World of Darkness” comprised of “Wraith,” “Mage” and the venerable “Vampire” role-playing games, among many others.  Great story and deep character development. A favorite of LARPers everywhere. I played a few times and could not stand the incredibly simplistic character generation and combat mechanics. I know this is a story based game, but it still felt a little…talky. I like a bit more crunch in my role-playing games.

4. TORG

West End Games attempt at a cross-genre game (similar to Rifts.) Multiple universes collide and struggle for dominance. It was possible for a cybernetic ninja to battle a pulp-villian in a Jurassic era jungle. Great fun, until you started running a combat. Some PCs were tough and some were fast. The fast ones dodged attacks very well and the tough ones absorbed damage. Problem was that the damage from a single hit was sufficient to put down a “dodge” character that traded hit points for speed. Occasionally referred to as the “glass-jawed ninja.” Tough to hit, but it only took one hit to kill them.  This system also suffered from “complexity creep.” Every supplement added new rules and very quickly it got out of hand. One bright spot was  a deck of cards to add randomness to combat. It was a blast! Someday I hope this game makes a comeback in some form, but I am pessimistic.

5.  Witch Hunter

Paradigm Concepts created an exceptionally deep world for this game of dark horror. Set in the early years of the American colonies, Puritans, religious fanatics and native americans  do battle with the forces of the devil himself. One of the best written game books I read in a long time. I especially enjoyed the historical research. It makes the list by using a system that reminds me of “White Wolf’s” d10 system. Not identical, but close enough.  This is one of the only games I might suggest going with a pure LARP or the Amber Diceless rules set.

Anyone else have some ideas? I am sure there are other great games buried under bad rules.

Trask, The Last Tyromancer

I can hear the screams now, echoing from the damaged souls of gamers with beloved, dead characters. “Trask is a killer DM!” “He is not a DM, he is a butcher!”

These are visceral responses, shouted without thought. A little analysis reveals that a TPK is actually a good thing for a campaign. I am assuming that the players are sufficiently mature and well-adjusted enough not to quit the game group or swallow Drano in despair. If they quit, then you are better off without them, see my post on finding a new player . If they commit suicide, then pat yourself on the back for improving the gene pool. It is just a game.

The primary function of a TPK in a campaign is it increases the enjoyment of the players. Fighting battles you always win, because you know the DM is a “softie” is just not fun. Players get complacent. Shake the players from their torpor with some PC death! Victories after that are much sweeter, since you clearly risk your PC every time you fight. It gives the DM credibility, which is a critical part of their toolkit. It also makes for more “intellectual” game play. Charging in where angels fear to tread is a recipe for early PC generation.

Beyond the DM benefits, the storyline can really benefit from a TPK housecleaning, especially if it involves a heroic last stand or a suicide mission to save the world.

Historical inspiration spring from “The Alamo ,” “Thermopylae ” and “Masada.” Do you want your PCs to die in bed? Surrounded by weeping women and children? Let them go out in a blaze of glory and use it in the campaign. Perhaps the PC’s children come forth to seek revenge. There can even be a political component, such as the eventual independence of Texas from Mexico after the Alamo. For a fun spin on the last-stand trope, maybe the bad guys win and the dead heroes face scorn and ridicule for losing. You can rub salt in the fresh wound by labeling them “traitors” by the people they sought to protect. See this post for running a campaign after the good guys lose. Story options always surface in the bloody wake of a TPK.

Building an entire campaign around a TPK is feasible. So the next time your party is in trouble and their back’s are against the wall, slaughter them like sheep. You will feel better and your campaign will expand and deepen with your bloody sacrifice.

Be sure to keep some extra Drano around. Someone might need it.

Trask, The Last Tyromancer

Staring into the Gaming Abyss

Trask, the Last Tyromancer

The books is split into three parts. The first and second sections deal primarily with witchcraft practices and behaviors. These are clearly meant to aid in a witch’s capture. The last section covers trials, witnesses and evidence needed to convict a witch.

Although dry and dull as a lich’s tongue, the book literally brims with tidbits to liven up any gaming witch hunt! Specific examples of evil deeds perpetrated on the faithful, magical effects and witch hunting techniques all appear in this tome.

Besides its value as gaming/campaign inspiration, the primary reason I am directing you to this document is its historical value. Skimming the “Malleus” gave me some real insight into the thought process of men with no foundation in reason, only fanaticism. There are examples of people being burned alive because a hailstorm disrupted a wedding to which the “witch” was not invited!

Take a look and get a feel for the true meaning of “Inquisition.”

Full Text of the Malleus Maleficarum

Trask, the Last Tyromancer

I digress.

Back to the reason for this post. Read this article and bask in the green mutant glow!

RPG’s in the News

Down at the bottom, they mention their hobby, “Dungeons and Dragon.” When is the last time a hobby got mentioned after a bank robbery? I doubt the New York Times would carry this headline. “Six People Murdered in Bank Heist. Criminals Played Tennis Together.”

Enough. I have spewed enough, just one last thing.

Several items mark these idiots as mutants, but one stands out above all. The single item that separates them from the “gamers.”

A true Gamer would be on a beach in Brazil earning 6%.

Trask, the Last Tyromancer