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November 24, 2004
15 Questions, answers
Here are my answers to the gaming questionnaire Ginger posted.
1. What is the first RPG you ever played?
I played red-box D&D. We explored an island and tried to fight or run away from dinosaurs.
2. What RPG do you currently play most often?
I am currently running a series of short scenarios, each in a different system. I am playing in an Exalted game, which is weekly.
3. What is the best system you've played?
I don't know. It's always been the people rather than the system that has made for the most striking successes.
4. What is the best system you've run?
Nobilis. It's the really the first unqualified success I've had as a GM in a long-term campaign.
5. Would you consider yourself an: Elitist/ Min-Maxer/ Rules Lawyer?
None of the above, rationally, and elitist emotionally. I tend to imagine myself as some superior gamer, but when I sit back and think about the people I've played with I cannot avoid the conclusion that I have played with some really awesome gamers, most of whom are better than me. :-)
6. If you could recommend a new RPG which would you recommend? Why?
In my own group, I want to try Heroquest, Wraith, Dust Devils and Dogs in the Vineyard, plus a couple of homebrews whose working titles wouldn't mean much.
7. How often do you play?
Twice a week -- I run one game and play in another.
8. What sort of characters do you play? Leader? Follower? Comic Relief? Roll-Player/ Role-Player?
According to my friends, a recognizable "Neel PC" is a character with a particular ethic or code, which they follow right into trouble. What the code is varies a lot between PCs, but it's usually present.
9. What is your favorite Genre for RPGs?
At this point, I'm most interested in running non-fantastic genres. I really want to run a game set in modern-day Nigeria, because it recently hit me like a bolt of lightning that since the critical audience for a game is just the players, you can do things that just wouldn't work in other media. Plays, novels, and movies all have to have mass appeal, but a game can touch on just the stuff the players are interested in, and that means we can potentially do much more unusual things.
10. What Genres have you played in?
Ancient world fantasy, modern urban fantasy, horror, cyberpunk, superheroes, post-apocalyptic, hard science fiction, space opera, and probably many others. Most of them have been in an action-adventure mode, though.
11. Do you prefer to play or GM? Do you do both?
I do both, and like to do both -- a diet of only one or the other would be boring.
12. Do you like religion in your games?
Sure. The neat thing is that we can do both realistic and "science-fictional" religions. For example, I'm interested in running a game in which we work out through play what kind of response people would make to living in a universe with a moral system as objective as the laws of physics.
13. Do you have taboo subjects in your games or is everything "fair game"?
Everything is fair game, but not everything is interesting. For example, I'm simply not interested in GMing "realistic" sexism in historical settings -- realizing that kind of pervasive oppression just drains my enthusiasism. When I run historicals, it gets Hollywood-ized -- discrimination becomes a plot point for the PCs to overcome before they get their happy ending. :-)
14. Have you developed your own RPG before?
Yes; I've developed lots of homebrews.
15. Have you ever been published in the Gaming Industry? If so...what?
A couple of minor pieces, but not really. I don't really have any desire to, either. The audience for the sorts of rpgs I'm interested in working on seems so small that trying to monetize it seems pointless; I might as well give them away for free and spare myself the hassle of selling.
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1. What is the first RPG you ever played?
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Comments
13. Do you have taboo subjects in your games or is everything "fair game"?
I can understadn the desire for everything to be okay but I've found there are things I don't want to be part of. If a game is a social interaction, and though we are pretending to be other people, it is also a face to face event. When I play along with a person I am involved, even if I don't like it. The question is where do I draw the line on being involved.
I run Matrix Games - in which people make arguments about what they want to have happens next rather than role playing one character. MGers champion a character and try to further their fellow's agenda. In the mid 90's I ran a Robin Hood game at a convention in the Midwest. One of the players championed Sir Guy of Gisborne. He succeeded in capturing Maid Marion and her ladies in waiting. Maid Marion refused to cooperate with him - as she should in the genre - he then very coolly and deliberately made the argument that he raped her ladies in waiting to coerce her to comply. The clear implied message was that she was next.
Blatant sex abuse is not fun. I think we can all agree on that. I grant that this tactic was highly realistic, sadly the world is not always a nice place. The question is should I allow this?
As it was I game him a very poor roll. I asn't fully enforcing my morality but was telling him in game terms what was unacceptable. I later regretted giving him even that much leaway.
This was a game in which children were playing. Without any regard for that this player drug us all through what can be seen as a rape fantasy. The cool calculated way the person did it made my skin crawl even as it happened. I was left wondering if he had actually done this. If it made me cringe (then a 32 year old social worker who had treated sex offenders, so I'd heard it all) I just wonder what the kids made of it.
Later on I wished I had told the guy that that argument was sick and not appropriate. Robin Hood is NOT a simualtion. That was when I realized that not everything is okay. I don't have to be involved is something I find repugnant and as a game host I have a right and duty to protect my guests from such assaults.
Sorry for the rant. I prefer to let people go. I do let them go but in the back of my head I know there are limits that I will enforce. Since then no one has ever pushed those limits. Hopefully no one ever will.
Chris Engle
Posted by: Chris Engle at Nov 30, 2004 2:31:38 PM
There's no need to apologize; that was a fascinating anecdote. Your reaction sounds very sane and sensible to me. I certainly agree that rape, graphic violence, and other adult subject matter in games need to be handled so as not to hurt the players, and that anything that crosses that boundary needs to be quickly and vigorously squashed.
Personally, I tend to distinguish between a) whether something bad can happen and persist, b) how graphic and detailed the description is, and c) the tone we describe it in. So, in the games I run, sex or racial discrimination is explicitly a plot point; characters subjected to it are guaranteed to have the opportunity to overcome or rise above it. This understanding, oddly enough, enables more "realistic" depictions of oppression to happen, because it reassures the players that I'm not putting them through some kind of sick power fantasy. Also, sometimes humor can make it possible to treat even very touchy subjects: "Okay men, we're going to rape the women and steal the sheep -- and get it right this time!" It's not high comedy, sure, but laughter can sometimes make scary subjects safe to approach.
Hm. There's a lot of balancing and watching the players to get to the boundaries safely, and I don't think I'm describing the process very well. Part of the reason is that the language I have at hand is inadequate; art can shock and sometimes even offend people, and that's okay, but it's totally not okay to hurt or violate people. There's a zone beyond "everyone is comfortable" but before "someone is violated" that I don't have a name for, and which I'm willing to go into in the right sort of group.
Posted by: Neel Krishnaswami at Dec 1, 2004 5:29:55 PM
