The official RPG design thread

[Fomorian]

I did a few of those a while back and they never got off the ground. This time I'm posting it in Creative since I know it won't get burrowed under piles of more popular threads and since I know a lot of people vested in RPGs frequent the place (well, that's "a lot of people" as in "The Real Mac Cabbe"). I also plan on turning this into a kind of "shareweb" for game creators and campaign builders so if you have anything to share with people interested in roleplaying (tabletop, live-action or computer) please fire away.

First entry:
Back in the days I was still in early stage of development for a game called "ID" which I am still planning on launching. Now I'm much further along, and a few tips taken from MacCabbe this summer helped steer me in the right direction I believe. With the system becoming solid and the game world remaining purposedly abstract I figure I'm ready to go down into details such as the mechanics of healing wounds and hacking computers.

For those who don't know, ID is a "psychological horror" game which I've been carrying since high-school (it was called Daemon Hunter back then), but that really hasn't gotten off the ground since a few years back since Silent Hill reignited my interest in the genre. The setting is The City which can be any city in the world, or none, or all of them. In truth I leave this purposedly blurry, because part of the game is finding out exactly what this place is (think Dark City; everybody lives there but very few ever figure out that's something is very very wrong).

Player Characters are part of that select few, and their lives have just gotten a whole lot more complicated because of it. Each protagonist (PC) comes with his or her personnal experience of what is called "The Weird": breaches in reality, which go from watching the walls of your room bleed out to impossibly surviving your own suicide. The Weird is a protagonist's cue to what's happening under the surface, it's also the source of whatever special ability he's got. For instance, the guy who saw his walls bleed could be able to detect evil, while the guy who survived his suicide could find he's invulnerable to certain attacks.

The weird isn't all superpowers through: there's something on the other side of the veil that want's in. Enter the protagonist's dark side, the antagonist: your own personal demon that's not too happy of being fed your refuse thoughts and unwanted memories. The Antagonist is basically a part of your character that you don't know about, the gamemaster (called "The Voice") determins it's agenda and what it can do. Antagonists are different for every character: one may be your classical "beast inside" turning you into a berzerker every chance it gets, another might be a "tormentor", besieging you with grief and horrible visions, another still may in fact be dormant parts of your soul that wish nothing more than to be allowed to exist in broad daylight along with the rest of your personnality... and that are willing to go to extremes to make you whole again. Needless to say, the more powerful protagonists get, the more insisting the beast is.

And then of course there's the City itself, which would already be grim enough without people's fears and nightmares living in between the walls. To paraphrase Sin City's Marv, go down the right back alley in this City and you can find anything; people's dreams and nightmares, lost souls, truths about the nature of the universe, children's inner world, landscapes that shouldn't exist and maybe, just maybe, one of them whopper secrets like the gate to heaven, the secret of immortality or a living-breathing Elvis Presley.

But then it's entirely possible you're simply missing a few cranks... maybe you're awake, maybe you're asleep, maybe you're mad, maybe you're dead...

That's the idea in an ostrich-egg shell. I'll post some more in a few for all interested.

In the meantime, I very interested in hearing from your own gaming ideas.

[MacCabbe]

Simon, you have to get your hands on the series "Carnivale". Even if you won't be able to use it as prime RPG material for your project, you'll love it. Take my word on that. In the meanwhile, I'll post here when I'll be published :ohh

[Fomorian]

Awww....
But I need your advice now!

EDIT: any website I can check for Carnivale?

[MacCabbe]

Yes, a French one, as a matter of fact...

http://www.carnivale-fr.com/

And I can give you advice, but... on what ? From your first post, your project is seemingly going well...

[nemarsde]

I haven't run many created many campaign settings. GMs always have to customise the campaign setting for the gaming group, and over the years I've heavily customised D&D with Mystara and Greyhawk campaign settings, and Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0.

I've run a historial campaign, set in 1670 Europe (using GURPS Lite), and a mythical/folkloric campaign (using D&D 3E) set in Merrie Olde England.

Neither wholy original, and concepts that have been used in other published RPGs.

Would you create your own system or licence one?

These days I think we're spoiled for choice with published RPGs. There are some fascinating games out there. My only problem is buying them. They're just too expensive for a game you're never likely to play.

[MacCabbe]

I have created my own system, yet highly unoriginal. More like an extreme tweaking of the original Star Wars system. My current project is some sort of space opera game, where the "opera" is incredibly heavier than the "space".

As a game master, I always go for the simplest. Or better, the quickest. I have no interest for complex rules. Anything that distract the player (or me) from his acting is bullshit in my book. So the rules have to be instantly understandable, and everything has to be done with a SINGLE throw of dice(s) in my games. If you start having localization tables, penalties tables, armor damages tables, and so on, it becomes unplayable for us.

My system reflects this. I added a few original details that add some more realism, but 1) do not require any further throws, and 2) require decision making by the players.

[nemarsde]

I recently picked up Unknown Armies for this reason. I loved the system. For example, the character creation is so simple and intuitive, it doesn't actually need you to refer to the book.

Only problem is it's limited by its simplicity. It's a game for campaigns set in the real world (or an alternate reality of it). It doesn't really do anything other than humans.

Have you ever watched Space Adventure Cobra? Psychedelic space opera. Actually one of my favourite films. It's poorly animated, badly written, but it's just so unashamedly bold and brash it's endearing.

I've often wanted to run a game based on its setting, but it's one of those GM idiosyncrasies. i.e., The GM wanting to run a game they actually want to play in.

[MacCabbe]

I actually watched that show a lot, indeed. If you're in your thirties, in France, there's no way that you haven't seen that show. I share fond memories with all my mates of that episode where there's a hardcore baseball game.

[nemarsde]

I've never seen the TV series myself. But I have a precious copy of the 1995 redubbed version of the feature film with the YELLO soundtrack. It's brilliant.

[MacCabbe]

Back on-topic, it's true that there's an immense quality in the RPGs, these days. Originality, gameplay, scenarii, etc... Unfortunately, working, and playing, on my own one has made me totally lose touch with those products. I regret that, since I could have got many more ideas for my own.

[nemarsde]

Well, that is a big problem. That Merrie Olde England campaign I put together, for example. I was checking out a new releases listing at DreamLyrics the other day and found two published RPGs that were basically the same as mine. And I wasn't even searching, so...

I've never really hit on an idea for an RPG or campaign setting of my own that I've thought is very strong though.

[MacCabbe]

I may have the same problem here. Unsure if there's not something close to my project. I don't think so, but the recent trends in comics, video-games, cartoons or even movies tell me that I should try to publish as soon as I can, or I may have some bad surprises.

Here's an advice on how to design a RPG campaign :

The key issue is that you have (usually) to create a story for a group. From a narrative point of view, that's highly unusual. There are only very few materials that have been delaing with such a situation, The Three Musketeers being one of this rare examples.
So, your story will have to focus on a group, not on a single individual or a couple. Usually, I base my story's backbone on how that group meets. And I design everything from that.

Take my current campaign. The core concept was to have... musketeers !... well, at least a group of young men who knew each other in a military academy. Each year, at a fixed date, someone tries to assassinate them. Without a clear reason.
Basically, in this campaign, each character "calls" the others when he has an unsolvable problem. Each of these problems constitutes one episode of the campaign. Little by little, I am adding the elements of the core campaign. Very few at first, and more and more as each episode goes. By the end of the campaign, each episode will be entirely focused on those assassinations.

Cheap trick, but that works. For a shitload of years now, I've designed all my campaigns on similar basis, and it's been working wonders, on a narrative point of view.

[Fomorian]

Yeah I remember talking with you about this. I work my campaigns the exact opposite way: I take each individual player character's micro-story and tie em into a macro-story. However, I'm beginning to realize the importance of group dynamics, especially after some of my players decided to go rogue on a couple of their mates. The problem is that my game (psychological horror) kind of favours individual and often intimate tales rather than groups of people. I'm currently trying to find a way to conciliate the best of both worlds.

@Nemarsde: I also procured Unknown Armies not too long ago and fell in love. I personnally consider it the best game system ever published, it almost made me drop mine. I also agree that the setting, while quirky and imaginative, lacks actual horror (it's more of a "weirdness" game than a "horror" game). Another game in the same vein which I thought was an amazing accomplishment was "little fears", game of childhood horrors, which features the best character sheet I've ever seen. I love games that can tie their thematics into their mechanics.

[nemarsde]

I was a little disappointed by the Unknown Armies setting too. If Over The Edge uses the same system, I might eBay Unknown Armies and by that instead. The setting looks much more interesting, imho, even without the Unknown Armies magic system.

By Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0. campaign is run very much like Fomorian's, while my Merrie Old England campaign is run just like the Real Mac Cabbe's. (Not that the two styles are even remotely mutually exclusive.) It does depend on what you're trying to achieve to some extent, although I find it depends mostly on how often you play.

My Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0. campaign has about x3 sessions per year than the Merrie Olde England campaign. The players in Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0. can develop their characters much more, so the structure is built around that aim.

[Fomorian]

I wouldn't say disappointed, it just went in another direction than what I thought. I just Googled "Over the edge" and I'm not sure I'm buying the concept either (though the system is intriguing).

I never got to play Cyberpunk 2020, I only read the core book like five months ago and can't fathom why a game like Shadowrun would outlive it: Cyberpunk is one of the most playable sci-fi games out there.

[nemarsde]

I guess I was just hoping the Unknown Armies setting would have more depth. As it is, it's fairly shallow, but I suppose that could allow a GM to give it hidden depths.

I toyed with the idea of running a UA campaign, and subtly changing the setting throughout, making it deeper and deeper, so the players would be thinking they know all about the setting from the books would slowly realise the setting in the books is just as full of shit as the other conspiracy theories it derides. The idea of Alex Abel not actually knowing the Truth is quite funny, imho.

As for Over The Edge, I just thought it might do psychological horror better. (Possibly not though. I need to browse through a copy.)

CP2020 is an inelegant, convoluted and often contradictory system that some how perfectly embodies the inelegant, convoluted and often contradictory setting of a post-apocalyptic dark future. Rules lawyers get completely tied-up by CP2020, so you really have to agree to be fast and loose in your intepretation of the rules because that's how the writers were. Over the years my best campaigns have always been CP2020.

CP v.3 has just been released by RTG through DriveThruRPG, but it's ill-conceived, imho, taking the game away from the cyberpunk genre. Not only that but the artwork is scandalous.

Sample

That's right, they dressed up action figures and took photos of them. Now, RTS say this is supposed to signify something about the setting, which is OK, but it still looks like cheap crap.

So here's a question about RPG design:

What lead illustrator/artworker would you use for your RPG?

[MacCabbe]

Dear God, I'm just in the middle of that issue... Ideally, in terms of style, the closest I've found for my current project would be Marini :



But to be honest, even though I'm a freak when it comes to graphism, I don't care that much about the style. What I want now is to be able to have a close relationship with an artist, leave him as much freedom as he can take, and work on a collaboration basis. Fomorian's best friend, Phaelenopsis, is actually making a few sketch for me, and I can't wait seeing his first results.

[Fomorian]

He's been working on it for a week now, they're coming along great.

[MacCabbe]

Not wanting to be flattering, but I loved talking to Vincent. He understood right away each and every of my suggestions. He added right away stuff I had not thought about. Intellectual shortcuts such as " ho yes, like goblin technology ?" or "he could have that gizmo, or this gizmo". We ended in 30 minutes a discussion that I thought would last for days. It was especially great since even if Saturnin can be easily understood as a concept, he would be much harder to describe in details.

[nemarsde]

Nice. That Marini has a style reminiscent of Disney. (Obviously more resolved because it's an illustration, not animation.)

I also told myself I'd get Keith Parkinson to illustrate any RPG I did, so I was gutted when he passed away last year.

[Fomorian]

PRODUCTION UPDATE

I'm having trouble designing a cool and efficient magick/weird system for ID. My problem is I want to tie it to character-psychology, which is thematically coherent with my setting but dreadfully unpractical gamingwise.

Up to recently, all I had was a list of snazzy powers that came with their own world of trouble (ie: each power could make the object of an adventure) but aside from that there were no boundaries to what the Weird could or could not do. Problem was, I didn't have a governing principle aside from "it really screws reality up".

Analysing the list of weirds I did, I came up with some common ground on which to build on: they all were tied to everyday objects (the telephone, the tramway, razor blades, briefcases, teddybears, a collection of Star Wars action figures, etc.), they were all very personal (ie: nobody can teach you a weird. You are probably the only person in the world who has it), they were all double-edged (ie: at some point, if left unchecked, they'd begin to backfire), they were all very subtle (no fireballs or lightning bolts, just stuff that make you go "huh") and they were all directly linked to a specific type of character (namely an archetype).

From that I tried to organise Weirds according to types of mental stresses like violence and despair. For instance, the more a character had suffered from violence, the more agression got inside his mind, the more powerful the "Violence" weirds would be, and the greater it's chances of backfiring. At the time it seemed like a good idea, giving the weird symbollic weight to specific characters. But the problem is that by narrowing powers down to these categories killed much of the instant creativity that went in designing them. Also, linking the phenomenon of the weird to mental illnesses made it a tad less fun to play around with. Hence I'm trying to find a middle-ground between complete free-form and thematic categorisation.

I generally don't like the way magic is portrayed in RPGs: a tool to an end. That's not magic, it's technology with big words and cool effects. Magic in game should be wondrous, an end in itself, not something to clean your sink with! Once again, Unknown Armies' system is one step beyond, making magick a reflection of you're character's worldview, which is the direction I'm leaning towards except making magic even more symbollic and double-edged (IE: it hurts your soul to use the Weird).

Magic, of all abilities, should also be the less "mechanic" and the most "dramatic". This is a principle many game-designers seem to leave out. Dungeons and Dragons' magic is perhaps the worst offender in this regard as it requires incessant book-keeping (all but the most nerdish players can never keep track of what all spells do) and completely pointless and irrealistic managing ("Oh, let's wait eight hours for me to prepare 'turn-stone-to-mud' in order to progress further"). Come on! It's magic! Using it should have everyone jumping up and down in their seats! It should be fun!

[MacCabbe]

All right. Firstly, I don't quite agree when you're saying "magic HAS to be bizarre and ununderstandable". It all depends on the world in which you play. If you've read the (mediocre) Lanfeust comics, it is set in a world where magic is common, mundane and available on a daily basis : everyone has magical powers. In that case indeed, it is a tool, and is not surrounded with any mystery.

That said, I understand that it is not the case in your gaming world, The City. But what surprises me is why you want to have it called "magic". Are we talking about supernatural powers ? Psys ? Or magic as in the medieval sense of the term ? I believe that it is by defining the cosmological foundations of your Weirds that you'll get answers. Where do they originate from ? How comes these powers exist when they do not in our real world ? Do they bear any cosmical importance ? Or are they just manifestations of something else ?

I know that you will not be very keen on answering these questions in a precise manner. That is, as opposed to a romantic, literary, crypted, attracting manner. But doing that job as a bureaucrat will help you having a better grasp on those issues. A gamemaster has to be first and foremost the bureaucratic architect of the players' pleasure. They are the ones who will live in a fantasy world, osbcure and fascinating. You won't. (IMHO).

And in any case, defining precise rules does not force you to tell anything about these rules to your players. On the opposite ! You can even have them think what these powers are, when it will be drastically different. That opposition may create doubts and uncertainty with your players, hence, reinforcing the "surnatural" aspect of your powers. Creating confusion and mayhem in their minds is probably what you should aim for. That is what I did for my own campaign. The INRI world has created an infinite number of academies to understand and explain what psys are, and not a single explanation is even close to the truth.

So, I believe you should not be bothered by these rules. Just do not tell them to your players.

And I had an idea for you... Hrr, actually another rule.
You could also take into account the relationship between the character and his mental illness. Some people are devastated by their own issues. They cannot cope with them and remain human, and conscious of the beast that devours their minds. Whereas others are perfectly comfortable with that beast and even enjoy its company. Sheer sociopaths. Maybe the backfiring/mastery shoudl take into account that relationship ? The closer to the beast the better the mastery ?

[Fomorian]

Originally posted by The Real Mac Cabbe
All right. Firstly, I don't quite agree when you're saying "magic HAS to be bizarre and ununderstandable". It all depends on the world in which you play. If you've read the (mediocre) Lanfeust comics, it is set in a world where magic is common, mundane and available on a daily basis : everyone has magical powers. In that case indeed, it is a tool, and is not surrounded with any mystery.

Point taken. I got carried away.

I do not like High-fantasy.

That said, I understand that it is not the case in your gaming world, The City. But what surprises me is why you want to have it called "magic".

I don't. I only called it that so that you and nemarsde would understand. In the game it's called the "Weird"

Are we talking about supernatural powers ? Psys ? Or magic as in the medieval sense of the term ?

Allow me to begin by being romantico-litterary-cryptic and ask you what the difference is between these? Because from my point of view, they're all different approaches to the same phenomenon.

I believe that it is by defining the cosmological foundations of your Weirds that you'll get answers.

I also believe that.

Where do they originate from ? How comes these powers exist when they do not in our real world ? Do they bear any cosmical importance ? Or are they just manifestations of something else ?

I know that you will not be very keen on answering these questions in a precise manner. That is, as opposed to a romantic, literary, crypted, attracting manner.

ORIGINS: They're what happens when the abstract realm of the mind (the ID) intrudes on the realm of physical reality. Normally the two are kept separate by the Veil, which is our sense of reality in all it's bendy cultural relativeness.

WHY NOBODY KNOWS ABOUT IT: The weird still happens while the Veil is their albeit on a neigh imperceptible level. It usually bends the Veil just enough so that it affects the cascade of causality. But there are cases and places where the ID is just too strong and simply punctures the Veil. Those can be moments of intense emotion (being lovestruck for instance, or experiencing trauma) or instances of great symbollic mass (for instance, the bullet that killed JFK or the Cross on which Jesus was crucified were all "weirded" as a result of their importance in the collective uncounscious. Likewise, miracles happened much more frequently in a time when everyone believed in God). Every player character has experienced one such instance, a point where the ID litterally stepped out from behind the Veil said "boo!". From that point on they may either want to close the breach or delve further into it.

COSMIC IMPORTANCE: Well, aside from being concrete manifestations of abstract concepts, they also have personal significance. In fact, personal significance is probably what made them happen in the first place. One of the Weirds which I called "Teddy" has a standard plush-toy gradually transforming into a kind of guardian creature because of all the security and care that's been projected into it by it's owner. The problem is that the Weird draws from your uncounscious and within your uncounscious lies the Antagonist (your monster in the closet). What that means is that Weirds get scary. Teddy for instance, may become too protective, he may want to keep you imprisoned in your room because that's the only way you'll be safe. Of course, starvation will never cross Teddy's mind, as he was created by your need to be protected against the world. He isn't a rational being, and he'll probably become quite upset once you decide you don't want him anymore (which is where it gets interesting).

But doing that job as a bureaucrat will help you having a better grasp on those issues. A gamemaster has to be first and foremost the bureaucratic architect of the players' pleasure. They are the ones who will live in a fantasy world, osbcure and fascinating. You won't. (IMHO).

I absolutely disagree with these last two sentences. I think the Gamemaster's job is very much to invite players into the wonders he sees in his head (it's the reason I do this stuff you know).

And in any case, defining precise rules does not force you to tell anything about these rules to your players. On the opposite ! You can even have them think what these powers are, when it will be drastically different. That opposition may create doubts and uncertainty with your players, hence, reinforcing the "surnatural" aspect of your powers. Creating confusion and mayhem in their minds is probably what you should aim for. That is what I did for my own campaign. The INRI world has created an infinite number of academies to understand and explain what psys are, and not a single explanation is even close to the truth.

So, I believe you should not be bothered by these rules. Just do not tell them to your players.

Thanks... this is actually something I never thought of

And I had an idea for you... Hrr, actually another rule.
You could also take into account the relationship between the character and his mental illness. Some people are devastated by their own issues. They cannot cope with them and remain human, and conscious of the beast that devours their minds. Whereas others are perfectly comfortable with that beast and even enjoy its company. Sheer sociopaths. Maybe the backfiring/mastery shoudl take into account that relationship ? The closer to the beast the better the mastery ?

HEY THAT'S FRICKIN AWESOME! I'll be diving into it right now!

[nemarsde]

[color=burlywood]I find this interesting. That's about all I can say, because I'm a spanner at this sort of thing.

However, the point Formorian made about magic/psionics "all different approaches to the same phenomenon" is risqu

[MacCabbe]

Originally posted by nemarsde
Anyway, I really like what I'm reading about Weirds. I love the example of the Teddy. How do you mechanise a system like that though? And more importantly, how do you keep the continuity of the setting? The game world's reality must have some constant, right, for the gamers to be able to comprehend the game? If reality in the game world is solipsist, how can the characters have a series of adventures together?

H

[Fomorian]

Point taken, and it is indeed some of the criticism that's been leveled at the game from the playtesters and the interested onlookers (all twelve of them : / ).

I'm trying to give the City more of a backbone, which is kind of hard given the fact that it's meant to be an "archetypal city". I've begun to think about major characters, people who have been weirded and formed communities as well as major nightmares who have emerged and stayed in reality. I figure this is improtant because as both of you have noticed, it's hard to get your grounds in a world like this. And if I decide to go with "there is no ground" well I completely loose the horror along with the opposition of normality-abnormality. I think the City would benefit from being as close to the real world as possible. That would make every little weird detail more effective and significant.

There is also the problem Mac Cabbe spoke of, which one of my playtesters summed up with "What does my character do when he's not hunting down his oedipus complex with a 12-gauge?". And that's just it: there's little in the way of "casual, relaxed adventuring" in ID and that IS a problem: for all my 2nd and 3rd degrees I lack good ol'fashioned adventures that don't involve finding out "the TRUTH" or going to hell and back. I need mobsters, feds, insurance frauds, internet porn and stuff like that that make my setting more believable and more fun to play in.

So far I've only been able to conduct short campaigns of less than 10 game-nights, and I'm completely at a loss when it comes to being able to make longer bouts where players would actually learn to like their character.

[MacCabbe]

Is that an issue ? Some games may have that sort of issue. Paranoia of course, of the Call of Cthulhu. If your project is well defined, it should not be an issue. Except of course for your players, but in that case you should consider adopting a second game to play a more casual-yet-longer-term campaign.

I'm unsure if I ever thought about it, but, what about INRI ?

Btw :

2nd and 3rd degrees

[Fomorian]

I think INRI is absolutely perfect to play long and involving campaigns. It's got a grand setting which can span from from petty thievery to courting to naval warfare to exploring the far reaches of space to getting your quatrains right for your duel in the afternoon. All of those make the game richer, they're all different flavours, different approaches to the game.

ID has only one approach: reality is breaking down around you so what are you gonna do about it. period. It is a great way to get down into snazzy psychological intrigues and funked-up disturbing imagerie, but once you've reached the bottom, once this bizarre reality has become commonplace, there's not much left to do. That's because you're not building a character through your adventures, you're deconstructing him, which is the opposite of what every good roleplaying game does.

Paranoia and Cthulhu and even the gorram World of Darkness all offer alternative ways to venture: they offer a context and a world you can explore (well, paranoia is mostly just casual fun), stuff to do that doesn't involve getting all wet with monster goo. I don't and it's bothering me. I'm definitely coming up with some cool and creative locales (especially from the other side of the Veil) but the cut of political intrigue and jolly camaraderie is still out of my reach. I'm making progress though.

[MacCabbe]

You got me wrong hombre !

On Paranoia & Cthulhu : I compared them to ID simply because after one scenario, you ALWAYS can put your character to the bin. They're never meant to be ran on the long term. As for ID if I understood well ?

On INRI : I need further testers according to Anne V

[Fomorian]

Well we COULD do that if I had the gorram rulebook! ... hey... wait a minute... I DO!