Are Germans Really That Scary?

I am, of course, NOT speaking about their soccer team, which is scary-awesome.

[yes, despite the USA and Mexico losing over the weekend, I am still watching World Cup action...I'm rooting for Die Mannschaft at this point, or La Furia Roja should they win out in the semi-finals]

No, I am talking about this tendency in RPGs to cast the Germans as the heavies/antagonists in their games. I mean really, are these makers of fine automobiles the epitome of a soulless scourge of evil?

I guess it's the whole Nazi thing...man, those guys are never going to live that down. I mean it's not like the English and Spanish and Portuguese and French and Dutch and Italians didn't wipe out whole civilizations all around the world during their Imperialistic/Colonial periods, right? You know...in Africa and Asia and the Americas and the Caribbean and Australia and the Pacific Islands, etc.?

But noooo, "Nazis" are the big bogey man, since they had the gall to bomb developed western nations. Well, and they did systematically murder millions of people (as opposed to the Russian pogroms only semi-systematically murdering hundreds of thousands or the French Revolution killing tens of thousands). However, as those murdered (for the most part) were German citizens, one would think the main people to fear the Germans would be, well, Germans.

Okay, sure...Nazis did awful, awful things. There's really no getting around it. But do Germans ALWAYS have to be associated with Nazis?

Recently, I've been sniffing around the Tannhauser board game, because it has all the kind of crazy ambience I totally dig and riff off for inspiration. Tannhauser is an alternate history type action game that throws steampunk and demons into a World War setting. Basically, you are acting as heroic Allied forces blowing demon Nazi soldiers all to hell with big guns...and trying not to get sucker punched with sorcery or a stick grenade.

Except that the alternate history is that the Tannhauser war is an extended WWI...and there weren't any "evil Nazis" in WWI.

At least as far as I know...I'm not a World War historian. I just like the ideas of trench warfare and barbed wire and gas mask goggles and bayonets and sharpened spades...you know, all that Charge of the Light Brigade stuff? Or maybe, I should say All Quite on the Western Front stuff...yeah, the Germans were at odds with MY country back in the day (that's America) but does that mean they were "Evil?" Or were they just on "the wrong side?"

I suppose I'll have to do some research on the subject. Right now, I'm pretty good with Nazis = Evil. But I'm not so sure I want to cast Germans as the Big Bad all the rest of the time.

And why am I bringing this all up? Well, maybe 'cause I'm working on a couple-four new games right now. Yes, the television watching has been quite a work-out (FINALLY finished Battlestar Galactica last night and the World Cup starts up again tomorrow), but there is some hope over that something might be coming out of La Casa Blackrazor (a.k.a. Beaglehaus) sometime in the very near future. I know I've been developing this TERRIBLE habit of over-promising and under-delivering, but I really REALLY plan on giving y'all some good stuff in the very near future. Hopefully, within the next 24-48 hours even...we'll see.

All right, gotta' run...

Musings on Intellectual Property

I've had a particular thought brewing in my brain the last week or so, just thought I'd share.

I don't think every cool piece of IP needs to be licensed as an RPG. Hell, I don't even think some should be.

Case in point: Battlestar Galactica.

My wife and I have been watching BSG the last couple weeks and thoroughly enjoying it. The show is compelling drama (even if it didn't compel us to give up our Friday nights when it originally aired). But just because it's a sci-fi story, a war story, a story that involves shooting, starships, and alien/robot antagonists does NOT mean it would make a decent RPG. Heck, it has heroic characters and it STILL wouldn't make for your average "adventure game." At least not in the traditional, non-indie RPG sense of the idea.

Yes, I'm aware that there is already a Battlestar Galactica RPG. I can only imagine that it has write-ups of all the star characters complete with lists of "skills" like "shoot gun" and "pilot viper;" as if that's what the television show is all about. I suppose one could consider the characters of the TV drama to be "on an adventure" but what is interesting about it, what makes it worth watching is NOT whether or not Chief Tyrol makes his "repair fighter" roll or whether or how many "hit points" (or the equivalent) Baltar loses when getting knocked around. Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick!

Now compare that with Star Wars which, despite an over-arching plot, is still just an episodic adventure series. There's no real "depth of character" to Chewbacca or Han Solo (one of the reasons cited by Harrison Ford for never wanting to reprise the role), or any of the characters, and the"development" that occurs is as superficial as any traditional RPG. What is Anakin Skywalker but a cardboard cut-out perhaps with an "anger meter" or a "selfish +2" stat? Not much more, really. The characters are present so that the "fun adventure story" can be told.

In Battlestar Galactica, the war story is present so the characters' stories can be told.

How they develop, how they evolve (or devolve) under pressure, how they love and hate, their relationships with each other, with duty, with the mission. How they mature. How they deal with the (mental) curve balls and challenges thrown at them.

That's not the foundation for an "adventure" RPG. Maybe the basis for a psyche-exploring, Story Now-type indie-game, but I doubt that's what you get in the glossy hardcover I see on the shelf of the game shop.

Now, of course, it is possible to "drift" any RPG into character exploration and personality development...certainly I've seen it happen with long-term Dungeons & Dragons play, despite a rule system aimed at facilitating treasure seeking. But what D&D (at least Old School editions) had over the current commercial RPGs was a simplicity of game rules/design that made system so quick and easy that drifting was a fine little side jaunt. Who wants to spend hours constructing a feat/talent/skill/class/spell-studded stat monster just to have none of those stats and abilities matter? No one, that's who. If I have cleave and great cleave, written on my sheet, you better bet I want a chance to use 'em. Don't tell me the game is about facing my personal demons or dealing with political fall-out.

As I work on my B/X space opera, I find myself wondering how much "story" I should add to the game. The truly innovative part of OD&D (and by extension, B/X) was it's openness to most any type of "pseudo-fantasy-medieval" game you wanted to run. It could be adapted to a Greyhawk or a Forgotten Realms or a Dragon Lance with no sweat (even though they were all, in a way, "licensing" certain game conventions -- for example, the way the Vancian spell magic worked in the "game universe"). I find myself wanting to actually include antagonistic agencies (the equivalent of "The Sith" or the "Evil Empire")...but would such organized opposition hamstring the game? Do I want to be creating my own Intellectual Property at all? Even to such a small degree as "this is how people use "The Force?"

I don't know, I'm just wondering. I haven't checked out X-Plorers, which for all I know may be a truly generic B/X space game. My original idea was NOT generic, but rather "B/X Star Wars." But if I don't own the licensing rights I have to do away with the IP. And if I don't have Lucas's IP do I really want to bother writing this game?

Ugh. Well, time to get back to work.

Happy Valentine's Day Star Frontiers!

I was flipping through my Star Frontiers books the other day, and decided it was time to give the game a little love. I know that I have denounced it in the past, but damn if there isn't some impressive parts to it.

Today, I spent a good hour or two re-reading both the basic and advanced game rules of Star Frontiers Alpha Dawn. This is easy enough to do when the basic rules are 16 short pages and the the advanced game 64, less charts, tables, and artwork. Ahh...the benefits of the 64-page game.

[just by the way, most of St. Valentine's Day has been spent hanging with the sweetie...I'm not a total punk after all!]

'Course, after reading through the rules I was feeling a lot less charitable. Again.

Basically, the thing fails the Achilles Test:

Squeemish, the runtiest neophyte out of the PGC training corps, has just touched down on the feral world of Myrmidia, little knowing the xenophobic nature of its savage inhabitants. Heck, he knows little of anything at all (Tech PSA:Computers 1, Beam 1) in addition to being scrawny (Str/Sta 30/30...he rolled a "01") and being slow on the uptake (Dex/RS/IM 60/35/4...he rolled a "50" but adjusted his Dexterity upwards as much as possible ).

By contrast, brave Achilles, hero-king of Myrmidia is no such slouch...years of battle experience has hardened him to the max in just about every category (Str/Sta 100/100, Dex/RS/IM 100/100/10, and the equivalent of level 6 in melee and archaic weapons). As Squeemish steps down from the orbital lander, trespassing on the land Achilles has sworn to defend against all foreign "invaders," the warrior charges the PGC operator with his mighty spear.

Rolling initiative, Achilles gets a "10" and Squeemish rolls an average "5;" mighty Achilles will get his attack off long before Squeemish clears laser from holster. His chance to hit is 125% but he will still miss on a 96 or higher...he rolls an "01" (the best possible hit!) and maximum possible damage, plunging his spear deep into the PGC rookie. A full 25 points of damage (including adjustment for his Strength of 100). Squeemish's Stamina is reduced to 5.

Now it's Squeem's turn. He turns the dial of his laser pistol to 10 SEU and fires: plink! His chance to hit is 30 (Dex) + 10 (skill) -10 (wounds) = 30. He rolls a 30 and the "pencil-thin beam" strikes Achilles for average damage: 55 points of damage. He notes his weapon has a rate of fire of 2 so he takes a second shot (at the same chance to hit), rolls a 26 and again hits for average damage. Plink! Mighty Achilles has taken 110 points of damage and is toast. Squeemish, despite taking the most terrible wound possible, is little the worse for wear. If his rookie team medic administers a shot of biocort, his Stamina will increase to 15 and after a single day's rest he'll be able to move and fight with 0 penalty. Squeemish whistles a happy tune as he changes the power clip and prepares to meet more of this world's "savages."

The wikipedia entry for Star Frontiers says "Characters are quite durable in combat" and that's a bit of an understatement. A character with an average Stamina (45 by random generation), an take a full burst from an auto-rifle and, on average, be just fine (27 points of damage). The problem for me, I suppose is that combat in Star Frontiers isn't realistic OR cinematic...it's just silly.

Hit Points in Dungeons & Dragons aren't "unrealistic" because they are abstract...they are a simple measure of character sustainability. In SF, there are no hit points, only Stamina, which is NOT an abstract ability but rather it "measures a character's physical fitness and general health."

Oh, I suppose it's slightly abstract in that "Stamina also measures how badly a character can be wounded before he passes out and dies." This means a SF character with a Stamina of 30 is a pansy that collapses bleeding and shrieking from wounds that mean little to a Stamina 60 he-man. But I don't like the way they've modeled damage in SF...mighty Achilles had rookie Squeemish dead to rights and should have skewered his ass to the side of the drop ship.

But hey, I've said before "realism in combat" is one giant Quixotic quest, pretty much unobtainable, at least in a table-top RPG (sorry TROS). And anyway, this post was supposed to show a little love for Star Frontiers, not beat on it. Obviously the game was not meant to run The Chronicles of Riddick as the last thing anyone wants to do in SF is bring a knife to a gun fight!

Here's the thing: Star Frontiers is NOT an open-setting RPG. It is a very setting specific RPG. One can run it by its canon (including the map of the Frontier provided!) to have adventures in the setting provided...or one can suffer the consequences of going off book (said consequences being the thing doesn't work as well).

For example, SF is NOT appropriate for a Rogue Trader type game...it assumes all humans come from the same world and have evolved to the same level. Spears have been replaced by blasters, and the only reason one would use a sword is because they don't have access to something better, not because "it's all they've ever known."

There are no psionics. There are no mutations. There are no cybernetics or eugenics. Hell, there are no nukes! The technology present imagines a DIFFERENT human race that evolved in a very different manner than ol' Earth humans. Coupled with their alien allies, humans are just one species of the galaxy, neither the most prevalent, nor the most ingenious, nor even the most war-like.

This isn't Dune or Foundation or a planetary romance of any particular stripe (though the Voluntas series is a bit of a disconnect...almost as if SF was trying to "do Traveller"). It's certainly not Star Trek or Star Wars...there are no military starships and no "Force." It is it's own animal.

In many ways, I think it might actually be the ideal game to run a BG Caprica-style setting. One would probably want to remove the alien races (since re-booted Battlestar Galactica doesn't appear to have any...even the Cylons were human-created), and substitute the Soldiers of the One or other terrorist group in place of the Sathar. But otherwise, it's very suitable to this idea of a human race of non-Earth origin with the same old human problems (racism, classism, greed, religious intolerance) popping up under a different set of history and cultural tradition.

Heck, even if one runs a straight Star Frontiers setting (including all the aliens) it should probably feel A LOT like the Caprica series...especially if you play up the differences, rivalries, and possible bigotry between species.

So Star Frontiers has THAT going for it. And if you run it like that, there's little need for the Knight Hawk ship rules or even a different combat system from the one present, two things that I have missed since the day I opened the box.

The other thing I think is great about Star Frontiers (aside from certain pieces of equipment) is the How to Referee chapter starting on page 53. Coupled with an understanding of what the SF setting IS (see the inside cover of the Basic Game Rules), it really does tell the GM most everything you need to know on how to run a game...something I've found missing from a LOT of RPGs these days.

Perhaps this has been my real hang-up from the beginning: I wanted a science fiction RPG that could be used to run MY ideal game...and Star Frontiers is best used to run a Star Frontiers game. Not Dune, not Star Wars, and certainly not Warhammer 40K.

Maybe I WILL pull it out and play it again one day; this time, on its own terms.

; )