Life During Wartime

Every time I listen to "Life During Wartime" by the Talking Heads, I can't help but think that it would make an awesome movie, TV show, or (since I don't blog about those other things) role-playing game.



I love this song because it embodies the urban spirit that the Talking Heads capture so wonderfully in their music and it also evokes a vivid picture of the chaos of 1970s militancy. According to a book about the Talking Heads (fine - I found the quote on Wikipedia...), David Byrne was thinking about Baader-Meinhof (Red-Army Faction), Patty Hearst, and Tompkins Square in New York City when he wrote it. I don't think he'd object if I say that the song takes my imagination elsewhere, and that's where I think it would be awesome to run a campaign.

Whenever I listen to "Life During Wartime" I always think about the civil war in Lebanon and what would happen if something similar were imposed on the United States. It would be like West Beirut in an American context. If I were to run a campaign with this as the inspiration, the basic scenario would look like this:

In the near future, the United States is engulfed in a low-intensity civil war. Secessionists angry with Washington have taken up arms in their states and localities. While entire states have not seceded, local revolts have popped up in nearly every state. The country is divided along a spectrum, ranging from those who support independence for local areas to those who want to crush any disloyalty to the government. Incidents of terrorism and guerrilla warfare have become commonplace across the nation.

Democrats and Republicans are no more. Instead there are three new parties (As I've mentioned before, I love me some factions):

• The Democratic-Republican (National Unity) Party - Most political leaders have rallied together against the secessionists and are working to resolve the problem, though without much success.
• USA Whig (USA - Where Has It Gone?) Party - The new Whig party is the political wing of the secessionist movement. It works in Washington and in state capitals to directly further that cause and to obstruct policies that would otherwise bring about an end to the revolt.
• The Liberal Unionist Party - On the opposite end of the spectrum are those who believe in no compromise with the Whigs, no mercy for secessionists, and a strong, unchallenged federal government.

The campaign is set (or begins) in Washington, DC and the player characters are college students trying to live their lives amid the chaos, politics, and fighting that has engulfed the country. It doesn't really matter what system it gets played on, but I totally think that players should get bonuses for incorporating lyrics from the song into their characters (e.g. "Got a van that's loaded with weapons;" "Lived in a brownstone, lived in a ghetto;" "We've got computers, we're tappin' phone lines."). Any player who is David Byrne also gets a massive bonus.

Nothin' but a G-Thang (Gamer Thang), Baby

I'm becoming a terrible blogger. At the same time, I'm becoming a better gamer.

Ironically, I have not had as much time to write (or attend my regular gaming crew) because I've been busy at work designing games. I'm not quite sure why it took so long for me to bridge the gap between my career and my hobby of choice, but one day I realized that I should try to incorporate gaming into my job (or my job into gaming?), since I work with some of the greatest wargamers in the industry.

Granted war games are not my traditional mode, but designing them is a lot more interesting than writing papers -- especially when they also incorporate significant role-playing aspects. I didn't ever think that I would have professional conversations about GURPS or the analytic utility of dungeon crawls, but I have. I'm also learning a shit-metric-ton about game design, game development, and the American way of war. And.... I'm getting paid for it, so that's frickin' awesome.

Anyway, I aspire to update the blog whenever possible, and I intend to play games much, much more... since I can justify it as career development now. :) But since the gaming "world" is so huge, I'm not sure exactly where it will take me. Still, if you've read this far, you may very well tune in again [thumbs up, geek!]... and this is good since my wife is always impressed when someone who is not her logs in for a read.

A Spy In Isengard

Stop the presses!

Stop. The. Fracking. Presses.

I just found A Spy in Isengard online. What is this, you ask? I wasn't quite sure either. All I knew was that as a kid I played this the crap out of this book, and it was a critical link in my jump from Choose Your own Adventure to Dungeons and Dragons.

As I remember it, the book was basically a choose-your-own-adventure format, but with a few interesting advanced steps. You have to create a character in the beginning, there is a character sheet with inventory list at the back, and a random numbers table in case you don't have 2d6 lying around (or if you're squeezed in the back of a station wagon with two younger brothers on family vacation).

Middle Earth Quest Character Sheet: Awesomeness from the 80s.

By the magic of Google, I have come to learn more. A Spy in Isengard was a Middle Earth Quest (MEQ) book published by Iron Crown Enterprises, which also published Middle Earth Role Playing (MERP), a system based on Rolemaster. I'm guessing that this book was a way to publicize MERP or maybe even it was designed to be a gateway drug book to heavier MERP games. I'm still not sure, but I'm struck by a couple things.

One, it's a little baffling to me that one publisher could produce so much at that time. Rolemaster, MERP, MEQ, a few books, and I recall couple similar Sherlock Homes books produced around the same time. For one, it drives home just how much the gaming industry was producing in the 1980s. But how big of an operation was Iron Crown? Was it a couple guys working out of a garage? If so, how did they get wide enough market access to be successful? Was it a wing of some giant corporate conglomerate? If so, how did they fund enough staff? Did the really sell that many copies of Rolemaster and A Spy in Isengard to turn a profit? Is that why the MEQ system ceased to be?

Two, it hits on the importance of having proper introductions to games. Not long ago on Google+, some folks were having a discussion about how a game product should be properly introduced to a kid who just picks it up off the shelf. Rightly, the issue is that many kids like myself grab something cool (A Spy in Isengard) at a local store and have no way to tie it in to anything.

I remember wondering as a kid what MERP was, but I had no idea how to find it. The local library didn't have information on it. Not even the country library had any information in the whole card catalog! Even if I had found something, I was beholden to the preferences of our friendly neighborhood game shop, and to my mom's willingness to drive me there.We didn't even have a comic book store in my town until I was 14. As a result, A Spy in Isengard was the only MEQ product I ever purchased.

What I'm saying is that an awesome product like A Spy in Isengard produced today would come replete with links to a website where more information could be had and more products purchased. I see on the Iron Crown Enterprises website they have produced a Sherlock Holmes game app. This is great. Hopefully ICE will be able to continue making great gaming products and not lose potential customers because they can be linked in to the magic of the internets.

Meanwhile, I'm totally going to rip a copy of A Spy in Isengard from Scribd and print it on the work Xerox.

Factions in the Sandbox

My recent post on the Bakdunis family has me thinking again about tools a DM can use to run a successful sandbox campaign. Anyone who has run a campaign has faced the challenge of balancing between railroading the players into the game that has been prepared and giving them the agency to make the decisions they want. I think most railroading happens because the DM is unprepared to deal with the players' choices.

A central way to avoid having to force the players down a path (or force your path down the players' throats) is to have a rich setting. Having a bunch of different options and bounding your players with ample choices will keep you from having to force one choice on them. A resource like Vornheim, chock full of tricks, tables, and quick outs, is a great tool to have on hand.

One way that I'm making Kimatarthi a rich setting is by laying out a canvass of factions for the players to deal with. The Bakdunis are the ruling family that came to power through a coup. Perhaps it was warranted, but no one pulls that off without making enemies. The city they rule has also become a mixing bowl of refugees from all across the land, different classes of people, different backgrounds, different customs... different expectations. All this creates friction.

Markaz is not just the ruling family and their supporters. There are the old elite families that the Bakdunis deposed and the non-elites who suddenly found themselves in competition with the world's refugees. There are the elites that were deposed by rampaging goblins and reestablished themselves in Markaz. There are the descendents of refugees, some of whom did well, others not as well. There are new elites, charismatic populists, clergy, merchants, kings and queens of the black market, and time lords crime lords. The Markaz Guard are not the only military organization in town, a development that always makes things interesting. And, of course, there are the Mages.

The PCs will start off as conscripted grunts in the Markaz Guard, but it will soon be clear that they will have the opportunity for freelancing, moonlighting, and the pursuit of their own separate interests. If these interests happen to run contradictory to their current jobs, well, that just makes for good plot hooks. They're bound to make friends, allies, rivals, and enemies. So if they don't want to take the job that's being offered one week, that's fine. This decision will, no doubt, put them in some other interesting position.

So what's the advantage of having a plethora of factions, as opposed to other tools for building the sandbox? Simply, it's because of the relationships. By creating a scenario in which the characters build relationships it will self-generate plot hooks and constraining factors, thus removing the need for the DM to railroad them into a particular storyline. The players can build trust and affiliations. They can build animosity that creates its own challenges. Our group's Slaying Solomon campaign has this dynamic, which played out in a major way this past week (...as I have learned. I had a "kid" to "take care of" and couldn't "go play games this weekend."), and I think it's a great way to keep things rolling and make up some great stories along the way.

The People of Anamere II

Well, Jenna's two for two in my Plugs for Peeps. Either the rest of us need to get crackin' or I need to meet more people who are actually publishing gaming materials.

This series is pretty cool in that it provides everything you need to run a game, except the rules. So it gives you all of the set-up, characters, twists, turns, and all you need to do is plug in your favorite gaming system. You could run this as Risus or Traveller just as easily.

So go out and buy Sci-Fi Sandbox 06: The People of Anamere II. It's got a cast, and encounters in space and on a beautiful tropical paradise. I haven't read it yet, but it is promising anthropologists and an alien race of Otterfolk.

You can download it from DriveThru RPG by clicking... here.

The Bakdunis Family

Rise of the Bakdunis

Before the Goblin Wars, Family Bakdunis was one of the wealthy merchant families of Markaz. And, like all wealthy families, they were involved in politics and military affairs.While they had not been among the princes who ruled the city states, their wealth was able to buy them a certain amount of influence.

When the goblins appeared and swept across the land, Coron Bakdunis was Captain of the Markaz Guard. Unlike other cities, Markaz had time to consider its defense and prepare for the attack. It was not much time, but it was significant. Coron was known to be a man of action and of little patience. As stories and refugees rolled in from across the land, he saw the Prince and Governing Council dithering. Not only that, they offered no clear plan while they deliberated.

So, one afternoon, he made a decision and ended the deliberation with the assistance of a squad of his most loyal officers.

Coron Bakdunis comes to power. (or the Death of Nero - same difference.)

Coron put Markaz under martial law and prepared his force to meet the goblin horde. One of his key decisions--and one that had been blocked by the Council--was to retool several hundred of his finest fighters to be light, mobile infantry that could act as scouts and also waylay the goblins from behind the front line. He called these troops the Rangers.

He conscripted every man, woman, and child that could physically hold a weapon, training each to the best of their ability. As refugees arrived, only the sick and injured were allowed to rest. The others were put to work somehow. In the short period of time after taking over the city, Coron was able to establish a rag-tag force to meet the goblins at the city walls.

The city held, but not without massive casualties and widespread damage. Coron retained his position as both leader of the Guard and de facto leader of the city and began the long, slow process of rebuilding. He would not have much opportunity to be a builder, however, as he was taken by illness not two years after the end of the Goblin War. His brother, Kalan, succeeded him. Kalan would rule Markaz--and effectively most of the human population--for the next twenty years. He saw the people through the chaos of those early years, a famine, and the initial rebuilding of civilization. There have been a total of five Bakdunis rulers in the decades since the Goblin Wars.

In many ways, civilization is still being rebuilt, but the Bakdunis family proudly takes credit for both saving human society and reestablishing over the past decades. Many are prone to agree, but there are those who believe that the Bakdunis family has done little except enrich and empower themselves. They continue to rule, however, by way of their shrewd ability to build and maintain political alliances, to suppress the opposition, and to make sure that the right people get rich and the right people disappear. It's a robust system, but how long can it last?

Branches of the Geek Tree

There's a lively discussion going on over at Monsters and Manuals, prompted by Noisms' question about why we fantasy gamers care so much for historical research, when such research has yielded very little evidence of dragons, orcs, or hippogriffs.

My take on it is that it's in the genetic code of our hobby.

Remember that before there was D&D there was Chainmail, and Chainmail was a wargame. The wargaming hobby is steeped in the tradition of historical research and analysis. Every game designer looks at what came before and tweaks it. What if we changed the focus from battalions to companies? What if we changed the combat dynamic?  What if we consider the logistical challenges of this campaign? All of this requires research to fill in the blanks that the game designer wants to fill.

Good wargames have serious research behind them. Some are so good, they get used as reference materials. Some grognards even advocate the use of wargames to more thoroughly study and understand historical realities. The Holy Grail of wargame research is discovering that there was an apple orchard outside of Leningrad that forced a Panzer division to approach from a different direction.

Chainmail developed as a way to simulate medieval war, bringing combat stats to individual soldiers. Gygax then took the next step and said, what if these guys went and fought a dragon?

And Gary saw that he had made fantasy role playing, and it was good.

RPGs took off on a totally new trajectory, but D&D maintained that deep tradition of mathematical combat dynamics, infinite outcome tables, and room for innovation. That innovation requires research. The research could be for atmospherics, such as determining the size of an average medieval village. It can be material, such as evaluating the benefits of spears versus other weapons. Or it can be theoretical, such as imagining the macroeconomic impact of hippogriffs on the shepherds and the wool industry.

Even if we fantasy gamers look to different sources, this spirit of inquiry and invention runs strong. The same sorts of folks that like to ponder these questions are drawn to these different branches of gaming for this very reason - it's just that some of us like to fight Napoleon and some like to fight orcs.  In the end, we're all branches of the geek tree.