From my Fevered Imagination: the Chuck Norris Memorial Hard Man RPG Challenge

I should preface this by saying that I love the concept of stupid challenges undertaken by a group of mates. I think it's to do with the (generally) male bonding involved or something. 

Anyway, my fevered brain last night channeled whatever sick muse it was listening to create in my mind's eye the Chuck Norris Memorial Hard Man (or Woman) RPG Challenge.

What this clash of the titans involves is five (lets say five) GM who all agree to run a three to four hour session over the course of a weekend away somewhere. The kicker is that these GMs will only know what games they are running two (lets say two)days before where they are randomly provided with a system and a time slot over the weekend. The GMs would then have a couple of days to digest the rules, write a short adventure(or if they are lucky adapt one from the game they are given) and create pre-gens (if need be).

And these just wouldn't be any old games. This would be five games covering different genres and different systems, usually obscure and well out of date. No Storyteller System or GUMSHOE here. It would then be a challenge of the GMs skill and ability to create and convincing and enjoyable game out of a foreign system with a short time to prepare (for the record, my nomination would be Star Frontiers).

If the GM really hated their randomly selected game, then they could swap it for the MYSTERY GAME which they would have to keep, which could be either completely awesome or completely arse.

I was also thinking (yes I've given this quite some thought over the day) that scoring would be done by the four players in each game and the GM with the highest score would win an AMAZING prize*.

I've still a little undecided on how long the GMs should have between receiving their system and running their game. Two nights (if they are on the first day of the weekend) doesn't seem like much, but then again a week sounds like too long. But I guess it's meant to be a challenge. Also those going in the latter session would have a slight time advantage in preparing, but would probably be more fatigued, so it might balance up in the end.

I think a lot of fun would be finding the games, as there are some classics floating around out there. Of course, all this would be accompanied by beers and ideally a nice out-of-town location.

Sadly I don't think it is something that would see the light of day easily, but what do you guys think? Any thoughts to add?

* Warning: prize may not actually be amazing.

Empire State Secrets: The Wreck (Part 2) + Cthulhu Dice

Monday saw part 2 of our Empire State State Secrets campaign called 'The Wreck', where our noble characters investigated the arrival in port of an almost abandoned steamer carrying a mysterious cargo.

Looking into the events around the ship arrival and the cargo, the investigators dug up all manner of fun terms like 'Innsmouth', 'Kingsport', 'the Marsh refinery', 'Project Covenant' and 'R'lyeh'.

The investigation heavy parts of these Cthulhu adventure can sometimes be a little bitsy, as the characters are often off following up their own leads and contacts, but overall I think the game went well. The tension is slowly building and I think things are nicely coming together for the next couple of sessions.

As an added bonus, I also got the sanity loss inducing present of Cthulhu dice from J. and some delicious cookies from S. Thanks guys!  

Kapcon Calling

It's about five months to go until Kapcon 2011, but I'm already starting to think about what to run. This year was my second Kapcon, as my first time running a game (The Murderer of Thomas Fell for Trail of Cthulhu), and I really enjoyed the experience. Due to the high standard of games run, it pays to be on to these things early in order to build in enough time for playtesting and tweaking.

This year I think I'll stick to running two session and playing in four (though I might also go for a three-three split). Kapcon is interesting in that the sessions are all only three hours long, which presents its own set of challenges, especially if your players aren't used to the system. So this has to factor into any decisions as well.

I'm still very much in the brainstorming stage at the moment. I'm pretty sure I want to run at least one session for Trail of Cthulhu, possibly the soon to be published adventure called A Dance in the Blood by Graham Warmsley. The buzz online has been pretty good about it so far and it sounds like it might tick the boxes. I'm also feeling increasingly confident with the GUMESHOE system from my regular game, which means the learning curve wouldn't been so steep.


However I'm also thinking about running something that is not Cthulhu related. Current ideas include: 


A Cold City adventure I've had kicking around for a while involving a trail of murdered ex-Nazis. I've got the start and the ending of this one worked out in my mind, but I've got to figure the rest out before I can write it.


Something for the Esoterrorists set in old Wellingtown itself. This one has the advantage of using the GUMSHOE system, and I also really like the idea of setting it in Wellington for both the locals and the out of towners. In fact I've got a great idea in mind for the first scene at Wellington airport. I haven't written a word for this, so would have to figure out a story to go with the premise.


A Spirit of the Century game, which I haven't got anything more for than a vague inkling that I would like to run it. I like the concept of a 'high pulp' game and the fact that it's designed for pick up play, but I don't even own this one yet, so it would require some investment.


So those are the ideas so far, though there are still other options around including something for the Doctor Who RPG, though I'm probably just looking for an excuse to buy the books. I'm going to use this blog to record how my decision making progress goes and, if nothing else, the more adventure I write up, the better I'll get at them.

Dr Strangeplot: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love my Players

I have been thinking a little lately as Empire State Secrets progresses, and as I read more GUMESHOE related material, about how my approach to running games has changed over the years. The moment of 'self-awareness' really dawned on me last weekend when I was running a session for the Thursday night (soon to be the Monday night) group.

When I was younger and less experienced, I remember getting frustrated or disappointed if the game didn't proceed down the carefully crafted plot line that I or the published story author had devised. If my players wanted to do something outside what was anticipated, which happened quite often players being players, it would throw me a little. If scenes were jumped or missed out, I would feel a little like I had failed. I would have 'succeeded' if I had carried out the scenario successfully and my players would have a good time accordingly.

As I have run more games and written more stories, I have to come to redefine success in running a game. I am successful not if I tick off all the different parts of the story (like a compliance document), but if my players have a good time. If that means they decide to jump certain parts of the story or bulldoze through my plot, that's fine, as long as I can run it without missing a beat so they still enjoy themselves. This involves being way more relaxed about how the game goes and to stop worrying if things don't go as planned.

An example of this comes from Thursday's game where the characters were investigating the kidnapping of a child from a wealthy family. The story, as written, pretty much has the characters doing waiting around until the money drop before they follow the kidnappers back to the hideout at the docks. However, thanks to the proactive investigating of one character, I decided the location of the hideout would be found sooner, thereby jumping all the scene relating to the money dump.

Now I could have 'blocked' his progress in order to keep to the story as written, but that would have felt really artificial as part of the story. So I relaxed, rolled with it and let the story take its course. The result was a really good scene that felt organic, natural and something my players seemed to really enjoy.

Taking a more laid back approach to running game has been helped by using the GUMSHOE system, which is a style of play that I am coming more and more comfortable with and fond of. The focus is on giving the players clues for the story without getting bogged down in the mechanics of how they get them. This is articulated well by another blogger sharing his thoughts about Trail of Cthulhu: 

So now I don’t worry about whether a clue would be better found by Evidence Collection or by Forensics. I just see that a character is looking where they should to find a clue, and give it to them. I keep a list of what abilities the different characters have, and I phrase the evidence in keeping with whichever of the abilities makes the most sense given the information. If they’re looking for more, I’ll ask for a spend from a particular ability, or I’ll ask them what ability they’re using to get more information.

The two important things are that the clues get found and that the players enjoy themselves.

Once the characters have the clues, it then up to them to decide how they want to proceed with them. This take a lot of stress out of running a game, as I don't have to quickly shoe horn another scene in if the players miss their roll, since plot advancement isn't dependent on dice. It also means I can spend more time on the stuff I really enjoy, like setting the mood, building the back story or working on the plot.

The total result being that my perspective on running games has changed, in my opinion for the better, which has in turn enhanced my enjoy of the process and I think that of my players.

On an unrelated topic, this weekend I watched the recent Sherlock Holmes movie that came out here in New Zealand about 6 months ago. I really enjoyed it as a movie, but what struck me how very similar it was to a roleplaying game, from the plot to the pacing. It also re-sparked my interest in running a Gaslight Cthulhu game again, so watch this space.