And here's Chapter 12. The title comes from something my Dad said about roleplaying games. "Building castles in the clouds is fine, until you try to collect rent."
I don't know if he was quoting someone or if he came up with that himself. He does like to quote people and he seems to have at least one for every occasion.
Anyway, I thought this chapter it'd be fun to focus on The Game, thus the chapter title.
I don't know if he was quoting someone or if he came up with that himself. He does like to quote people and he seems to have at least one for every occasion.
Anyway, I thought this chapter it'd be fun to focus on The Game, thus the chapter title.
12 comments:
It's been a while since I last ran a game. Despite having suffered GM burnout (to the point that I suffered sudden-onset migraines whenever I even thought about starting up a new game - no longer happening, fortunately), I miss running games. Hopefully I'll be able to start up a small group; I just wish I could find a fourth player. Ah well.
Rob H.
@Robert: I miss gaming, too. Never been a GM, though I tried a couple times with my sisters. Didn't work, at all. One of these days I gotta get Dad to run a campaign again, or maybe find a local group that's willing to focus on the *roleplaying* aspect rather than just hack-and-slash-grab-the-loot.
It's not quite a quote - more of a close paraphrase of what someone in the 'college gang' said.
@Dad: Cool. I should've figured it'd go back to that time.
Unfortunately I lost my enjoyment of playing in these games after having several GMs that either were vindictive and disliked me or were just not good at it. It's become a control issue unfortunately; I enjoy having that control (and let's face it, I also enjoy being six people at the same time and trying to carry on conversations with them all!) and tend to get bored and twitchy when someone else is at the wheel.
Of course, one other problem with gaming these days is that the people I game with know so many stories that half of the time the game descends into "remember when..." stories. ^^;;
Rob H.
@Robert: Yeah, all of that can be some major problems. Oh man, that last one would be just annoying. Yeah, they're probably fun stories, but come on! There's a game going on right now!
Too many people these days are so entrenched in video game culture, it seems, that pencil-and-paper role playing is just too boring and time consuming for them. Why spend hours using your imagination to accumulate a little wealth and experience when "World of Warcraft" and the tens of thousands of hit points and infinite re-spawns it offers is only a router away?
I think that's why I gave up RPGs in favor of writing a long time ago (although I do still consult RPG handbooks as a sort of loose source of inspiration). My imagination is no longer limited by what the players are willing to accept. And I don't have to worry about things descending into a "Monty Python and the Holy Grail", "Princess Bride" and/or "Labyrinth" quote marathon.
@Dan: There may be something to that. lol Thankfully, I never experienced that particular descent into quotes. Though I do seem to recall a few references to cartoon shows here and there.
@Brian - we must have run with similar college crowds.
Our version of a similar saying went something like this: "The difference between neurosis and psychosis -- neurosis is building castles in the sky, psychosis is trying to move in..."
peace,
Zach
Hey, sorry for my ignorance, but what is GM?
@Journo: GM=Game Master. Kinda like saying Dungeon Master, but without the (tm) symbol.
@Brigid: Oh, right.
Post a Comment