Post by Barnaby Cuthbert on Aug 5, 2011 14:56:23 GMT -8
Things can escalate so quickly in political games like the ones in the oWoD.
In The Beginning there was only Cowboys and Indians.
Kid 1/Kid 2: BANGBANG!
Kid 1: Bang, You're Dead!
Kid 2: No, I'm not! You are!
Kid 1: No I said Bang FIRST!
Kid 2: No I did!, You're a liar!
Kid 1: I'm not a liar! You just can't hear cuz your ears are full of mud!
Kid 2: MOM! He's cheating!
Kid 1: No HE IS!
MOM: You both knock it off or you can go to your rooms!
Kid 1/Kid 2: MOOOM!?
Kid 1: I can't *believe* you told mom! Crybaby!
Kid 2: Shut up cheater!
and on and on...
Eventually silence covers the room when Mom threatens to bring Dad into this (or the other way around perhaps).
Oh for the simple life of a kid. It's more complicated now in some ways, playing make-believe, but in others, it's the same old story. We're still playing make-believe. Maybe it's not Cowboys and Indians, maybe it's Primogen and Sheriff, Ventrue and Brujah, Warder and Gatekeeper, Orphan and Hermetic, Sidhe and Commoner.
Whatever the game, there are rules, both spoken and implied.
Whoever says bang first wins.
We know that. Nobody really had to teach us that more than once. If 'they' have the gaul, the unmitigated gaul to shank you first, that's it, they've won! Crap. Time to create a new Indian, cowboy.
But we've added all these steps between the shanking, because when it comes right down to it, 'Bang, you're dead' is a short term thrill. Some gamers live for it. Shooting, being killed and respawning hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of times in deathmatches, using handguns, missiles, rifles and rockets. Over and over and over.
Bang, you're dead.
Bang, ya got me.
Bang, you're dead.
Bang, ya got me.
I'll admit, I like it sometimes. I can't play for days and days in that environment like my old roomate, but I like the odd fragfest here and there. And usually it goes something like:
Bang, ya got me. X58
Bang, you're dead. X18
But I don't get that pissed off when it happens as long as gradually that discrepancy starts to improve - even a *little* improvement is ok, as long as I feel I'm not actively getting worse. Still I would be lying if I said it didn't irk me to be taken out by the same sniper over and over and over from across the map. And campers, don't get me started.
Eventually, that kind of game wears thin with me, though I may come back to it from time to time to blow off a little steam. I've been a soldier/halo dude/whatever enough times that I want to do something a little more immersive, a little more creative.
That's where role-playing comes in.
PvP running and gunning games add a little something between 'Bang' and 'You're dead', but not a ton. A simulated environment, a list of possible weapons, perhaps a list of achievements to collect. 100 kills with the Pulse Rifle, whee... And maybe I can play Stab, you're dead! Or even GRENADE! You're Esplode!
LARP Adds a LOT more in between bang and you're dead, and some of them you even start out dead or MORE alive than most! My things get interesting. Instead, there's no simulated environment - rather the greatest sim ever in existance - the imagination!
Yeah LARP is cool. As games go, it's pretty much right up there with the most creative kind of play you can do. I look at LARP like a room with endless doors. Gamers that like simulations can key into aspects of it, theatre actors can explore characterization, business, storytellers can examine mood and theme and a never-ending set of ever-moving characters that act in realistic ways. There's political drama, war drama, tactics, dealing with the underpinnings of the human soul and basic questions about authority, morality, vice, justice. I could literally talk about larp for... well, 15 years so far.
God I'm old.
Anyway it's awesome. Larp, is fucking awsome. LARPers on the other hand...
No, still awesome.
But not always too bright.
Because they forget sometimes that they are playing Bang! You're dead!
But in-between Bang!/Stab!/Politically Ruin! and You're Dead!/Your Death is Restrictive!/DOUBLE Death!/You're in Charge Sucker! there are lots of things, court meetings and influence moves, cool powers to buy and Stuff to amass.
There's certainly more effort involved. More iterations. More ego.
Ah, and there we are. It all boils down to where we started.
So fucking get over it!
Ah... no.
Sorry.
Sort of the core of who we are. No getting over that, I'm afraid.
Let's go deeper.
You can DIE.
I know right?
Fuck.
Bang. You're Dead.
Imagine the impact that first had on you back as a kid.
Yeah, well, you didn't understand death. But you LOST the GAME.
Wait what? There's no real getting around the impact of it all? Play, Ego, maybe even mortality? It's all tied up together?
Sometimes in someways says I. Enough to make games 'real' in the way that it can really mean something to us to lose them, or do poorly at them.
This is some serious shit, this playing around.
But Man! You say, Man in his infinite wisdom is capable of learning and moving past his base desires and ego and... you know can be *better* than that!
Yeah, but it's hard. Maybe ultimately harder than you think. I try, you try. I'm sort successful some of the time. And because of that I also try to give others a break when they screw up and aren't their best selves.
Cuz Bang! You're Dead!... isn't the end of the world, even when it sucks.
Please, get that.
<3
Schetzle
In The Beginning there was only Cowboys and Indians.
Kid 1/Kid 2: BANGBANG!
Kid 1: Bang, You're Dead!
Kid 2: No, I'm not! You are!
Kid 1: No I said Bang FIRST!
Kid 2: No I did!, You're a liar!
Kid 1: I'm not a liar! You just can't hear cuz your ears are full of mud!
Kid 2: MOM! He's cheating!
Kid 1: No HE IS!
MOM: You both knock it off or you can go to your rooms!
Kid 1/Kid 2: MOOOM!?
Kid 1: I can't *believe* you told mom! Crybaby!
Kid 2: Shut up cheater!
and on and on...
Eventually silence covers the room when Mom threatens to bring Dad into this (or the other way around perhaps).
Oh for the simple life of a kid. It's more complicated now in some ways, playing make-believe, but in others, it's the same old story. We're still playing make-believe. Maybe it's not Cowboys and Indians, maybe it's Primogen and Sheriff, Ventrue and Brujah, Warder and Gatekeeper, Orphan and Hermetic, Sidhe and Commoner.
Whatever the game, there are rules, both spoken and implied.
Whoever says bang first wins.
We know that. Nobody really had to teach us that more than once. If 'they' have the gaul, the unmitigated gaul to shank you first, that's it, they've won! Crap. Time to create a new Indian, cowboy.
But we've added all these steps between the shanking, because when it comes right down to it, 'Bang, you're dead' is a short term thrill. Some gamers live for it. Shooting, being killed and respawning hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of times in deathmatches, using handguns, missiles, rifles and rockets. Over and over and over.
Bang, you're dead.
Bang, ya got me.
Bang, you're dead.
Bang, ya got me.
I'll admit, I like it sometimes. I can't play for days and days in that environment like my old roomate, but I like the odd fragfest here and there. And usually it goes something like:
Bang, ya got me. X58
Bang, you're dead. X18
But I don't get that pissed off when it happens as long as gradually that discrepancy starts to improve - even a *little* improvement is ok, as long as I feel I'm not actively getting worse. Still I would be lying if I said it didn't irk me to be taken out by the same sniper over and over and over from across the map. And campers, don't get me started.
Eventually, that kind of game wears thin with me, though I may come back to it from time to time to blow off a little steam. I've been a soldier/halo dude/whatever enough times that I want to do something a little more immersive, a little more creative.
That's where role-playing comes in.
PvP running and gunning games add a little something between 'Bang' and 'You're dead', but not a ton. A simulated environment, a list of possible weapons, perhaps a list of achievements to collect. 100 kills with the Pulse Rifle, whee... And maybe I can play Stab, you're dead! Or even GRENADE! You're Esplode!
LARP Adds a LOT more in between bang and you're dead, and some of them you even start out dead or MORE alive than most! My things get interesting. Instead, there's no simulated environment - rather the greatest sim ever in existance - the imagination!
Yeah LARP is cool. As games go, it's pretty much right up there with the most creative kind of play you can do. I look at LARP like a room with endless doors. Gamers that like simulations can key into aspects of it, theatre actors can explore characterization, business, storytellers can examine mood and theme and a never-ending set of ever-moving characters that act in realistic ways. There's political drama, war drama, tactics, dealing with the underpinnings of the human soul and basic questions about authority, morality, vice, justice. I could literally talk about larp for... well, 15 years so far.
God I'm old.
Anyway it's awesome. Larp, is fucking awsome. LARPers on the other hand...
No, still awesome.
But not always too bright.
Because they forget sometimes that they are playing Bang! You're dead!
But in-between Bang!/Stab!/Politically Ruin! and You're Dead!/Your Death is Restrictive!/DOUBLE Death!/You're in Charge Sucker! there are lots of things, court meetings and influence moves, cool powers to buy and Stuff to amass.
There's certainly more effort involved. More iterations. More ego.
Ah, and there we are. It all boils down to where we started.
So fucking get over it!
Ah... no.
Sorry.
Sort of the core of who we are. No getting over that, I'm afraid.
Let's go deeper.
You can DIE.
I know right?
Fuck.
Bang. You're Dead.
Imagine the impact that first had on you back as a kid.
Yeah, well, you didn't understand death. But you LOST the GAME.
Wait what? There's no real getting around the impact of it all? Play, Ego, maybe even mortality? It's all tied up together?
Sometimes in someways says I. Enough to make games 'real' in the way that it can really mean something to us to lose them, or do poorly at them.
This is some serious shit, this playing around.
But Man! You say, Man in his infinite wisdom is capable of learning and moving past his base desires and ego and... you know can be *better* than that!
Yeah, but it's hard. Maybe ultimately harder than you think. I try, you try. I'm sort successful some of the time. And because of that I also try to give others a break when they screw up and aren't their best selves.
Cuz Bang! You're Dead!... isn't the end of the world, even when it sucks.
Please, get that.
<3
Schetzle
