Ugh, moral nausea seeping into my hobby-thoughts

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Ravenloft played that way- yeah, I could see that getting heavy. I'd talk to your players, let them know that the game you're running is far too depressing to you with all the things that are currently going on in the world and would like to either put it on pause for a bit, or just end it. If you wanted, you could run something a lot more upbeat and lighthearted.

Superheroes can be a good choice, especially if you model more towards supers helping people in need instead of just being there to fight villains. Black Vulmea had a good post about the game he ran where the focus was on saving people. RPG's are basically rules for conflict resolution, so what do you want your conflicts to be? In my real life, there's loads of conflict- sometimes feels like more than I can handle- but I have to tell you, the amount of physical conflict where I'm running around fighting for my life in combat is thankfully zero. So there's a ton of other stuff you can focus on.
 
Shipyard Locked said:
In no particular order:
- To amuse my friends
- To master an art form
- To simulate genres I enjoy soaking in
- To play out interesting strategic and tactical scenarios
- To give my brain something to mull over when the only thing I can do is think
- To save money (yes really, this activity is much cheaper than other things I would like to do)
- To enjoy the praise I receive from others for a job well done



I can get behind that. My current Ravenloft campaign is explicitly about giving the players the free will to decide if they are going to do good, wind up in a state of purgatory or end up damned. I'm not a believer, but I've leaned very hard into Christian themes for this one, something that regularly takes my secular New York crew by surprise.

Like I said however, this has required me to write and then perform some pretty awful people for the player characters to work against. I'm pleased to note the players have mostly made good moral choices (as defined by Gothic horror tropes), but I'm still stuck inhabiting the Evil (capital E) people until I wrap this up in about six or seven sessions.

I'm reminded of Warhammer 40k's solitaires, eldars who must perform the role of Slaneesh in their culture's epic plays. It's not something done lightly, but someone has to so the others can shine by contrast.

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(Shit, is this starting to get unbearably pretentious? Let me know.)
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The thing about a Solitaire is that the Harlequins don’t do Masques about The Fall very often. GMs have to play the bad guys every weekend (or whatever).

Sounds like you might need some Paranoia, or Boris and Natasha Evil for a while, twirl your dastardly moustache and tie Polly to the train tracks.
 
Shipyard Locked said:
- To simulate genres I enjoy soaking in
- To play out interesting strategic and tactical scenarios
- To give my brain something to mull over when the only thing I can do is think
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I'm right there with ya on these three.

For me, roleplaying games are like creating my own "What If . . . ?" comics.

What_If_Vol_2_49.jpg
 
Yeah, just as the official Marvel Universe is designated 616, my games take place in universe 919. I approach it like an animated series adaption, insofar is everything is set to ground zero, with elements of the MU in their most archetypal forms introduced as appropriate to the campaign centered around the player characters
 
Did they ever say why they chose the Number of the Beast as the mainstream Marvel number?
 
Trippy said:
That said, I only managed to read Underground for the first time a few years ago and thought ‘man, they really got this quite close’.
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It's only natural, Cyberpunk was played straight and Underground was low comedy.

AsenRG said:
On TBP? I'd have thought that the chorus would be on your side, actually:shock:!
And just to be clear, I think your idea isn't exactly correct, but that's besides the scope of this thread, nor is it a topic I particularly want to rehash:thumbsup:.
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It would have been like twenty years ago :0 And, no, the idea wasn't entirely correct.
 
Some of my players have talked wistfully about going back to my Genius campaign so they can punch Nazis. No moral ambiguity, no self-exploration, just kicking ubermenschen ass. Which would be fine, I guess. The next villains I planned to introduce were a mad AI that wants to make the whole world lactose-intolerant and an octopus crime boss with a smartifying brain-implant powered by a lawnmower engine, but they won't get stale on the shelf.
 
Regarding the OP, some months ago I had a similar dilemma. I don't know what the answer is. For my part, one thing I have resolved to do is be more careful and not create "bad guys" or "barbarians" that are analogs of disenfranchised real world peoples. So my Praxians in my Glorantha are definitely not based on "Indians." I also really don't treat them as lesser. They are the power of Prax while the more European Sartarites are the power of Sartar, all subject to the maybe sort of Roman (but not really) Lunar occupation. I don't know if that works, but it works for me.
 
OK, so, I'm going to suggest watching this video:



This is the exploration of a film that is full of high-stakes conflict, where there are no villains, simply different points of view. In other words, it's not necessary, or even diserable or realistic, to have situation where it's Good vs Evil, or for the GM to be stuck playing out malicious and immoral characters as a foil for the "heroes".

evil.JPG
 
There's always DragonRaid. :dice:

Or Phoenix Command a Bake Sale. ("All the maths..." - :shock:)

Or you can have combat resolved by in-real-life pillow fights instead of Jenga towers! :evil: On second thought, that might be too therapeutic.:beat: ("And it is not social distancing either." - :worried:)
 
spittingimage said:
Some of my players have talked wistfully about going back to my Genius campaign so they can punch Nazis. No moral ambiguity, no self-exploration, just kicking ubermenschen ass.
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If we're being honest here, the average soldier in a wartime "bad guy" regime is some poor asshole who was forcibly conscripted. Most of the dudes in the wartime Wehrmacht, Red Army, KPA, and NVA never had a choice in the matter.
 
Brock Savage said:
If we're being honest here, the average soldier in a wartime "bad guy" regime is some poor asshole who was forcibly conscripted. Most of the dudes in the wartime Wehrmacht, Red Army, KPA, and NVA never had a choice in the matter.
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Hell, even a third of the Waffen-SS was conscripted. They were treated as soldiers after the war instead of the others, who were treated as criminals.
 
Brock Savage said:
If we're being honest here, the average soldier in a wartime "bad guy" regime is some poor asshole who was forcibly conscripted. Most of the dudes in the wartime Wehrmacht, Red Army, KPA, and NVA never had a choice in the matter.
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In the game universe, the antagonists are the personified fear of fascism combined with some odd notions about Nazi mysticism, not conscripts who had the bad luck to be born inside the wrong borders. Brutes and sadists, every last one of them. They come equipped with pain-rays and jetpacks.
 
ffilz said:
Regarding the OP, some months ago I had a similar dilemma. I don't know what the answer is. For my part, one thing I have resolved to do is be more careful and not create "bad guys" or "barbarians" that are analogs of disenfranchised real world peoples. So my Praxians in my Glorantha are definitely not based on "Indians." I also really don't treat them as lesser. They are the power of Prax while the more European Sartarites are the power of Sartar, all subject to the maybe sort of Roman (but not really) Lunar occupation. I don't know if that works, but it works for me.
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I’ve decided to stop playing NPCs that are so self-centered that they believe that what they do at their gaming table could possibly affect any real world group in one way or another, and if they did think they could help some real world person in some way, would be honest enough to admit that altering the way they play a game that they’re going to play anyway is the absolute last way to accomplish it.
 
spittingimage said:
In the game universe, the antagonists are the personified fear of fascism combined with some odd notions about Nazi mysticism, not conscripts who had the bad luck to be born inside the wrong borders. Brutes and sadists, every last one of them. They come equipped with pain-rays and jetpacks.
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So, basically, science fantasy orcs:thumbsup:?
 
I can identify with this and feel for you, OP. My solution was fantasy with lots of undead, then fantasy with lots of politics, then DCC with lots of comedy, and superhero stuff without the sorts of villains that require the moral calculus of "should we kill this fecker for the good of humanity?".

On a related note, I can't run modern-day games anymore without setting them in some sort of modern-day that deviates massively from our post-2008 world.
 
Shipyard Locked said:
I'm reminded of Warhammer 40k's solitaires, eldars who must perform the role of Slaneesh in their culture's epic plays. It's not something done lightly, but someone has to so the others can shine by contrast.
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I've taken a couple stabs at writing a setting that's like 40k with its magic and intra-war technology but without the endless awfulness. I don't know, almost more of a rebuttal than a knockoff or parody. That's not to say it's without fascism or evil people but there's not that evil is the only way for humanity to win. A setting where humanity wins by being good, I guess.

I look at all the companies producing GW knockoff figurines and I wonder why they haven't created a unified setting that they all exist in for the purposes of giving themselves a degree of separation.
 
Voros said:
Yeah I love it. It is authentically disturbing too. Something I didn't expect.
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I think it's because it was printed by Marvel UK. Who had much less oversight and were basically staffed by guys who cut their teeth on 2000AD. Which in the 70s and 80s was about as far removed from American comics as you can get.
 
I rely heavily on enemies who are either mindless or unambiguously inimical to mankind. Dungeon vermin, undead, constructs, beasts, and Mythos creatures are solid. Fighting humans is a BIG DEAL and I am very clear in explaining to my players that humans are going to be the most difficult enemies in more ways than one.
 
Brock Savage said:
Fighting humans is a BIG DEAL and I am very clear in explaining to my players that humans are going to be the most difficult enemies in more ways than one.
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These days when my PCs kill humans (or 'demi-humans') for the first time I make a big deal out of it. If this happens in an area where there is a local authority, they are questioned by 'cops' and have to justify themselves to the 'judge'. This means that almost every time they are in a city they end up meeting the local law enforcement. But yea go ahead and kill all the undead and non-humanoid 'monsters' that you want.
 
arjunstc said:
* tend to agree *

To think it all started when they wanted to make a computer game with identical factions but with different skins.
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Orcs were still assholes for the first two, weren't they? It was the cancelled adventure game, Lord of the Clans, where they developed the Orc background (Which fed into WC3 and WoW).
 
arjunstc said:
These days when my PCs kill humans (or 'demi-humans') for the first time I make a big deal out of it. If this happens in an area where there is a local authority, they are questioned by 'cops' and have to justify themselves to the 'judge'. This means that almost every time they are in a city they end up meeting the local law enforcement. But yea go ahead and kill all the undead and non-humanoid 'monsters' that you want.
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You take some of the more railroady modules like the Time of Troubles for FR and run it for the pure humor value. IE, the players try to get off the train, but nothing works. And allow them to seriously sass all the major NPCS. And. get. away.with.it.
 
spittingimage said:
Just as you say. I have no idea how D&D orcs got rehabilitated into today's hotheaded but noble savages.
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I don't think it began with Warcraft (Warhammer Fantasy?) but it definitely created the definitive approach for that type of orc.
 
Elder Scrolls maybe? It's a plot point in Daggerfall that Orcs become seen as a "people". Savage but noble.
 
robertsconley said:
I don't think it began with Warcraft (Warhammer Fantasy?) but it definitely created the definitive approach for that type of orc.
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definitely not Warhammer, orcs there are a type of fungus.

But Warhammer did standardize orcs as having green skin.

I think it was an MMO, if not WoW, then one of the big ones, that popularized orcs as more human "noble savages" rather than straight inhuman monsters.
 
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